Unlike fellow Dem John Edwards, Bayh’s decision to retire from the Senate has nothing to do with herpes simplex virus 2 in any way, shape or form. He simply believes he can do more good for the country in the private sector, rather than in government.

Really? And Bayh was a Dem? How’d they let him get away with thoughts like that for two terms? He sounds like your average Newt Gingrich Republican!

Fading to the middle of the Democratic field quickly and well behind Hillary, Barack and even Al Gore, who’s not running (yet), Edwards has adopted the political strategy that led Walter Mondale carry only his home state of Minnesota and the District of Columbia against Ronald Reagan in 1984: Promise everything to everyone and screw even the first thought of how to pay for it. After all, the rich won’t be paying their fair share even after they’re all penniless and we’re all unemployed, right? It’s just and endless well of money from those types, right?

So let’s promise free health care, free college, free Internet… heck, let’s just give away a bunch of iPod Touch units and a free PlayStation 3 while we’re at it to every American. Oh, and no work requirement, either. Can’t have folks being productive on the government dole, can we? No siree.

Fortunately, I suspect that (just barely) most Americans have just enough IQ points to see past this one, even if the drive-by media doesn’t. (Including the Concord (NH) Monitor that ran the original piece on Edwards speech.) Of course, that’s to be expected from the zittohead crowd.

Speaking in Tipton, Iowa about his Hillary-style universal health care plan, Edwards promised:

“It requires that everybody be covered. It requires that everybody get preventive care. If you are going to be in the system, you can’t choose not to go to the doctor for 20 years. You have to go in and be checked and make sure that you are OK. The whole idea is a continuum of care, basically from birth to death.”

Does this plan include indemnifying doctors from ambulance-chasers like Edwards in this mandatory care system? Not likely.

Edwards is off the deep end on this one, and while he’s unlikely to get the Dem nod for the top of the ticket, if he’s chosen as someone’s running mate, just remember all the damage Al Gore did when the previous Clinton was at the top of the ticket. It’s enough to require most people to seek out a headache treatment.

One has to wonder exactly what the penalty would be for a prospective patient who didn’t go for his or her annual physical, and whether it would be a better or worse fate than he has in mind for Ann Coulter, Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh, if he ever does achieve power.

It opens up the question of whether Edwards, despite his age, is enough of a grown-up to be president of the United States. It’s fine to be opposed to the war, to suggest there’s a different way to conduct it, even a preference for ending it before the war is won. Folks can debate the merits of such proposals and base their voting decisions of it.

But to deny six years of actual history as a campaign slogan is to display such a shocking lack of maturity and temperament as to make one wonder if Edwards has the gravitas to serve. Certainly, the comment drew a response from the current president, George W. Bush. On Thursday at the White House, in a news conference, Bush took a swipe at Edwards, indirectly, when he said, “This notion that this isn’t a war on terror is, in my view, naive.”

Naive, immature and dangerous, in the Wonderful Pessimist’s assessment. Of course, Edwards’ entire party is burying their heads in the sand of late, wanting to wipe out the very term “War On Terror” from official government use.

Sure… the war is like a bad dream. If you ignore it, it’ll go away. Just keep believing that through the 2008 elections, Dems. You’ll be doing the GOP a big electoral favor. Thanks!