Liberal Talk Radio

Joe Trippi, Howard Dean’s famous campaign manager and king of the ‘netroots’, is joining the Edwards campaign. This makes me wonder, does Edwards’ continued presence help Hillary? And if so, is that poetic justice for the man who would have been the nominee in 2004?

Back in 2004, Will Saletan argued that Wes Clark did just well enough in the February primaries to stay alive, thus splitting the Southern vote and depriving Edwards of the one-on-one fight with Kerry he needed to win:

But when the history of the 2004 race is written, my guess is that we’ll look back at Oklahoma as Edwards’ Stalingrad. He had to kill off Clark. The media were itching to write off Clark, and a no-win night would have given them license to do so. Now they can’t. Clark will go on to Tennessee and Virginia, where he’ll do what he did in Oklahoma: split the non-Yankee vote and keep Kerry in the lead. Maybe Edwards will win Tennessee and Virginia, and Clark will fade. But by then it may too late to stop Kerry.

Now in 2007, the names have changed, but the dynamic is the same. The media keeps wanting to make this a two-way race between Clinton and Obama, but Edwards won’t let them. He’s playing Clark’s role, too strong to write off but not strong enough to win. (For proof, just look at National Journal‘s latest race rankings: they’ve put Edwards in “2.5 place.” He’s in the top tier… sort of.)

With Trippi on his side, Edwards will only get stronger, all the while splitting the progressive (or rather the anyone-but-Hillary) vote with Obama and effectively giving Hillary a clear run at the end zone.