Sen. Barack Obama has released a statement responding to reports that his rival, former Sen. John Edwards, is dropping out of the race for the Democratic presidential nomination. It's a pretty flattering statement, which is interesting, since Edwards reportedly has no plans to endorse any candidate yet.

The full statement:

"John Edwards has spent a lifetime fighting to give voice to the voiceless and hope to the struggling, even when it wasn't popular to do or covered in the news. At a time when our politics is too focused on who's up and who's down, he made a nation focus again on who matters -- the New Orleans child without a home, the West Virginia miner without a job, the families who live in that other America that is not seen or heard or talked about by our leaders in Washington. John and Elizabeth Edwards have always believed deeply that we can change this -- that two Americas can become one, and that our country can rally around this common purpose. So while his campaign may end today, the cause of their lives endures for all of us who still believe that we can achieve that dream of one America."

Update: Readers have commented that some phrasing in the statement as I originally posted it -- specifically "that two Americans can become one" -- seems odd, probably like a typo. That's the way the Obama campaign had it in their e-mail of the statement, but it definitely didn't seem purposeful, and they've fixed it on their Web site, so I've changed it to "two Americas" as well.