Progressives' Silence Doomed Edwards

(Updated below)

I was deeply saddened to learn today of the death of the Edwards candidacy. A decent man who fought for the poor and the working class, Edwards deserved a better fate from the progressive establishment whose values he represented. The endorsements are rolling in, now, some for Obama, some for Clinton. But there is an appearance of safety about those endorsements, now, choosing as some are between the last two standing in this Democratic war of attrition.

You can't endorse a candidate when there's only one left, I suppose. But the endorsements coming now, even Kennedy's, when Edwards was all but an afterthought, all but dropped out, have the appearance of picking the odds on favorite rather than philosophical alignment. Everyone likes to pick a winner, but there's something cowardly about waiting until you can endorse the candidate you feel reasonably certain will win.

Where have the progressives been during this campaign?

I admire Edward Kennedy greatly, for his service, and for his years of advancing progressive causes. But the truth is that when there were two progressive candidates in the early stages of this race, Kucinich and Edwards, Kennedy remained silent, and waited to see who was a viable candidate before putting his opinion forward.

He's not alone. John Kerry waited until it was clear his former running mate had littel chance of winning before making an endorsement. Both of Massachusetts' safe senators chose to take the easy route, choosing one of the top two candidates late in the game rather than backing a dark horse progressive early in the campaign.

Al Gore, progressive champion. A hero of mine, for sure. No endorsement.

Maybe senators and politicians feel they can't be seen backing a loser, but what's to stop the progressive movement's top pundits and bloggers? You know--the ones who routinely criticize the Democratic party for their timidity, their refusal to take a stand? Their inability to police the blue dog Dems?

Well thanks to everyone who stayed on the sidelines up till now in this campaign, the two least progressive candidates are still alive.

The progressive voices on the Internet have steadfastly avoided endorsing a candidate.

Greenwald? No endorsement.

Kos? No edorsement.

Hamsher? No endorsement.

Digby? No endorsement.

Why? They want to be able to support the eventual nominee no matter who wins. Is that what they call keeping your powder dry? As much as I admire and respect each of these writers, they sure can't be neutral among the candidates. Why not say so? Why not stand up and be counted?

As a result, I'll repeat: we are left with arguably the two least progressive candidates in the race, the two promoted by the msm because of the great storyline their battle provides. The liberal blogosphere in its silence provided no counterpoint to this narrative.

My friend Cliff Schecter, without officially endorsing a candidate, managed to state unequivocally that Chris Dodd and John Edwards were the candidates he preferred in the early going. He stood up for the progressive movement without knowing who would eventually win. And now that both are out, I fully expect Cliff to support the eventual Democratic nominee. We all know that Clinton and Obama will be far superior to anyone the GOP has to offer.

My governor, Ted Strickland, made an endorsement I didn't agree with, but at least it was early, and decisive. (He endorsed Clinton.) My friends in Ohio, the great bloggers at the Chief Source, have advocated for Obama from the very beginning. I prefer Edwards, of course, but their many readers in Akron and Ohio never doubted where they stood. And I am sure that whoever the Dem nominee is, Clinton or Obama, he or she will have the full support of many who may have intitially backed their rival. That's politics.

But I don't think they represented the best the Dems had to offer. It's too bad that so many in positions of leadership, whether an elected position or a position of leadership created by the thousands and thousands of readers who, like me, flock to their sites every day. You can't blast the Democratic Congress for failing to exert leadership, for failing to take a stand, when you aren't willing to do so yourself.

It seems to me that there are a lot of progressives out there who could have stood up and been counted for the candidates they believed in, whether Kucinich, Dodd, or Edwards. Maybe some preferred Obama or Clinton. That's fine too. But make your preference known when it matters. Not after the dust settles.

Maybe next time the progressive movement will line up behind a candidate in the early going. If they stand on the sidelines again, the progressive voices of people like Dodd, Kucinich, and Edwards will be ignored by the corporate media that picks the winners.

UPDATE: Bob Cesca says it's time for progressives to unite around a candidate. Actually, Bob, that time was months ago. But great minds and all that.