Edwards on the Stump in Iowa

Edwards on the Issues, CNN Ballot Box:

JOHN EDWARDS (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We have so much work to do in this country, so much work to do and so much opportunity in front of us. We look at what's happening in America today, and what is happening is there's some very powerful forces that stand between you and the America that you deserve.

There are very powerful forces, well-financed forces, that stand between your children's future and the kind of future they should have. That's what this campaign is about. That's what this election is about.

Are we faced with enormous substantive issues? Yes, we are -- the war in Iraq, universal health care, energy, global warming, poverty, taxes, trade. There are enormous substantive issues facing this country, but the reality is this -- unless and until we actually take the country, the democracy back on behalf of the American people, unless and until you have a president of the United States who's willing to stand up with some backbone and guts and fight and stand up to these corporate interests and stand up to those that are preventing America from getting what it needs, nothing will change.

EDWARDS: Now, I'm very proud of the fact that I've never, in my entire time in public life, taken money from Washington lobbyists or PACs.

EDWARDS: You also cannot bring about, in my judgment, the change that this country so desperately needs either if you take their money or if you say, we're going to sit at the table with insurance companies, drug companies, and they're going to compromise their power away, that they're just going to give their power away voluntarily. It is a fantasy. It will never happen.

I'll tell you, when they give up their power, the insurance companies, drug companies, oil companies, when they give up their power is when we take their power away from them. That's when they'll give up their power.

EDWARDS: And you look at what's at stake. Look at what's at stake.

I met a man named James Lowe (ph) just a few months ago. He's 51 years old. James was born with a cleft palate. Because he had his cleft palate, he couldn't speak.

He could have been fixed with a simple -- his problem could have been fixed with a simple operation, but James had no health care coverage. Therefore, he couldn't get the operation. Finally, somebody came along and fixed his problem when he was 50 years old. James Lowe (ph) lived for 50 years in America not able to speak because he had no health care coverage. And I thought to myself, when he told me his story, how long are we going to let insurance companies, drug companies, their lobbyists run this country?

America belongs to us. James Lowe (ph) finally got his voice. Now it's time for the American people to get their voice.

EDWARDS: And Elizabeth always says -- and she's right -- that this is all personal for me. When I speak about these things, they come from my gut. They come from inside me. Everything that drives me every day toward the presidency is what I want to do on behalf of people like James Lowe (ph), on behalf of the that Elizabeth, Mary and I met this morning living in that shelter who deserve a decent life, on behalf of my own parents.