"Reprehensible Schmuck"

I have posted several aggressively anti-John Edwards commentaries in the past few years (e.g. here, here and here).  Some might even call these posts over the top.  I have to disagree.  I was driven above and beyond the normal levels of politician bashing simply because John Edwards is a unique creature, unsurpassed in his phoniness and superlative in his own special brand of loathsomeness.   I don't know if I have a nose for this or if I was simply paying attention, but never have I seen a politician whose contemptibility was matched only by their self-absorption.  Never have I seen a politician with a more fundamental conflict between his life and his message, and who operated so overtly behind the cameras as the antithesis of what he said in front of the camera.  I like Roger Simon's assessment: "one of the most reprehensible schmucks to appear on the American political scene in some time."  Some time, Roger?  A very long time, IMO.  The fact that John Edwards was even minimally successful in politics is a pox on the American electorate and an indictment of our collective judgement.  Shame on us.