The Associated Press reports that although Edwards has been saying publicly for a month that the liaison is nothing but a lie, he changed his tactic and admitted the indiscretion, saying the affair took place in 2006. He called it a "serious error in judgment" and said he confessed his dalliance to his wife, Elizabeth, who has been diagnosed with an untreatable form of breast cancer.
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So who is Rielle (pronounced "Riley") Hunter? If you read "My Life Story," Jay McInerney's novel of 1980s excess and degradation, you'll know. Hunter has long been said to be the inspiration for the book's "cocaine-addled, sexually voracious" character Alison Poole. McInerney told The New York Post's "Page Six" gossip column that Hunter used to be "a real party girl," but has calmed down in recent years. Formerly known as Lisa Druck, she was hired by Edwards' presidential campaign in 2006 to produce four Web videos showing Edwards as a down-to-earth, regular guy. Even though she had no experience in the field, she was paid $114,000. In one of the videos, Edwards jokes with several people traveling with him, including a woman who is not visible on camera. "That is a great speech," AP reports he tells her as he reviews the words he will later deliver to an audience: "If we want to live in a moral, honest and just America...we can't wait for somebody else to do it. We have to do it." That makes the woman laugh.
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Edwards says the baby girl, born February 27, is not his since the affair ended in 2006. He has offered to take a paternity test, but CNN reports that Hunter's attorney says his client won't allow a test. She calls such a test an invasion of her privacy. No father's name is listed on the baby's birth certificate. Andrew Aldridge Young, a married father of three and former aide for Edwards, claims the child is his.
