Franklin Roosevelt, John, Bobby and Ted Kennedy, are all very rich men who live or lived in very big houses.  Among the largest mansions in America, and most of them owned multiple mansions.

Did that impact their drive to fight poverty?  Did they not live their values?  How is Edwards any more or less sincere than any who came before him?

I think that Edwards built a home using energy-saving technology and drive a Ford are telling.

Should he give all his money to charity and run the truly insincere campaign of being a poor man?

I think Edwards wants a future where everyone can have a nice house, a good job, and dignity.  To question that sincerity tells more about the questioner than the subject in question.

I don't like this attack line against John Edwards AT ALL!  Criticize his record, his positions, his experience, but not this.

Finally the Edwards supporters see what it's like to have your candidate attacked for a stupid reason.  Although this isn't nearly as stupid as blaming Obama for "talking like Lieberman" since he uses the phrase a "new kind of politics".

Since you brought it up, they cut down a lot of trees to build this manor.  Solar energy is good, but keeping trees is better.

including FDR - who started the worlds greatest anti-poverty program of all time - social security.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt was born on January 30, 1882 in Hyde Park, in the Hudson Valley in upstate New York. His father, James Roosevelt, Sr., and his mother, Sara Ann Delano, were each from wealthy old New York families, of Dutch and French ancestry respectively. Franklin was their only child. His maternal grandfather, Warren Delano, Jr., made a fortune in the opium trade in China.[1] Roosevelt grew up in an atmosphere of privilege.Roosevelt completed his undergraduate studies at Harvard, where he lived in luxurious Adams House and was a member of the Alpha Delta Phi fraternity. While at Harvard, he saw his fifth cousin Theodore Roosevelt become president, and Theodore's vigorous leadership style and reforming zeal made him Franklin's role model and hero.

I am also reminded of the Kennedy's wealth

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/kennedys/pe opleevents/e_wealth.html

"Joe Kennedy never publicly revealed his wealth, but the New York Times estimated his net worth at $500,000,000 when he died in 1969."

and how Ted Kennedy has been one of the working mans best friends.

If you are ever in the 'mid-state' New York region (near White Plains, Manhattan is a big animal!) you should visit the publicly accessible mansion of Franklin Roosevelt. You see the pen and pad on the gorgeous desk, you can feel the power of the man.

One thing about Franklin Roosevelt: The guy had balls of steel. If you ever plan on having your picture taken with Joseph Stalin and Winston Churchill, you better have balls of steel (or the equivalent thereof). You think John Edwards has that?

I'm not sure you really get an "Energy Star" for building a 29,000 square foot complex on 100 acres of cleared land and sucking out the local aquifer to fill the pools, tubs, law sprinkers etc.

Nice the Edwards are using solar energy but the amount of energy a massive estate like that is going to consume vs. a modest 5,000 square foot mansion makes the use of solar energy to heat the pool and baths a case of lipstick on the energy pig.

The problem for Edwards is two fold.

1. He used the Katrina victims homes as his campaign screensaver launching a campaign based on the "two Americas" while building a huge estate that takes advantage of tax breaks (tree farm and solar energy credits) available to the wealthy.

As one of the Democratic campaign workers put it:

"It's one thing to be a millionaire, but it's totally tone-deaf to be using Katrina victims while you're putting the finishing touches on your multimillion-dollar mansion," said one Democratic operative.

2. It will make a huge target for the Republicans if Edwards is the nominee, fair or not. Think of Dukakis and Boston Harbor.  You will see aerial shots of Edwards huge estate (think Google Earth bombs) superimposed over New Orleans abandoned homes.  And god help him if the large grounds crew maintaining the place has any illegal aliens.

The fact that you have conversations going on left wing websites defending Edwards' real estate hubris should be some indication of the perception problem Edwards has created.

The place is so extreme it makes the Clintons, the McCains and the Obama's look like Ozzie and Harriet and Edwards like Richie Rich. Edwards probably should have waited until after the election before building the "Southern White House"

Agree.  It doesnt bother me that the John and Elizabeth built a "palatial estate."  

The fact that he has been planning a presidential campaign around the theme of being the working man's hero, while he built his estate is awkward, and something that is easy for his political competition to exploit.  

But dont post diaries which try to muster up liberal sympathies by pointing out how good for the environment the house is.  It is just a transparently desperate tactic to defuse the embarrasing fall-out from the revelation.  Do you know how much it is gonna cost to heat in the winter and cool in the summer a 15,000 ft2 recreation annex with its four-story tower?  Solar panels... whoo hoo!  Its like saying "I put the poor to work, (in the yard)","  or "I only used union plummers to install the gold sink faucets."

Conspicuous consumption is what it is.  If the Edwards partisans cant admit it, dont publish diaries that perpetuate the story.  And for a successful trial lawyer, I am suprised Edwards couldnt come up with a better argument than .. "well.. energy star rating."

...would have. They left most of the trees right where they were. The other likely developments in store for this land would have been far less desirable than the Edwards' home.

The fact that Republicans are trying to make a big deal out of a nice house shows just how little ammunition they have against Edwards. If the Republicans want to make the argument that the rich couldn't possibly give a damn about the everyday person, that's an argument that's going to hurt them a lot more than it hurts us.

"You realize the NY Post is a tabloid, right?"

Yes I realize NY Post is the most widely read newspaper in NY.  You didn't know that?

The story on Edwards 29,000 square foot, 100 acre estate was entirely accurate. I thought the title "Estate of Denial" was pretty funny.

http://www.nypost.com/seven/12272006/new s/nationalnews/estate_of_denial_national news_ian_bishop.htm

The link you provided to the Post story was also good journalism, debunking the Fox News attempt to smear Obama and Clinton on the Madrass story.  Did you read it before you posted the link?

http://www.nypost.com/seven/01202007/new s/nationalnews/osama_mud_flies_at_obama_ nationalnews_maggie_haberman.htm

Many media outlets published the story about Edwards new mansion.  It was on AP as well. Pick LA Times or another newspaper if you don't like the Post's write up.

As the the quotes point out, it demonstrates a sort of tone deafness by Edwards, running a campaign about the "two Americas" while building an outlandish estate making himself an extreme example of the "other America".

Using New Orleans Katrina victims homes as his campaign backdrop while building himself a Southern style Xanadu compounds the problem.

If Edwards is the candidate, Republicans in 2008 are just going to fry him on this...making him look hypocritical.

"While John Edwards talks of the two America's...he's walling himself off in an estate worthy of a robber baron built on money that runs up your health care costs."

"While John Edwards talks about saving energy, his 29,000 acre estate uses 20 times the energy and water of a working American's home".