A Dead Helmsley Over A Live Edwards

"We don't pay taxes," a former Leona Helmsley maid testified the hotelier said, "only little people pay taxes."

Whether Helmsley ever actually uttered those words or not, they engraved Helmsley's image as the "Queen of mean" on the public mindset, and they were remembered by the nation today as news of her death broke.

Helmsley went from the self-anointed spokesperson of the Palace Hotel, standing in a jeweled gown at the entry, pronouncing that the Palace was the only hotel in the world "where the Queen stands guard," to serving 21 months in prison for tax evasion. She was so thoroughly awful that a judge added 150 hours to her 750 hours of community service after it came to light that she had forced employees to perform her required service for her.

Helmsley earned her Queen of mean title unfair and unsquare, terrorizing employees, stiffing contractors, quibbling over bills and hatching plots against competitors for the Helmsley Hotels crown. An utter, unrepentant bitch, she died at 87 in one of her many luxurious homes.

Were she alive, I'd vote for her in a minute over John Edwards, the utter, unrepentant poser.

Edwards' revolting fawning over the poor while he lives on a 102-acre estate, his railing against mortgage lenders while he pockets $479 million from mortgage lenders, his $400 haircuts ... one can't imagine a more self-aggrandizing, despicable liar. (Just as one can't imagine that a sizable number of Democrats see him as a viable president.)

Helmsley tried for a while to project a public image of something other than what she was, but after her conviction and prison time, she allowed herself to fade into obscure, genuine nastiness. Meanwhile, Edwards seeks out the spotlight as he continuously tries to sweep his real self under the carpet, thinking he can fool the little people into seeing him as something other than what he so obviously is.