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Posted: July 11, 2007 7:01 PM
Edwards Plans 'Road to One America' Tour
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This week, former Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., announced plans to tour eight states, hitting 12 cities in three days, to highlight the needs of the roughly 37 million Americans living in poverty.

He is slated to start in New Orleans on Monday and finish July 18 in Prestonsburg, Ky., the site where Robert Kennedy concluded his poverty tour in 1968.

Edwards continues to make poverty a significant, if not central, issue in his campaign. The launch of the tour will be covered by ABC’s “Good Morning America.” Along the way, he is slated to stop in Marks, Miss., the town where Martin Luther King Jr. began his Poor People’s March to Washington, D.C. in 1968. He also plans stops in Pittsburgh and Memphis, Tenn., in an effort to draw attention to the needs of the rural and urban poor.

On Tuesday, Edwards won 33 percent of the vote in a MoveOn.org straw poll on climate change policies, besting the other candidates.

MoveOn.org plans to run a newspaper ad outlining the results in Iowa and New Hampshire next week.

Last week, Edwards’ hair cuts once again grabbed attention when his stylist broke his silence to the Washington Post. He revealed Edwards paid $1,250 for a trim during the 2004 race, covering the stylist’s travel expenses and missed work. The article also pointed out Edwards was not the only candidate who paid a pretty penny to look good.

On July 5, Edwards continued to try to win the labor vote while talking trade before the United Steelworkers Union in Cleveland.

Edwards, who is banking on an Iowa win to be the catalyst for his nomination, discussed the momentum early primary victories would bring with Al Hunt of Bloomberg News .

A recent Boston Herald op-ed took aim at Edwards for calling President Bush’s war on terror more a bumper sticker than foreign policy, citing recent events in London as examples of extremist threats. Other news reports said two of the creators of the Wake Up Wal-Mart campaign are expected to join the Edwards camp shortly. The Edwards campaign has yet to confirm.

As for the rest of this week, Edwards is expected to have a town hall meeting Wednesday with Sheet Metal Workers Local 88 in Las Vegas. On Thursday, he has agreed to participate in an NAACP candidates’ forum in Detroit in the morning and a community meeting in Fort Dodge, Iowa that night. He intends to make more stops in Iowa, including Humboldt, Algona, Garner, Iowa Falls and Webster City on Friday, and Maquoketa, Peosta, Anamosa and Cedar Rapids on Saturday. Later that day, he agreed to speak at the American Association for Justice PAC presidential forum in Chicago.