  The central tenet of effective theory is that the details of short-distance
physics will not have a significant impact on low-energy observables. Here we
perform an analysis of electron-deuteron scattering at low momentum transfers
which is based on effective field theory. We show that in our approach the
deuteron electromagnetic form factors $F_C$ and $F_M$ indeed are largely
insensitive to the short-range $NN$ potential at momenta $Q$ up to about 700
MeV. We also find that the effective field theory approach to deuteron
electromagnetic structure provides a systematic justification for many features
which have been seen in potential model calculations of the same quantities.
