John Edwards makes campaign stop in Missoula

At a campaign stop in Missoula Sept. 4, John Edwards told a teeming crowd that the system in Washington is broken and he’s the man to fix it.

Edwards, who is running third in the polls in the Democratic primary for president, told a packed crowd in the University Center North Ballroom that Washington lobbyists are “standing between you and your government.”

He struck a populist theme, calling for free tuition and books for U.S. students who work 10 hours a week, raising the minimum wage to $9.50 an hour, and international efforts in support of education, clean drinking water and economic development.

He said he would fund universal health care coverage by curbing insurance industry profit.

Edwards called for cutting carbon emissions by 80 percent by 2050, adding it will require sacrifices from all Americans. He said Congress should require a dated exit plan before approving any more money for the war in Iraq. “We need to end this mess of a war in Iraq,” he said to a crowd that began to act as a chorus to his talking points.

“We don’t need a surge in Iraq. We need a surge in New Orleans,” he said. “We should be asking Americans to be patriotic about something other than war.”

Edwards noted that change does not come from Washington, but from the ground up, citing the Civil Rights Movement. “The power of America is in places like this,” he said and then paraphrased Mahatma Gandhi, saying, “become the change you seek.”

Edwards, a former trial attorney, left his position in the U.S. Senate in 2004 to run for vice president on the Democratic ticket with Sen. John Kerry.