Send well wishes to the Edwards on website, get email back asking for a contribution

What he says:

First of all, there’s not a single person in America that should vote for me because Elizabeth has cancer. Not a one. If you’re considering doing it, don’t do it. Do not vote for us because you feel some sympathy or compassion for us. That would be an enormous mistake. The vote for the presidency is far too important for any of those things to influence it.

What he does:

When you visit the John Edwards for President Web site, you’re invited to send a sympathy note to the Edwardses. And tens of thousands of well wishers have done so since that heart-wrenching news conference two weeks ago at which Elizabeth Edwards courageously discussed her incurable cancer.

What those well wishers get in return — e-mail messages soliciting contributions to Edwards’s campaign.

Visitors to the Edwards site who choose to “send a note to Elizabeth and John” are first taken to a heartfelt letter from the candidate that was written the day after he learned that his wife’s cancer had returned. Edwards thanks readers for their “prayers and wishes,” vows that he and Elizabeth will “keep a positive attitude always look for the silver lining” and declares that “our campaign goes on and it goes on strongly.”

Anyone who then chooses to send a note of sympathy to the Edwardses — and, thus, provide his or her e-mail address — automatically becomes part of the Edwards campaign’s online e-mail database, a list that is crucial to any campaign’s ability to raise vast amounts of money over the Internet.

Very clever, Mr. Edwards. And also very tacky.

I continue to pray for the Edwards family, especially Elizabeth, because she is facing an uphill battle – an unwinnable one – with her cancer. But I feel little else but contempt for candidate Edwards, who has proven once again that nothing is off limits in terms of what he will do and say in order to try and get elected.

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