So Edwin Edwards gets a reality TV show. The media reports that he and his much younger wife are trying to have a baby. He has been a featured speaker at engagements throughout the state.
Given the fact the Edwards is, for all practical purposes, a disgraced politician and convicted felon who would likely have trouble finding a place to live or a job because of his felony background if he were not, well, Edwin Edwards, why does anyone think we care about such foolery?
The local media even bothers to glean what Edwin Edwards has to say about current events. In fact, when news regarding the antics in former U.S. Attorney Jim Letten’s office began to break, the local thrice-weekly published a story that highlighted what the former governor had to say about U.S. Attorney Letten’s troubled office. It was some old Chinese proverb about sitting by a river and watching the dead body of your enemy float by or something like that. It was certainly a dig at Letten, who was the lead prosecutor against Edwards in the case that sent him to federal prison for the better part of a decade. And we get that because of that history, Edwards probably felt he deserved to take that jab at Letten. Still, we just can’t help but wonder what’s up with the fanfare and the fascination surrounding Edwards.
Let’s be clear: we have no particular bone to pick with Edwards. He was a politician who was ostensibly caught doing wrong. He was tried, convicted, served his time, has been released and is now living his life. But we can’t understand why the mainstream media seems hell bent on treating him like a rock star, and we would bet there are many other leaders and elected officials, especially African-American ones, that have fallen from grace that would not get the paparazzi treatment Edwards seems to attract, with only a cursory mention of his misdeeds in such a colorful and glorified manner that it seems more cartoonish as opposed to felonious.
To us it is just another brazen example of the bias that exists in our community, and we have to call it like we see it.
