An argument one can occasionally hear being made runs like this: a woman or a black man would enter the general election for the Presidency at a disadvantage due to (supposedly) widespread misogyny and racism. Under this logic, of the top three, being a white male, John Edwards is presented as the best candidate. This argument was made in a particularly irksome troll diary the other day, and a little digging uncovers it elsewhere on the internets.

There are many, and many good, reasons to support John Edwards, as I do. This, however, is not one of them, for the simple reasons that it’s morally reprehensible, that the candidate disdains it and that, lastly, it’s not supported by actual polling data.

Details over the fold.

(Originally posted at Daily Kos; the HTML rendering here is somewhat messed up, so you have to, alas, scroll to see the tables)