So much for rumors

UPDATED


It doesn't exactly rise to the level of Dewey Defeats Truman, but The Politico embarrassed itself today. The site broke the "news" about an hour ago that John Edwards would suspend, or even end, his presidential campaign over the news about his wife's cancer.

John Edwards is suspending his campaign for President, and may drop out completely, because his wife has suffered a recurrence of the cancer that sickened her in 2004, when she was diagnosed with breast cancer, an Edwards friend told The Politico.

"At a minimum he's going to suspend" the campaign, the source said. "Nobody knows precisely how serious her recurrence is. It’ll be another couple of days before there’s complete clarity."

According to Edwards, "the campaign goes on. It goes on strongly."

By the way, I don't think I ever appreciated before what an impressive woman Elizabeth Edwards is. Wow. What an amazing, courageous lady. What an amazing marriage these people have.

UPDATE

Inevitably, there will be Republicans who try to make political hay over the fact that Edwards is not suspending his campaign. They will imply that he is a heartless, ambitious pig for forcing poor Elizabeth to endure the rigors of a presidential election. Those people are stupid, but not nearly as stupid as the wingnut who left the following comment on the Politico article that got the news so wrong:

If he really loved her he would resign his senate seat.

Posted By: JJM | March 22, 2007 at 12:29 PM

"His senate seat."

I tell ya...

UPDATE II

The Politico tries again.

That's more like it.

Meanwhile, Politico blogger Ben Smith, who wrote the incorrect story, explains and apologizes.

The source, whose anonymity I agreed to respect, spoke of the kind of grim prognosis Elizabeth Edwards herself just described hearing before a second round of tests came back. I trusted the source, somebody I've known for several years, and who has always been reliable.

And with less than an hour before Edwards was to announce, I unwisely wrote the item without getting a second source.

When the campaign pushed back harder than I'd expected, I added that information to the original item, but that doesn't undo the damage.

My apologies to our readers for passing on bad information.