LEWISTON – Two weeks after her husband came to town, Elizabeth Edwards – wife of Democratic vice presidential candidate John Edwards – campaigned here Wednesday.

Edwards spoke, then took questions, from a mostly female audience at Lewiston-Auburn College.

Healthy families need good jobs, but more families “are walking along a narrow edge” as jobs have disappeared under the Bush administration, Edwards said. The jobs that have replaced the lost jobs pay less. While incomes have gone down, college tuition, child care, health care costs have risen. The country needs an administration that “sees the problems. This president doesn’t see your faces and doesn’t know your stories,” she said.

Kerry and Edwards would improve the plight of middle-class families by rolling back tax cuts for the wealthy, making health care and college more affordable, and by keeping promises to the states so safety net programs aren’t cut, Edwards said.

She answered questions on topics ranging from Iraq to education to energy independence. A man said his nephew is stationed in Iraq and “calls up crying because of all the civilian casualties. … Was it worth it?”

“We went in for the wrong reasons, but we’re there now and we need to finish,” Edwards said. A Kerry-Edwards administration would involve the Iraqi people in reconstruction and security, something the current administration is not doing, she said.

One woman said she works with single mothers who are “terrified” of being drafted and their children being put into foster homes.

“Senator Kerry will not do a draft,” she said to applause.

Another woman said she volunteers for the Kerry-Edwards campaign, and asked what she should say to undecided voters.

The country needs to change direction, Edwards answered. The country has gone from a $5 trillion surplus to a $3 trillion projected deficit. “What do we have to show for it?” she asked.