Today I’m driving out to New Hampshire to help knock on doors for John Edwards bid for the Presidency. While many of the polls are showing him a close third behind Senator Clinton and Senator Obama, I believe he is the right man to be our next President.

Why do I feel so strongly to drive 150 miles just to support a man whose running for President? I believe Edwards will be right for our environment, our foreign and domestic policies, and argumentatively the best candidate to address the issues of Rural America.

Edwards comes out of a small town much like I do. He worked his way up through the ranks, eventually becoming a very successful trail lawyer and politician. He grew up in a mill family with little hope for a prosperous future, but then pulled himself by his bootstraps. He was not the blue blood of Hillary Rodham or the Barack Obama.

How can you even start to understand the issues of Rural America if you did not grow up there? Things are different when you don’t live in a big city, when you know the pitfalls and downfalls of small towns and rural communities are much different then that of the big city. Edwards is the only man who speak of and understand Rural America to run for the presidency since Carter.

Beyond that though, he’s the man who has the best ideas to address the serious threat of global warming. His ideas don’t involve generating massive amounts of nuclear waste or experimenting with dangerous technology, underwritten by massive government subsidies. Instead, he looks towards a future of clean and renewable energy eventually replacing all our conventional sources of energy. It won’t be easy going up against corporate interests, but he’s been more then willing to speak out for change.

John Edwards has also made it clear that he wants our troops out of Iraq as soon as it’s safely possible. He’s exposed the clearest and more realistic plans of all the major candidates towards that goal. He knows the effect that our continuing war has had on Rural America, taking men and women, who often are our first responders, and sending them over to death in Iraq. It’s a terrible policy that he’s determined to change.

Edwards has had the courage to stand up to the corporate interests that sometimes control our democracy. I hope you will join me in New Hampshire and fight for a better, safer country by working to get John Edwards elected to be our next President.