On Friday morning I had the opportunity to sit down with Democratic presidential contender John Edwards after his speech at the DNC's winter meetings. Two previous interviews from the week of the meetings have already posted here on MyDD -- Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee chair Chuck Schumer and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. This was the second in a series of interviews with candidates and potential candidates for the Democratic nomination, the first coming back in May with Sen. Russ Feingold, who was then still believed to be in the running. The series continues tomorrow with my interview with Sen. Barack Obama, which was also recorded last Friday.

The questions for the interview were culled from your suggestions here on MyDD and via email. Topics covered include Iran, Iraq, poverty, healthcare, trade, and genuineness. You can listen to a stream of the interview or download it as an .mp3 here and read the transcript below:

Jonathan Singer: I had the opportunity to see you speak at USC.

John Edwards: At the poverty conference. I remember that very well.

Singer: I also got the chance to see you about three years ago in California at Pomona College.

Edwards: I remember being there. It was during the primary campaign.

Singer: I was right up front watching. And I came away from the second speech seeing a different man -

Edwards: I'm not surprised.

Singer: - having broken through, it seemed, from the type of campaign mentality. And you spoke to that. I was wondering how you see yourself being able to stay away from getting...

Edwards: Getting back into that?

Singer: Yeah.

Edwards: It's to not hire a bunch of consultants that you listen to, and just to be yourself. That's the simplest way to do it.

Singer: Realistically you're going to have consultants on your campaign.

Edwards: Not doing much.

Singer: I mean there are going to be polls taken...

Edwards: Sure. My pollster doesn't... I decide what I'm going to say. The speech I gave today - I wrote it. Nobody else wrote it. I have to admit that we did have a speech written that I didn't give. I gave my speech. And that's what I do now. Anything that matters I do it myself.

I had a town hall meeting in New Hampshire Wednesday and I talked and answered questions, and every word that came out of my mouth was just me. Nobody told me what to say or suggested what I should say. I don't do that anymore.

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