I’ve been thinking more about John Edwards and his half-million dollar book deal.

Edwards runs in 1998, beats Lauch Faircloth – a rival who was not the smoothest of campaigners, but let’s give credit where it’s due: beating an incumbent Republican senator in a year dominated by the Lewinsky scandal is nothing to sneeze at.

By 2000, he’s already angling for a position on Gore’s ticket. Four years later, he’s ditching the Senate, with a rather modest list of accomplishments in one term, and running for president. He does fairly well, and when the field narrows to Kerry and himself, Edwards pulls his punches and is later rewarded with the vice-presidential slot.

Roughly ten minutes after Kerry’s concession speech, Edwards is getting ready for another bid in 2008.

This is the career path of a man at home on the campaign trail. (Actual governing looks like another story.)

His target audience – Democrats – very rarely “punishes” him for any of the stuff that leaves us shaking our heads – the big house, the huge speaking fees, the half million in hedge fund work, the haircuts, etc. I’ve seen him leave a room full of burly union guys starry-eyed in admiration, completely convinced that he was “one of them.”

The use of an S-corporation filing to avoid paying Medicare taxes? No problem to ‘em.

Neglecting to pay property taxes? Nobody on his side of the aisle really gives him any grief about it.

Ironically, the other side of the aisle rails against the hypocrisy of David Vitter.

We’ve seen the same phenomenon on “Gulfstream environmentalists” – as long as you vote the right way, everything else is forgiven.

UPDATE: Campaign Spot reader Patrick writes in:

I’ve long thought, and your recent post confirms it, that John Edwards is unique among frontrunner US candidates but he’s not unique among North American. He is almost totally in the model of central and South American politicians who get elected by their pandering to the poor, while more interested in consolidating their own power. Edwards is a caudillo. I’m sure he’s thought of a really fancy general’s uniform for when he becomes Commander in Chief.
This, sadly, is my less cynical way of looking at him. To be honest I think he’s in it all just for the money. He’s playing a game and making all sorts of speaking and book deals, with very little cost to himself. Running for president is a better money maker than personal injury law. And much more respectable.