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The Mystery Man of the Edwards Affair
Josh Merwin, The New York Times / Redux
As Elizabeth Edwards talks (and talks) about her husband’s affair, The Daily Beast provides an exclusive look at one central character who remains a cipher: “Uncle Fred” Baron, the lawyer who paid for Edwards’ mistress to move across the country.
As Elizabeth Edwards continues to share and overshare about her marriage and her husband’s affair (this week’s stop: The View), one key aspect of the story remains untold. Why in the world did two friends of the senator go to such extraordinary lengths to help hide his affair?
The two ciphers in the saga are Andrew Young, an aide who has claimed to be the father of Rielle Hunter’s daughter, and Fred Baron, a legendary Texas trial lawyer and Democratic financier. It was Baron who rushed to Edwards’ rescue as the presidential primaries were approaching and the tabloid reporters closing in, and paid to relocate Young and Hunter to California. When Baron then died in October 2008 after a battle with cancer, it seemed all the stranger that a man of his reputation, in his final days, would get so deeply involved in a mess like this.
“Fred was kind of a doting father,” says one Edwards staffer. “He was incredibly dedicated to John, extremely loyal, probably spoiled him a little too much, maybe an enabler in some ways.”
But in conversations with Baron’s friends and Edwards campaign staffers, a fuller picture of Baron emerges. He was more than Edwards’ money man; he was deeply integrated into Edwards’ life. In the campaign office, he was known as “Uncle Fred.” To understand their close friendship is to understand a bit more about the Edwards scandal and why, it turned out, Baron would protect Edwards at any cost.
In a campaign of true believers, Baron, who was 61, had a greater stake in John Edwards than most. “Fred was kind of a doting father,” says one Edwards staffer. “He was incredibly dedicated to John, extremely loyal, probably spoiled him a little too much, maybe an enabler in some ways.” Baron was chairman of Edwards’ 2008 campaign-finance committee (a title he also held in 2004), but for the candidate he was an irreplaceable sounding board. He was “as close a professional colleague as you get in this business,” says Kelly Fero, Edwards’ Texas spokesman in 2004.
Baron’s affection for Edwards was political but it was also professional. Both men styled themselves as trial lawyers in the classic Southern tradition. They were fighting for regular guys against the big, powerful interests—the “Atticus Finch model,” in the words of the Edwards staffer. Edwards’ campaign spiel of “two Americas,” of an underclass fighting for economic and social justice, was right out of the Baron playbook.
Around the campaign’s Chapel Hill headquarters, Baron was a smiling, benevolent figure. He had moved to North Carolina for the campaign, and he arrived at the office each day looking as if he’d just emerged from a Brooks Brothers catalog. (The joke was that he was more carefully coiffed than even the carefully coiffed candidate.) Baron had a trial lawyer’s gift for being intense without a breaking a sweat, and, in his Texas drawl, he was the campaign’s house optimist. Even as Team Edwards stumbled irreversibly in the primaries, Baron was quick with a pep talk. Whenever a staffer needed help, Baron, in a foreshadowing of later events, was the first to volunteer.
“He was a type of guy that, if a person falls, Fred expects someone to pick him up in a hurry,” says Dave “Mudcat” Saunders, an Edwards adviser.
Back home in Texas, Baron wasn’t shy about throwing money around. After graduating from law school in 1971, Baron became a feared plaintiff’s attorney working in toxic tort litigation. By 2001, Baron and his wife, a fellow lawyer named Lisa Blue, built a fortune that Forbes put at $21 million. Baron was a Democratic politician’s dream—an idealist with a checkbook. “He just believed in electing the right kind of people to public office,” says Martin Frost, a former Dallas-area congressman, who was Baron’s friend for decades. “And had the financial wherewithal to make that happen.” In 2000, the Barons moved into a 22,000-square-foot home in Dallas’s Preston Hollow neighborhood—the same neighborhood that now counts George W. and Laura Bush as residents. The home was much larger than the Barons needed, and the ostensible purpose, said a friend, was to make it ground zero for every Democratic political fundraiser, charitable gala, and friend’s wedding they could squeeze in. Baron was even known to grant use of the home when he was out of town.
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I feel bad for these poor delusional people they still think Edwards is going to be a contender in some part of politics and we all know that's never going to happen, stick a fork in him he's done. Rielle made sure of that with a baby and the National Enquirer made damm sure of that. these people want to give away money give it to people who can use it and need it not rich John Edwards or wantabe Hunter
I hate to say it, but the more I read about this scandal, the more fascinated I become, and also the more disgusted with John Edwards I become. He had so many people-Elizabeth, Uncle Fred, Andrew Young-willing to sacrifice so much for him, and he threw it all away. i feel guilty saying this, but this would make an interesting movie.
I feel bad for all of US! Having to listen to his "wife" on the news and talk shows, why would she air all of their garbage in public? Edwards was not capable of running his own life, let alone the US of A. Why Elizabeth stays with him is beyond rational thinking. She ought to throw him out and live her last years in peace.
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I do not approve of John Edwards' affair with that disgusting woman. BUT, I do feel that we are throwing out the baby with the bath water here by rejecting him completely. John Edwards has done so much for the disadvantaged. His heart and soul are dedicated to alleviating poverty; even his work as a lawyer against corporations, protecting the average person, shows his dedication to the "little guy", a class to which most Americans belong. John Edwards has a lot to offer; an ambitious woman brought him down at a time of incredible stress in his life - Elizabeth's cancer, running for the presidency, etc. I do not excuse his behaviour, but I recognize that he is only human, as am I and as are you who are reading this. What about forgiveness, and second chances? John Edwards deserves to be forgiven his mistake and given a second chance. Maybe we can all grow from this. ALL of us have an opportunity for growth. I know that he has already been forgiven by the only one that matters...his higher power. Why do people keep nailing this guy to the cross??? I gave money to his campaign and I was extremely angry when I realized this sleazy woman may have benefited from my hard-earned money. It still unnerves me to think that all she had to do was open her legs for my money...while I worked hard for it and chose after much thought, to give it to John Edwards. His aspirations haven't changed and his dedication to helping the less fortunate, is still there. Let's forgive and give the guy a second chance. He deserves it just like the rest of us. The puritannical mindset of many Americans is defeatist and primitive. Let's rise above the nasty little finger-pointer within, and support this man.
I had the privilege on two separate occasions to meet Fred Baron. Once in Montana at a rally and fundraiser for Edwards and again when I worked in Des Moines during the 2008 caucus. Although I was not a rich contributor but had maxed out twice with my husband in 2004 and 2008 for Edwards and had spent time and hotel and plane fare stumping for him, Fred treated me like a super star and as an equal to any of the big money people. His address to us at a breakfast the day before the Iowa caucus was filled with hope backed up by polling. I never once knew he was sick. He was so sunny and smart and looked great. Everybody on his finance team were terrific too. Not a snob among them. Lots of real people's attorneys were among the group. People who really did care about ending poverty and fighting for worker's rights.
I recently met Jim Hightower who praised Fred Baron for changing Dallas politics with his infusion of cash.
I appreciate this story so that I have a chance to say thank you and to give my condolences to Lisa who was also very gracious to me.
For all the faults and missteps, the people I met on both the 2004 and the 2008 campaigns were sincere about their fight for economic justice carrying on the work of Martin Luther King, Jr and before him Thomas Paine. It was fitting that John Edwards got the Thomas Paine award in 2005 at Take Back America. It would have been even more fitting for Fred Baron to get that award someday.
I would go to the movie about this too :), the Madoff movie is still on top of my list.
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wanting--> For argument's sake let's say you are an adult male, worldly, successful,and to top it off, smart enough to be a credible Democratic contender for president of the United States of America. Let us say that I am a lady that approches you and says to you "YOU ARE SO HOT!"
All of this, happening on a Manhattan sidewalk.
Would you feel like an idiot if you fell for the woman that utters that idiotic line or would you take a dive into the Idiots Hall of Fame by consorting with a completely unkown lady you met in a Manhattan sidewalk.
Would you actually want that idiot to be your president?
John Edwards has proven that he is an ignoble character. He was prepared to sacrifice anything and everything to get to a higher place that he thought he merited. I heard his wife on Diane Rehm today. He first told his wife that it had been a one-night stand. Later, after he left the race, he confessed that it had been an ongoing affair. He has been married to his wife for about 30 years! She apparently did not really know him. Why she stays with him is anybody's guess. Her story is kind of commonplace. The dutiful wife who was betrayed. The much more interesting story is his--how does he think, what does he feel? If one's character is so lacking in integrity, at least do us the favor of staying out of public life so that your errant ways do not become a subject that all of us have to be concerned about.
All Elizabeth Edward's has accomplished with her pathetic appearance on every talk show in town is to elevate the mistress to the only class act in the triangle. It is hard to believe that this was her intention. Truthfully, I never paid serious attention to the Edwards in the past, but the few visuals that did register were the disparity in attractiveness between the two and that he always positioned himself in front of her. It is an unconscious body language thing that indicates detachment from or resentment of another. My guess is that both are relevant in this case.
Neither Edwards does anything beneficial by belaboring this. Face it, until Elizabeth went on her media tour, most of America had filed it under "who cares." Obviously that is not where Elizabeth Edwards wants the public sentiment to reside. As it stands now, my perception is that John, an immature, ineffective weak politician cheated on Elizabeth, the intellect and controlling force in the Edwards dynasty and that Elizabeth was determined that his failure to keep it in his pants was not going to rob her of the WH so she cheated the people who had believed in her, not him - her. I get it and I still don't care. John Edward's had no hope of winning the nomination. I think Obama proved that he was unbeatable and Edwards would never have survived the Clintons.
Edwards is a schmuck, damaged goods. The ensuing hoopla is immaterial.
His future is Joey Buttafuoco-caliber.
As I've said before, Elizabeth wants as much traction as she can get. To hell with her humiliation and dissembling perfomances as long as she's being heard. This shallow man
isn't worth the attention. Elizabeth is embarrassing and should stop talking,talking,talking.
Little johnnie edwards
Couldn't keep it in his pants
made a little baby
With his little tiny slant
Little tiny liberals
Loved that rascal John
hate the little baby
Made by the tiny coiffed don Juan
Saintly zaftig Elizabeth
Never had a clue
John is off again with the blondie
Whats a wife to do
The press toiled most nobly
To cover up the facts
Cover up the baby
Cover up his tracks
But out damn spot
The truth will out
And the tale will oft be told
How little Johnnie Edwards
Left his country out in the cold
It is amazing what people will do to be close to power.
I do wish this had remained private...*sigh*
That said: How could John Edwards, a man of the twentieth century perfectly at home in the 21st, NOT KNOW that the press would find out about his affair?
Either he is considerably stupider than he appears and had no clue that he was being watched by the paparrazi, or he is totally arrogant, to believe that he was above getting caught.
Or he is simply a self-seeking, self-serving narcissist, believeing that no one would care if he did get caught.
Any way at all, the country is better off without him. The US doesn't need a man who is either stupid, arrogant, or totally callous in the Oval Office.
Isn't that part of what folks thought of Bush?
Baron's behavior throughout illustrates the blind arrogance so often displayed by people of extraordinary wealth whose material success has led them to believe that they can control and shape any situation to their advantage. Sadly, for this man his cancer proved his worldview wrong. His own death which he couldn't forestall, was perhaps a karmic revelation that destiny is too often beyond human will.
Obviously what Edwards did was disgusting towards his family, but I do not think that being a crappy husband or wife necessarily would impede someone's political ability. Clearly he will never be president now because people get hung up on personal matters, but I'd be willing to bet 99.9% of people in politics (and most people in general for that matter) have some sort of skeletons in their closet, whether its an extra-marital affair or anything else. In my opinion, we ought to focus more on people like Edwards and Clinton's policies politically and less on their personal failures.
Why won't any media outlet ask Mrs. Edwards about Baron and Young? Are they off limits too? She must know the depth of their involvement in the caretaking of her husband's affair. Also, is Andrew Young being paid by Baron's estate to not speak of being the father of Rielle's baby? There are still so many unanswered questions about the mess. For the record, I trust neither Mr or Mrs Edwards to be in public office; I feel their talents are better served managing an NGO for helping poor Americans transition to better lives.
You know, I would like to forego personalities when considering political issues.
However, the personal characteristics of elected leaders matters a very great deal.
A man who is either too stupid to know he is being watched closely by paparrazi, or too arrogant to care has tremendous blind spots in his character that will impede his ability to make well-reasoned decisions when governing.
That simple.
Edwards betrayed his family, true enough. Btu a man who could betray his political aspirations through either stupidity or arrogance doesn't need to be leading this nation. Doesn't matter what form the betrayal takes. Matters that he cares so little or thinks so little as to do it.
Grow up people! For chrissake, we are all flawed. We drink and sneak and drive ...in the privacy of our homes we yell aand demean our spouses and our kids behind close doors...some of us sleep around.. others indulge in porno when no one is looking...John and Elizabeth are no different than the rest of us humans. He made a terrible terrible mistake and his family is suffering as they try to heal in their own ways. Men and women alike have been playing around in someone else's sandbox from the beginning of time. We are all tempted in different ways...God knows I can't walk pass a bakery or a good rib joint without wanting to treat myself. Some of us drink a little too much...others smoke a joint from time to time or snort coke or whatever your pleasure.... and we irresponsibly driven ourselves deep into the pit of debt...grow up and have some compassion for us flawed humans!
Elizabeth,the victim,No,the professional victim.He is a dog,she has been sniffing his behind for 30 years.She wanted to cement the hatred ,her children might have ,for their father after she,s gone.
My guess,John asked the "baby mama" to lay low till Lizzy dies and then all will be well.Lizzy must have figured that out and wanted to demean the woman and her child.
Why is this "other woman" called a mistress? She was just a
fast f*** in my mind. Yes, she got pregnant. But to me a
mistress is someone who gets an apartment, her own limo,
jewelry, clothes, trips, etc. She does not qualify for that title.
Or am I wrong?
Thank you.
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