NEW ORLEANS — With the ruins of New Orleans as his backdrop, former Democratic vice presidential nominee John Edwards on Thursday called on Americans to take action against poverty, global warming and other troubles as he officially launched his 2008 campaign for president.
"We can't wait for someone else to do this for us," the onetime U.S. senator from North Carolina said from a muddy 9th Ward backyard where volunteers were fixing a home gutted by Hurricane Katrina.
Dressed in blue jeans, sneakers and a work shirt, Edwards outlined his vision of the presidency as a moral force to promote universal healthcare, higher wages for the working poor and other steps.
New Orleans, he said, illustrates the "two Americas" that he lamented in his 2004 run for president -- one for the privileged, and one for those struggling to get by.
Reprising that theme for 2008, Edwards this time is stressing "personal responsibility." In a setting of flood-ravaged houses with boarded-up windows and punctured walls -- which he said the government had done too little to repair -- he urged Americans to volunteer for anti-poverty work and cut fuel use to ease global warming.
"Instead of staying home and complaining, we're asking people to help," he said in the drawl that became familiar to the nation during his four-month stint as running mate to 2004 Democratic presidential nominee John F. Kerry after Edwards' own presidential bid failed.
Edwards also called for the immediate withdrawal of 40,000 to 50,000 U.S. troops from the war in Iraq, saying the move would begin to restore America's standing as a world leader.
Campaigning hours later in Des Moines, Edwards took a swipe at a leading Republican contender for president, Sen. John McCain of Arizona, for saying the U.S. should send more troops to Iraq.
"It would be an enormous mistake to adopt the McCain doctrine and escalate this war in Iraq," he said to cheers from several hundred people packed into the central atrium of a downtown museum.
As he has in the past, Edwards voiced regret for his Senate vote to authorize the U.S. invasion of Iraq. "I should have never voted for this war," he said.
Iowa was the first stop on his three-day swing to the first states to hold Democratic nomination contests. Edwards plans to campaign in New Hampshire and Nevada today and in South Carolina on Saturday.
