Edwards runs on the "I'm from here, so vote for me" platform

John Edwards is trying to get South Carolina's attention. He's got an upper hand, since he lived there.

“I do understand what is happening in your state,” Mr. Edwards said when he took the microphone to sustained applause and faced hundreds of people at the dinner, which was held in a school auditorium. “I understand it because I have lived it. I don’t have to read it in a book. Nobody has to explain it to me. I don’t have to see it on television. I have lived it. I have seen every single problem and every single challenge that you face here in South Carolina.”

Every single challenge. He also connected with the locals:

At Brown’s BBQ in Kingstree, Mr. Edwards went from table to table, where he was received like a regular guy, shaking hands with diners whose plates were loaded with collard greens and fragrant barbecued meat.

“He is straightforward,” said Jeannette Chambers, 57. “He seems like he is taking a lot of interest in low- and middle-income families. And he is a Southerner.”

Mr. Edwards joked with customers as he paid for a takeout meal.

“I got an $8 haircut compared with a $400 one,” John Medley said in a joke referring to a widely mocked haircut that Mr. Edwards had billed his campaign for.

“This one cost me nine,” Mr. Edwards replied, not skipping a beat.

“Yours is still higher than mine,” Mr. Medley said.

...

“I am just like you,” he told hundreds of African-American high school students...

This was taken from The New York Times.