Political positions of John Edwards
Encyclopedia
Here are some of Senator John Edwards
John Edwards
Johnny Reid "John" Edwards is an American politician, who served as a U.S. Senator from North Carolina. He was the Democratic nominee for Vice President in 2004, and was a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2004 and 2008.He defeated incumbent Republican Lauch Faircloth in...

's votes and remarks on various issues.

End Poverty in 30 Years

One of Edwards' main themes as a political figure is the problem of poverty
Poverty
Poverty is the lack of a certain amount of material possessions or money. Absolute poverty or destitution is inability to afford basic human needs, which commonly includes clean and fresh water, nutrition, health care, education, clothing and shelter. About 1.7 billion people are estimated to live...

 in America. He believes that poverty can be cut by one third by 2016 and eliminated by 2036. He supports adoption of the National Academy of Science's recommendations for measuring poverty, which he claims would add 1 million people to the "poverty" class. His plan involves several tactics. These include stronger families, better schools and government-funded housing vouchers. Edwards argues in favor of creating one million housing vouchers over five years in order to place poor people in middle class neighborhoods and in areas where jobs are available. He also supports strengthening labor unions and raising the minimum wage
Minimum wage
A minimum wage is the lowest hourly, daily or monthly remuneration that employers may legally pay to workers. Equivalently, it is the lowest wage at which workers may sell their labour. Although minimum wage laws are in effect in a great many jurisdictions, there are differences of opinion about...

 to $8.40. Edwards has stated, "If we truly believe that we are all equal, then we should live together too."

College for everyone

Edwards has stated that if people agree to work part-time during their first year at a public-college, the government should pay for their tuition, books and fees.

Edwards has advocated his College for Everyone program based on proposal made in his 2004 campaign and the successful College for Everyone pilot
Pilot (experiment)
A pilot experiment, also called a pilot study, is a small scale preliminary study conducted in order to evaluate feasibility, time, cost, adverse events, and effect size in an attempt to predict an appropriate sample size and improve upon the study design prior to performance of a full-scale...

 program that Edwards and the Carolina non-profit organization
Non-profit organization
Nonprofit organization is neither a legal nor technical definition but generally refers to an organization that uses surplus revenues to achieve its goals, rather than distributing them as profit or dividends...

 Promise and Opportunity Foundation began at Greene Central High School in Snow Hill, North Carolina
Snow Hill, North Carolina
Snow Hill is a town in Greene County, North Carolina, United States. The population was 1,564 at the 2008 census. It is the county seat of Greene County and is part of the Greenville Metropolitan Area...

, a high school in rural eastern North Carolina with a high percentage of economically disadvantaged students.

Under Edwards' College for Everyone program, the government would help all qualified students pay for college tuition
Tuition
Tuition payments, known primarily as tuition in American English and as tuition fees in British English, Canadian English, Australian English, New Zealand English and Indian English, refers to a fee charged for educational instruction during higher education.Tuition payments are charged by...

, fees and books for college students who agree to work part-time
Part time
A part-time job is a form of employment that carries fewer hours per week than a full-time job. Workers are considered to be part time if they commonly work fewer than 30 or 35 hours per week...

 ten hours a week if they "complete coursework that prepares them for further education, stay out of trouble, and enroll in a participating public university
Public university
A public university is a university that is predominantly funded by public means through a national or subnational government, as opposed to private universities. A national university may or may not be considered a public university, depending on regions...

 or community college
Community college
A community college is a type of educational institution. The term can have different meanings in different countries.-Australia:Community colleges carry on the tradition of adult education, which was established in Australia around mid 19th century when evening classes were held to help adults...

." Funds would be provided for two million students.

Other aspects of the plan include strong preparation in high school, with College for Everyone students being required to complete a college-prep curriculum in high school and Edwards administration "working with school district
School district
School districts are a form of special-purpose district which serves to operate the local public primary and secondary schools.-United States:...

s to strengthen high school curricula."

The most significant part of the College for Everyone is its proposed overhaul of the student loan
Student loan
A student loan is designed to help students pay for university tuition, books, and living expenses. It may differ from other types of loans in that the interest rate may be substantially lower and the repayment schedule may be deferred while the student is still in education...

 program. Edwards has called for an end to large federal subsidies
Subsidy
A subsidy is an assistance paid to a business or economic sector. Most subsidies are made by the government to producers or distributors in an industry to prevent the decline of that industry or an increase in the prices of its products or simply to encourage it to hire more labor A subsidy (also...

 for banks that make student loans, which would free up $6 billion. Instead, subsidies would be replaced with loans directly from the U.S. Department of Education
United States Department of Education
The United States Department of Education, also referred to as ED or the ED for Education Department, is a Cabinet-level department of the United States government...

, "receiving loans that have very similar terms but are far less expensive for taxpayers."

Energy Independence and Stopping Global warming

John Edwards' positions on energy are documented on his 2008 Presidential Campaign website.

In March 2007 he was the first presidential candidate to make his campaign “carbon neutral
Carbon neutral
Carbon neutrality, or having a net zero carbon footprint, refers to achieving net zero carbon emissions by balancing a measured amount of carbon released with an equivalent amount sequestered or offset, or buying enough carbon credits to make up the difference...

.” He started buying carbon offsets to reduce his carbon emissions and having his offices buy recycled paper products.

One of the main focuses of his campaign was fighting global warming
Global warming
Global warming refers to the rising average temperature of Earth's atmosphere and oceans and its projected continuation. In the last 100 years, Earth's average surface temperature increased by about with about two thirds of the increase occurring over just the last three decades...

. He has said "Why has America not addressed global warming in a serious way? There's a very simple answer for that. Oil companies, power companies, gas companies and their lobbyists in Washington, D.C." He voted against drilling in the Arctic five times, and supports the standard that would require renewable sources to be the source of 10 percent of America's electricity by 2020.

Edwards endorses the widespread goal of 80% reductions of greenhouse gas emissions below 1990 levels by the year 2050. He has denounced the Bush administration for not signing the Kyoto treaty and supports the McCain-Lieberman bill to establish a cap-and-trade system to reduce carbon dioxide emissions. This would involve capping emissions, reducing the cap every year, and auctioning off the right to emit a certain quantity of greenhouse gases. He would then use this estimated $10 billion to fund research for alternative energy sources, in an effort to end the United States reliance on imported foreign oil.

Abortion

Edwards supports legal access to abortion
Abortion
Abortion is defined as the termination of pregnancy by the removal or expulsion from the uterus of a fetus or embryo prior to viability. An abortion can occur spontaneously, in which case it is usually called a miscarriage, or it can be purposely induced...

. He received a 100% rating from NARAL each year he was in the Senate, indicating a pro-choice voting record. He also supports public funding for abortion services for low-income women. Edwards issued a press statement saying he was "saddened" by the passage of the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act
Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act
The Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003 is a United States law prohibiting a form of late-term abortion that the Act calls "partial-birth abortion", often referred to in medical literature as intact dilation and extraction...

, and described this law as "offensive to women." Although absent from the official vote, Edwards had voted against the bill in previous versions.

LGBT issues

During his 2004 Vice Presidential
Vice President of the United States
The Vice President of the United States is the holder of a public office created by the United States Constitution. The Vice President, together with the President of the United States, is indirectly elected by the people, through the Electoral College, to a four-year term...

 run, Edwards stated he was opposed to same-sex marriage
Same-sex marriage
Same-sex marriage is marriage between two persons of the same biological sex or social gender. Supporters of legal recognition for same-sex marriage typically refer to such recognition as marriage equality....

. In late December 2006, in an interview with George Stephanopoulos
George Stephanopoulos
George Robert Stephanopoulos is an American television journalist and a former political advisor.Stephanopoulos is most well known as the chief political correspondent for ABC News – the news division of the broadcast television network ABC – and a co-anchor of ABC News's morning news...

 of ABC News
ABC News
ABC News is the news gathering and broadcasting division of American broadcast television network ABC, a subsidiary of The Walt Disney Company...

, Edwards said, "Do I believe they should have the right to marry? I'm just not there yet..." Edwards opposes a constitutional amendment
Federal Marriage Amendment
The Federal Marriage Amendment H.J. Res. 56 was a proposed amendment to the United States Constitution which would have limited marriage in the United States to unions of one man and one woman...

 banning same-sex marriage, preferring to leave that decision up to individual states. He supports the repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA). He does support letting states decide on civil union
Civil union
A civil union, also referred to as a civil partnership, is a legally recognized form of partnership similar to marriage. Beginning with Denmark in 1989, civil unions under one name or another have been established by law in many developed countries in order to provide same-sex couples rights,...

s and partnership
Domestic partnership
A domestic partnership is a legal or personal relationship between two individuals who live together and share a common domestic life but are neither joined by marriage nor a civil union...

 benefits.

Immigration

Edwards supported the expansion of the H-1B visa
H-1B visa
The H-1B is a non-immigrant visa in the United States under the Immigration and Nationality Act, section 101. It allows U.S. employers to temporarily employ foreign workers in specialty occupations...

 program to increase the number of work visas for immigrant workers. Edwards supports expanding legal immigration to the United States while working with Mexico
Mexico
The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...

 to provide better border security and stop illegal trafficking.

On February 7, 2007 Edwards said in a Cox News Service Q&A that "We want to change the immigration system, so people can get on the path to citizenship."

Civil liberties

Edwards voted in favor of the 2001 version of the USA PATRIOT Act
USA PATRIOT Act
The USA PATRIOT Act is an Act of the U.S. Congress that was signed into law by President George W. Bush on October 26, 2001...

 along with all but one senator, Russ Feingold
Russ Feingold
Russell Dana "Russ" Feingold is an American politician from the U.S. state of Wisconsin. He served as a Democratic party member of the U.S. Senate from 1993 to 2011. From 1983 to 1993, Feingold was a Wisconsin State Senator representing the 27th District.He is a recipient of the John F...

 of Wisconsin
Wisconsin
Wisconsin is a U.S. state located in the north-central United States and is part of the Midwest. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michigan to the northeast, and Lake Superior to the north. Wisconsin's capital is...

. He subsequently criticized the Bush administration for "abusing its powers in implementing the [Patriot Act]." Edwards was no longer in the Senate when the Patriot Act was reauthorized.

Cannabis legalization

Edwards has said he is against the legalization of recreational Cannabis. He currently supports legal use of marijuana for medical purposes. He said that if given doctors' approval, seriously ill patients should be allowed to use marijuana.

Health care

On February 5, 2007, Edwards unveiled his plan for universal health care. The plan subsidizes health insurance purchases for poorer Americans, requires that all Americans purchase health care, "requires that everybody get preventive care," and requires employers to offer health insurance through the Medicare
Medicare (United States)
Medicare is a social insurance program administered by the United States government, providing health insurance coverage to people who are aged 65 and over; to those who are under 65 and are permanently physically disabled or who have a congenital physical disability; or to those who meet other...

 system as one option for their workers. Since Medicare has lower administrative costs — under 4%, versus 20% or more for many HMOs
Health maintenance organization
A health maintenance organization is an organization that provides managed care for health insurance contracts in the United States as a liaison with health care providers...

 — Edwards believes that individuals will be able to save on health care by using the public option. While it is not a single-payer plan, the plan states that "over time, the system may evolve toward a single-payer approach if individuals and businesses prefer the public plan." and make Medicare the de facto national health program.

Edwards said "The bottom line is we're asking everybody to share in the responsibility of making health care work in this country. Employers, those who are in the medical insurance business, employees, the American people — everyone will have to contribute in order to make this work." The plan includes methods for cutting costs in the health care system and creation of revenue sources.

Cost Containment

There are six ways in which Edwards proposes to reduce costs in the health care system.
  1. Help doctors deliver the best care by researching improvements in health care delivery and disseminating best-practices information.
  2. Invest in preventive care. Require citizens to obtain preventative care; reward citizens who meet "healthy living" standards.
  3. Allow patients to review a hospital's or doctor's performance.
  4. Work for environmental and health justice by reducing pollution, especially in low-income/minority neighborhoods and support translation services.
  5. Improve productivity with information technology.
  6. Protect patients against dangerous medicines by strengthening the FDA and restricting advertising of drugs.

Revenue sources

The total public cost of the plan would be $90–$120 billion per year, paid for by eliminating the 2001 tax cuts for individuals earning more than $200,000 per year. Employers would be required to either cover their employees or to pay a payroll tax that will be used to partially fund regional health insurance pools (called "Health Markets") that are overseen by the federal government. Individuals who are not covered by their employers or by an expanded Medicaid program (covering individuals and families with incomes up to 250% of the poverty level) or Medicare will be required to purchase insurance from these Health Markets. Insurance companies must compete to win the right to be one of the providers in these Health Markets and must provide full comprehensive care (including mental health parity). In addition, one of the insurance plans will be directly provided by the federal government (similar to, but separate from Medicare). If a majority of individuals choose to purchase their insurance from the government plan, Edwards has stated that this could eventually lead to a single-payer health care system. In addition, there will also be a broad subsidy for those individuals who have to purchase insurance on their own. The subsidy is given on a sliding scale to individuals and families making up to roughly $100,000 per year (this is a significantly larger subsidy than is provided in the Massachusetts health care plan, another mandated insurance program).

War on Terrorism

Edwards has criticized the handling of the War on Terrorism
War on Terrorism
The War on Terror is a term commonly applied to an international military campaign led by the United States and the United Kingdom with the support of other North Atlantic Treaty Organisation as well as non-NATO countries...

 by the Bush Administration. Edwards feels that the War on Terrorism was misnamed: "It is now clear that George Bush's misnamed 'War on Terror' has backfired — and is now part of the problem."

He went on later to say, "The War on Terror is a slogan designed only for politics, not a strategy to make America safe. It's a bumper sticker, not a plan."

Iraq and the Middle East

Edwards voted for the 2002 Iraq War Resolution, and was one of 16 Senators to co-sponsor an early version of that bill, Joe Lieberman
Joe Lieberman
Joseph Isadore "Joe" Lieberman is the senior United States Senator from Connecticut. A former member of the Democratic Party, he was the party's nominee for Vice President in the 2000 election. Currently an independent, he remains closely affiliated with the party.Born in Stamford, Connecticut,...

's S.J Res 46, which was not brought to the floor for a vote. Three years after the war began, in November 2005, Edwards said that the decision to go to war in Iraq was a mistake. He apologized for his vote, saying that the intelligence reports which led to the decision were "deeply flawed and, in some cases, manipulated to fit a political agenda." He favors gradual troop withdrawal and concurrent training of Iraqi troops, as well as removing American contractors, instead awarding such reconstruction contracts to Iraqi businesses to promote the Iraqi economy and reduce unemployment in Iraq.

On January 14, 2007 Edwards spoke at New York City's Riverside Church
Riverside Church
The Riverside Church in the City of New York is an interdenominational church in New York City, famous for its elaborate Neo-Gothic architecture—which includes the world's largest tuned carillon bell...

 as keynote speaker at a Martin Luther King Day commemoration. In the speech Edwards criticized silence on the "escalation of the war in Iraq," reminding people about King's vocal opposition to the Vietnam War forty years earlier.

In a February 2007 appearance on Meet the Press, Edwards told Tim Russert
Tim Russert
Timothy John "Tim" Russert was an American television journalist and lawyer who appeared for more than 16 years as the longest-serving moderator of NBC's Meet the Press. He was a senior vice president at NBC News, Washington bureau chief and also hosted the eponymous CNBC/MSNBC weekend interview...

, "over time, when I reflected on what I thought was going to be necessary going forward, to have some moral foundation to work on issues like poverty and genocide, things that I care deeply about, I could no longer defend this vote. It was pretty simple. And I got to the place I felt like I had to say it and had to say it publicly. And so— what? — a year — a year or so ago I did that." He subsequently apologized for that military authorization vote.

Edwards was a vocal critic of the Iraq War troop surge of 2007
Iraq War troop surge of 2007
In the context of the Iraq War, the surge refers to United States President George W. Bush's 2007 increase in the number of American troops in order to provide security to Baghdad and Al Anbar Province....

, calling the surge the "McCain Doctrine" in reference to Sen. John McCain
John McCain
John Sidney McCain III is the senior United States Senator from Arizona. He was the Republican nominee for president in the 2008 United States election....

's support for the strategy. He has stated that he cannot guarantee to pull all U.S. combat troops from Iraq by the end of the next presidential term in 2013, but added he would "immediately draw down 40,000 to 50,000 troops." In October 2007, Edwards called for limits on the role of private military contractors in Iraq and elsewhere. As of the beginning of 2008, Edwards plans to gradually withdraw all troops from Iraq in the first 10 months of his presidency.

Despite President Bush's vetoes of funding bills with withdrawal timetables, Edwards urged Congressional Democrats to not acquiesce, but instead to continually present bills that include such timetables.

Crime

When asked how to prevent inner city kids from participating in violence, Edwards said, with implied criticism of "The idea that we're just gonna keep incarcerating, keep incarcerating, pretty soon we're not going to have a young African-American male population in America. They're all going to be in prison, or dead. One of the two." Instead of supporting such a notion, he said the government should spend more money on health care and education in order to prevent young people from leading a life of crime.

The Media

Edwards supports net neutrality
Network neutrality
Network neutrality is a principle that advocates no restrictions by Internet service providers or governments on consumers' access to networks that participate in the Internet...

. In addition, he has outlined a plan that will establish high-speed internet availability to all American homes and business by the year 2010.

He is also a vocal critic of the Fox News Channel
Fox News Channel
Fox News Channel , often called Fox News, is a cable and satellite television news channel owned by the Fox Entertainment Group, a subsidiary of News Corporation...

. He has accused the network of having a "right-wing agenda" and lacking objectivity in their reporting. He has boycotted debates hosted by the network, saying "there's just no reason for Democrats to give Fox a platform."

External links

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