At Least He** Had a Lede to Bury: John Edwards thinks he can come back .  And somehow in theoretically humble disgrace comes off as smugger and phonier than ever! (Sample: "The two things I'm on the planet for now are to take care of the people I love and to take care of people who cannot take care of themselves.") ... 

He thinks "every day" about what form his future role in activism or public life could take, but "right now, a lot of that is unanswerable." ... [snip]

"If I can help the most by working quietly, that's what I'll do. If as time goes by I can be more helpful with a public role, that's what I will do."

WaPo  reporter Alec MacGillis pathetically agreed in advance not to talk about the things Edwards didn't want to talk about (like the second tranche of now-festering lies he told in the course of his Nightline "confession"). MacGillis also asserts, as fact, that Edwards promoted health-care reform "more aggressively than anyone on the presidential campaign trail." True? ...

But MacGillis also buries a solid lede: The last web page of his piece features an impressive, reported survey of broken Edwards promises to various actual impoverished Americans --scholarship programs cancelled, Katrina foreclosure cases unaided--complete with victim quotes. ("I just thought he was trying to cover his tracks while he was a candidate. ... It was probably all for show in the end." ).

Who was the editor who decided to call this piece "Hope from a Humbler Perch" instead of, say, "In Defeat, Edwards Left String of Broken Promises"?

Note to Gawker : No, he can't have a Slate Rehab column. Sorry. We're saving the slot for Rattner. ...

** Correction:  Reporter MacGillis is a he, not a she. [ Thanks to reader B. ] ..   10:24 P.M.

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