John Edwards Affair: Fred Baron, Post-Modern Fairy Godmother
There seems to be a parallel between the John Edwards affair and the fairy tale, Cinderella, especially when you look at the antics of Fred Baron, whose recent behavior reminds us of a post-modern Fairy Godmother.
Baron, Edwards’ long time pal, political backer, and former national finance campaign chairman of both of Edwards’ run for President, has admitted that he’s been supporting Edwards ex-mistress, Rielle Hunter, as well as former right-hand man Andrew Young and his family, since late December.
Texas Lawyer recently spoke to Baron, who admitted he had “helped” Hunter and Andrew Young to “relocate” to “another state”. Baron said the two were in a “horrible situation”:
“It was just a horrible, horrible situation,†Baron says. “I paid for them to relocate to another home in another state.†Baron says he paid for several months of rent on a house in Santa Barbara, Calif., out of his own pocket and didn’t inform Edwards. “I never discussed it with John. He was on the campaign trail in Iowa at the time,†Baron says.”
Baron claims that he didn’t learn of Edward’s affair until “two or three weeks ago” and that he was “shocked” when he found out. And yet, DBKP wondered, is Baron somehow claiming he had absolutely no idea what “horrible situation” Hunter and Young were embroiled in back in December?
Baron, whom the Edwards 2008 Campaign paid over $1 million for “reimbursement” of Edwards using Baron’s private jet, (think pumpkin a 128 times) not only “paid” for Hunter and Young to “relocate” but also put the two up in a $4 million gated palatial home.
Baron’s largess not only included whisking away the six-months pregnant Hunter and Andrew Young, who by then had left the Edwards’ campaign, but also Young’s wife, Cheri, and their 3 children. Hunter as well as Young and his family all “lived happily after” in the same home until Cheri, the “wicked stepsister” wife, got into a “spat” with Hunter, who then found her own “palace”, paid for by Fairy Godmother Baron. After Hunter had a baby daughter in February, Young failed to sign the birth certificate. Meanwhile the “handsome” prince, John Edwards, denied he ever “loved” CindaReille, or that he had her “glass slipper”.
Baron claimed both Young and Hunter “worked for the campaign” and that he’d known both of them “for years”.
According to John Edwards, Hunter’s production company was hired by his PAC, One America Committee, to film a series of mini-documentaries, or “webisodes”. Hunter began filming Edwards in July of 2006 for a period of six months where she followed Edwards around the country and filmed him in various locations. Edwards stated the affair didn’t begin until after Hunter came on board in July. Her work was finished by the end of December 2006. At the time Hunter lived in New York City, so we wondered, how did Baron come to “know” Reille Hunter for “years” as he’s claimed?
Andrew Young, a long time friend of Edwards, was a former lobbyist in the 1990′s who went to work for Edwards during his North Carolina Senate campaign. Young continued to work for Edwards as his “go-to” guy and by 2007 was earning somewhere in the range of $90,000 a year as Director Of Finance Operations. When the Enquirer rolled out its December 2007 headline: John Edwards’ Love Child Scandal, Young issued a statement through an attorney that he was the father of Hunter’s baby. The New York Times followed up on the connection between Young’s attorney and Fred Baron. According to Times, Baron now seems to have a fuzzy recollection as to whether he was involved in “directing” both Hunter and Young to attorneys who have ties to Baron.
The site, Overlawyered.com, has some terrific info on Young and Baron. The site has also been following Baron’s antics since before the Edwards scandal.
Baron, who’s been trial lawyer buddies with Edwards since the late 1990′s and poured millions into Edwards’ campaign coffers, would have known Young, but it’s still not clear how Baron knew Hunter. She was Edwards’ mistress during the period of time she followed Edwards around filming him for the webisodes. Even so, Baron would have us believe that not only did he know Hunter “for years” but that out of the goodness of his heart he shelled out hundreds of thousands of dollars to “help” her and Young “relocate” because the two were in a “horrible situation” being “hounded” by tabloid reporters even though, according to Baron, he HAD NO IDEA why the two were BEING HOUNDED.
The Enquirer, who was right all along about Edwards having an affair and covering it up, reported that shortly prior to Edwards’ “confession” on ABC’s Nightline, Hunter and her baby were flown by a private jet to the Virgin Islands. DBKP reported on August 20 Hunter was flown to St. Croix where she stayed with another crony of Edwards and Baron, attorney Lee Rohn. Is Rohn yet another “fairy godmother” in this post-modern Cinderella story with Rielle Hunter in the lead?
Overlawyered takes a look at Rohn, a controversial figure in judicial circles in the Virgin Islands.
According to sources, Fairy Godmother Fred still continues to support Hunter and her baby daughter, Frances Quinn. Evidently Godmother Fred didn’t watch Prince John give his confession of the affair on ABC Nightline. Edwards claimed the only reason he was caught sneaking out of Hunter’s Beverly Hilton Hotel room at 2:40 in the morning on July 21 was to stop CindaRielle from outing the affair and not to see if the glass slipper he’d had since the ball fit her slender foot:
“I am responsible for it. I alone am responsible for it. And it led to this most recent incident at the Beverly Hilton. I was at the Beverly Hilton. I was there for a very simple reason, because I was trying to keep this mistake that I had made from becoming public.”
If Edwards’ goal was to keep Hunter from spilling the beans about the affair, then why is Baron helping this woman out, sending her thousands of dollars, helping her relocate to California, flying her and her baby to the Virgin Islands? Why would he continue to help her after Edwards not only confessed that he had a liason with Hunter while running for President but that Hunter had threatened to reveal the affair?
In the original Cinderella, it was the Fairy Godmother who took Cinderella out of her ashcloth clothes she wore, dressed her in a fancy gown, and sent her to the ball in a pumpkin turned into a carriage where she met the handsome prince, fell in love, then lost her glass slipper.
In the post-modern version, Fairy Godmother is a long time friend of the handsome prince who poured some of his vast wealth into the prince’s campaign coffers.
Cinderella met and fell in the love with the Prince at a bar. The Prince was in the midst of running for King while his “beloved” wife battled cancer.
Cinderella becomes pregnant and moves to the same town as the Prince’s loyal servant, her new abode, owned by a synchophant of the Prince.
Cinderella claims the baby’s father is the Prince’s loyal servant. Fairy Godmother saves Cinderella and Loyal Servant, along with his family, from the clutches of evil “tabloid reporters”, sending them off in a pumpkin turned into a private jet, to a fancy home in a land far away to await the birth of Cinderella’s baby.
Cinderella’s child is born, no name of the father on the birth certificate.
The Handsome Prince gets caught by his nemesis, the evil tabloid reporters, sneaking out of Cinderella’s hotel room several months after her baby is born. Handsome Prince bemoans that fact that Cinderella isn’t more like Razpunzel, who could have let down her long hair for his escape.
Handsome Prince makes a royal announcement that he’d cheated on his wife while Fairy Godmother once more sends his pumpkin to Cinderella, whisking her and her baby off to the Virgin Islands. Loyal servant and family return to the kingdom.
No one knows who possesses the glass slipper.
It’s still up in the air who will live “happily ever after”.
By LBG
Image – Cinderella Rabbits
