Best wishes for Elizabeth Edwards

I heard with real sorrow yesterday that cancer has reappeared in Elizabeth Edwards, wife of Democratic 2008 Presidential candidate John Edwards. Cancer has been detected in Mrs. Edwards’ bones and there are indications it may also have spread to her lungs, according to published reports.

At a press conference yesterday, the condition was characterized as incurable, but treatable. That means they can slow it down, but they can’t eliminate it. Barring the intervention of some accident or other disease process, it will probably kill her. The timing will become more apparent as the disease progresses and the effects of various chemo- and hormone-therapy strategies are assessed. I hope they're able to slow the cancer to a crawl.

Both have vowed to stay in the race for the 2008 White House. It’s not the decision I would have made, but, to be fair, the couple is not in a position in which I would ever find myself. I haven’t decided whether I think it’s a cynical attempt to use the emotions of the electorate or a sad commentary on what has become important to our career politicians.

By anyone’s standards, John Edwards is a rich man. He doesn’t need to work. He’s in an uphill battle for the nomination in which Democratic front-runners Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton have a commanding lead. He’s pursuing an impossible quest for a thankless job, spending precious hours and days playing the political game while his wife’s candle burns ever shorter. If politics is the couple’s favorite pastime, something they would pursue above all other activities, then I have no problem with the decision to stay in the campaign (though I question their priorities.) If Edwards is staying in the race because he hopes to get a “sympathy bounce” in the polling…I have no words...cynical just doesn’t cut it.

I like the sentiments of country singer Tim McGraw in his Live Like You Were Dying:

…I went sky diving
I went Rocky Mountain climbing
I went 2.7 seconds on a bull named Fu Manchu
and I loved deeper and I spoke sweeter
and I gave forgiveness I’d been denying
and he said someday I hope you get the chance
to live like you were dying.

I hope the campaign doesn’t rob the couple of too much precious time; it would be a shame to waste it on something as meaningless as politics.