‘Unsafe in any election’
Don’t look now, but a certain third party candidate is considering a fourth presidential campaign.
Ralph Nader says he is seriously considering running for president in 2008 because he foresees another Tweedledum-Tweedledee election that offers little real choice to voters.
“You know the two parties are still converging — they don’t even debate the military budget anymore,” Nader said in a 30-minute interview. “I really think there needs to be more competition from outside the two parties.”
Nader praised Republican Ron Paul and Democrat Mike Gravel, lambasted Hillary Clinton, and concluded that it is “very unlikely” that any major party candidate would forestall yet another race.
As for a certain presidential election that led to the Bush Nightmare, Nader still insists that Gore would have won easily in 2000 if only he had done everything Nader told him to do. “We had proposals that if Gore had picked up on, he would have landslided Bush,” Nader said.
The unpleasantness of 2000 notwithstanding, Nader appears anxious to run yet again — he just doesn’t seem to know why.
He doesn’t expect to win, he doesn’t expect to change the Democratic agenda, he doesn’t expect to appear in the debates, and he doesn’t even expect to make the ballot in every state. So, what exactly is the point here?
“What third parties can do is bring young people in, set standards on how to run a presidential election and keep the progressive agenda in front of the people,” he said. “And maybe tweak a candidate here and there in the major parties.”
None of this is persuasive. Major parties can and do bring young people into the process, Nader’s multiple efforts have never affected election standards, and his campaigns have generally done a poor job of promoting progressive ideas and have instead focused on his disdain for the two major parties. As for “tweaking” candidates, that’s a pretty shallow reason to launch a presidential bid.
Chris Lehane, who worked in Bill Clinton’s White House and Gore’s 2000 presidential campaign, said of a possible Nader candidacy: “His entry into the race, even to those who voted for him in 2000, would be just another vainglorious effort to promote himself at the expense of the best interests of the public. Ralph Nader is unsafe in any election.”
Sounds right to me.
” “We had proposals that if Gore had picked up on, he would have landslided Bush,” Nader said.”
Does anyone know, or can they point me to, some study that might have been done to reflect what the electoral college results would have been if Nader didn’t run (assuming all Nader votes would have gone to Gore)?
The problem is not that Nader is running and could siphon progressive votes. The problem is the election system. The solutions are simple and could be implemented quickly.
Instant Run-off Voting!
Public Campaign Financing!
However you can’t drag a hog from its trough. Maybe we needed Nader and 8 years of Bush to bitch-slap us back into reality. You have to hit bottom before you can bounce back.
Chris LeHane… speaking of nasty creatures.
This makes my head hurt.
Even as he initiated the Bush nightmare, I think Nader did serve one positive purpose in 2000: he schooled progressives in the realities of politics, especially the reality that purist, vanity third party runs are at best futile and at worst suicidal.
The far right figured this out years ago, and converted one political party into their own vehicle to power, even though doing so meant enduring years of exploitation and lip service. Now progressives have started doing something similar to the Democrats.
I’ll see your Nader and raise you a Kucinich!
Imagine that!
Having Spock and the Keebler elf on the same ticket!
Why… it is enough to make a mature man go out and buy some plastic pointy ears.
How can Nader foresee anything with 20 billion candidates taking part in the debates and a handful of additional candidates still officially undeclared? Is he really saying he disagrees with all of them except Paul and Gravel? If that’s the case then he needs to convince one of them to run as an independent because I can’t think of any name more toxic to more voters in American politics than Nader.
In 2000 Nader gave us Bush, and in my book that negates any delusions of grandeur that Nader has of his being America’s political savior.
I don’t believe Nader caused Gore to lose. I used to think that. Democratic voter apathy did that far more effectively than anything Nader did. There was very low turnout, and it’s because the beltway insiders running the Gore Lieberman campaign were such fucking idiots. Republican voter suppression didn’t help either, but it was probably a relatively minor influence compared to voter turnout (someday we’ll know).
Nader can count on his Republican friends to bankroll another campaign, and a few progressive “purity trolls” will vote for him.
IMHO the anti-Bush anti-Republican tidalwave is going to make 2006 look like a blip, and there is nothing to fear from Nader or Freddy the Faker unless the Democratic leadership in congress continues to ignore the Democratic base allows the Iraq war to become (in the public eye) the property of the Democratic congress. Anyone who thinks the Republicans won’t try to hang it on us is CRAZY. Yes, it’s insane, and so was the swiftboating of Kerry.
To the Dems: Learn, dammit.
Reid and Pelosi will decide the outcome of the 2008 elections, not Ralph Nader. And you and I will decide it too, if we let our own leadership continue to ignore the Amercan people.
Again, it’s all about apathy. Nader has a point, in a way. If the Dems can’t even figure out how to oppose an extremely unpopular war and use that to drive out the Republican slimebags, then there’s less difference between the two parties than we need there to be.
Is it any coincidence that the majority of the donors to Nader are corporations? No, I think not.
They say “Perfect is the enemy of good enough.” They forgot to mention that Nader is the enemy of ‘good enough,’ too. While pushing for maximum change, however worthy, Nader is overlooking the fact that a Democrat would be better for his policies than a Republican president — since Democrats at least care about policies.
You know back in 2000, when it became clear that the outcome was going to be decided on razor thin margins either way it fell, I couldn’t help thinking it was pretty ironic that people calling themselves “Green” were going to go out and vote for against one of the foremost environmentalists ever to actually hold high elected offices in the US. I do tend to stop short of blaming them for Bush though, certainly Gore made a few mistakes of his own.
The funny thing is that one if there’s one positive thing the Bush administration and Republican congress have accomplished over the last several years, it’s pounding home the ridiculousness of the very myth of the “Demicans and Republicrats” that Nader is still out there hawking. Anyone still unable to understand that there are some very significant differences between the two major parties at this point has very simply spent the last 6 or 7 years living under a rock. So take your pick because one of them is going to win.
imho, if gore were to decide to run again, it wouldn’t matter this time if nader ran or not. i still believe that gore is the best candidate for president.
run, al, run!
…the best interests of the public.
Pfff.
Since when is anything that the two-sides-of-the-same-coin bidding for control of the CEO job of Slavery Incorporated, known as the Democrats and ReThugs, done in …the best interests of the public?
In my hometown of Kewanee, Illinois, “The Hog Capitol of the World,” they call that hog wash, and all of Washington, D.C. stinks to high hell from it.
CalD wrote: “The funny thing is that one if there’s one positive thing the Bush administration and Republican congress have accomplished over the last several years, it’s pounding home the ridiculousness of the very myth of the “Demicans and Republicrats” that Nader is still out there hawking. Anyone still unable to understand that there are some very significant differences between the two major parties at this point has very simply spent the last 6 or 7 years living under a rock.”
Unfortunately, I still know some ultra-progressive types who argue that very point, that there’s no difference. I suspect that the R’s actively push this myth, as well, knowing that the only people losing votes will be the D’s. Think of how many times the R’s have used the argument, “Well, Clinton did it too,” regardless of the truth of the matter.
“Does anyone know, or can they point me to, some study that might have been done to reflect what the electoral college results would have been if Nader didn’t run (assuming all Nader votes would have gone to Gore)?”
Gore needed nowhere near all Nader’s votes in Florida. IIRC, Nader got about 90,000 votes in Florida. Without Nader, Gore only needed a plurality of about 500 over Bush (among those 90,000 who decided to vote in the absence of Righteous Ralph) to carry the state. A no brainer. I beleive a similar analysis applies to New Hampshire, but off the top of my head, I am not sure if NH would have given the election to Gore without Florida (electoral tie?). How Ralph Nader sleeps at night is beyond me. He is despicable and has the blood of thousands on his sanctimonious hands.
WILL BLOOMBERG RUN?
Mayor Michael Bloomberg has done a very good job running NYC. His switch of party affiliation from Republican to Independent has fueled speculation that he may well run as a third party candidate for president in 2008.
Let’s look back to the effect of the campaign of a major third party candidate, Ralph Nadar, in 2000. Mr. Nadar garnered some 90,000 votes in Florida; Al Gore lost the state, in “official” count, by a little more than 500 votes. Certainly, Mr. Gore could have won by doing lots of thinks differently in his campaign, but clearly Nadar cost him the election.
Think of some of the probable difference in the last six years, had Gore won:
No invasion of Iraq with its disastrous consequences.
No massive deficit
No illegal eavesdropping, renditions, and the like.
No extensive and questionable politicizing of the Federal government
Continued respect by foreign nations and peoples.
Environmental improvement instead of deterioration.
Action on global warming
Appointment of Justices who respect women’s rights.
A Bloomberg candidacy would draw from Democratic voters, which could result in continued Republican misrule. Mr. Bloomberg, if you are pro-choice and believe in honest and competent government, make the right choice and do not run!
homer http://www.altara.blogspot.com
I think I’m going to move to Ohio or Florida and vote for Ralph Nader just to piss off a few of you folks who have bought whole-sale into the propriety of the cabal masquerading as our Constitutional Republic.
Again, I say pfff.
“I don’t believe Nader caused Gore to lose. I used to think that. Democratic voter apathy did that far more effectively than anything Nader did. There was very low turnout, and it’s because the beltway insiders running the Gore Lieberman campaign were such fucking idiots. Republican voter suppression didn’t help either, but it was probably a relatively minor influence compared to voter turnout (someday we’ll know).”
In an election as close as 2000, you can point to a million things. However, just take Florida. Absent any one of these factors (all beyond Groe’s control), Gore carries the state and the election:
1. Nader does not run or withdraws before election day.
2. The criminally stupid Democratic election commissioner in Palm Beach county did not design the notorious butterfly ballot.
3. Republican voter suppression, the most prominent element being the Jeb Bush administration commissioned purge of “felons” from the voting lists.
4. Had SCOTUS permitted the state to conduct a full and fair recount.
So Nader is not the only factor, but if not for him, Gore is president. That’s enough to make him liable under tort law.
Go drive your Corvair off a cliff, Ralph. It’s truly sad to see you become the worthless piece of dog excrement you have become. How much are the Republicans paying you this time, you otherwise-unemployable asshole?
comment 1 and 16
Nader threw NH and FL to Shrub. Setting FL aside.
Gore had 266 electoral votes (One DC elector withheld 1 electoral vote for Gore to protest the taxation without representation thing).
Add the 4 NH votes and the one withheld DC vote and Gore would have had 271 votes and the presidency.
In this instance the Busheviks would have (as Condi would say) moved Heaven and Earth in NM to reverse Gores 366 vote margin there and reassign NM 5 electoral votes from Gore to Shrub.
If the NM scheme did not work, the Busheviks would moan the spoiler role Buchanan played in throwing Iowa and its 7 electoral vote to Gore.
Nader/Lieberman 08. The WATB Party.
Do I wish we had a viable three+ party system? Sure. But we already have one party led by utter dickheads, know nothings and egomaniacs.
Shut up and siddown Nader.
Quite apart from anything else, even if an independent candidate such as Bloomberg, Perot, Nader, Anderson, etc., were to win the presidency, that candidate would likely have a vanishingly small power base from which to push the House and the Senate into doing his bidding. Sure, he’d get some mileage out of claiming a mandate from the public and he’d be able to build working coalitions on specific items, but without a party behind him, mostly he’d have a whole lot of people looking for ways to help him fail, especially all the partisans seeking revenge for their own party’s loss.
However, there is an interesting potential dynamic with Bloomberg. It seems to me that third-party candidates (like Nader) usually run on the extreme side of a party that is perceived as moving to close to the center, and they either throw the election to the opposing main party (like Nader 2000) or their potential suporters become pragmatic and ignore them (like Nader 2004), but eventually their original party shifts back their way to win back disaffected supporters. However, Bloomberg must be trying to do what Roosevelt tried to do with the ‘Bull Moosers’, which is to say, nucleate a national party in the political center. Bloomberg would have to split the Republican party and throw the fundie reich-wing crowd onto the trash-heap of history, in the hopes of combining pro-business Republicans, dismayed and disenfranchised moderate Republicans, and centrist democrats (the modern equivalents of Nixon’s “silent majority” and “Reagan democrats”). Since the Republican power structure is so far out of the mainstream, I’d have to say that Bloomberg’s chances are at least as good as Roosevelt’s were. However, unless the Democrats are extraordinarily clueless, the outcome should mirror the Democratic wins in 1912 & 1916.
Maybe we needed Nader and 8 years of Bush to bitch-slap us back into reality. You have to hit bottom before you can bounce back.
The Communists in Germany, 1932: Nach Hitler, Uns!
Worked a treat, didn’t it?
Re: Tom Cleaver @ #20
Go drive your Corvair off a cliff, Ralph. It’s truly sad to see you become the worthless piece of dog excrement you have become. How much are the Republicans paying you this time, you otherwise-unemployable asshole?
Just a friendly reminder that Flush Rimjaughb’s phone lines are open for anyone wishing to prove their anti-democratic, anti-choice mettle.
Re: TAiO @ #22
But we already have one party led by utter dickheads, know nothings and egomaniacs.
C’mon, TAiO, don’t talk about the Democratic party that way.
I wouldn’t advocate assassinating him… but how about drugging him and filming him in a bondage scene with transvestite prostitutes or something.
We need RID of this man!!!
RALPH NADER: If you are reading this, don’t you DARE stick your nose in this and inflict 4 years of another neocon on us, because THAT is all you will do you selfish son of a bitch. GO AWAY!!!
Thanks brian. As you note I thought it had more to do with other states where Nader influenced the vote vis-a-vis Gore and Buchanan influenced the vote vis-a-vis Bush. So it really does come down to Florida then.
I get the wailing and gnashing of teeth here, I really do. Nader contributed to the Bush Nightmare, and nothing will change that. (And I voted for him, albeit in NY where Gore was assured of victory anyway. If the same is true with Our Lady of Perpetual Triangulation on the November 2008 ballot, I’ll vote third-party again.)
But remember that Ralphie also ran in 2004, and he was a total nonfactor.
Next year, he’ll be four years older and that much less relevant, and I’d be surprised if he does even as well as he did in 2004. Nobody respects him anymore, or even takes him seriously.
I know what Nader’s thinking: “Why the fuck should I risk letting a Democrat win the White House?”
Sour grapes, pure and simple.
Nader has every right to run. The winner-take-all electoral system is not his fault, and I agree with MNProgressive that we need some kind of Instant Run-off Voting and/or the abolishment of the electoral college.
I’m pretty sure his entry into the race will be as irrelevant this year as it was in 2004, and living in MA, I will probably vote for him.
I first started hearing about instant runoff voting just around the time of the 2000 election
It’s seven years later. Well? Where is it?
If Nader and the Naderettes put one-tenth the effort into IRV as they do into his ego-trip/grudge-against-Dems presidential runs, if Patti Smith would sing “People Have the Freaking Power” one-tenth as often for IRV as for Ralphie, we might actually have IRV in this country. Well, we probably wouldn’t, but it might actually be discussed somewhere, and no one’s talking about it at all.
The Naderettes keep saying, “It’s not fair! We should have IRV! By magic!”
Well, boo-hoo. Do something about it. Then run your secular saint.
I voted for Ralph Nader in 2000, then voted for John Kerry in 2004. I gave Kerry a lot of money (hundreds of dollars) and gave his campaign hundreds of hours of my time — only to see him concede Ohio even faster than Al Gore conceded Florida in 2000. Yet I’m supposed to just WUV the spineless “Democrats.”
If Billary Clinton is the “Democratic” candidate in 2008, I will vote for Nader again.
Guess what, people? This is supposed to be a f***ing DEMOCRACY — which means that if Ralph Nader or anyone else wants to run for president, he or she has the CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT to do so if he or she meets the constitutional requirements.
Third-party candidate Ross Perot, who won 19 percent of the popular vote in 1992, surely lost Repugnican King George Bush I a second term, yet you didn’t see even the Repugnicans lambasting Perot for having run for president.
Yet “Democrats” blast Nader for exercising his constitutional, democratic right to run for public office — and then wonder why people like me are turned off by — and turn away from — the “Democratic” Party, which has seriously, seriously lost its way.
Nader is right — the Repugnicans and the “Democrats” are becoming more and more alike every day.
Yeah, Robert, feel free to vote without any regard for the possible conbsequences of your actions. After all, it worked out so well in 2000. We all know Al Gore would have been the worst president of all time, would have shredded the constitution, started a horrible war, and let New Orleans rot after Katrina, while laying the groundwork for the overturn of Roe, so what difference did Ralph’s Florida votes make?
I don’t blame Nader or any other third-party or no party candidate for running, or for any of the Dem losses. It is their right to run. I save my scorn for those citizens who failed to recognize and identify a) the actual and significant differences between the particular 2000 GOP candidate on the ballot that year and the particular 2000 Dem candidate on the ballot; and b) the actual and significant differences between the 2000 Dem candidate (who had/has been a real ‘green’ supporter and who has shown himself then and since to be a true heavyweight in domestic policy, foreign policy and green issues) and the actual 2000 Green candidate (who has since really done little to push true green issues). The information was available back in the run-up to the 2000 election. Many chose to ignore the information or the signs of what would happen if Bush won in 2000. These people had the constitutional right to vote for Nader back then, and I support that. However, they also need to own up to that vote and the consequences of that vote–consequences which were all but assured if Bush were to win the 2000 election.
bubba wrote: “I don’t blame Nader or any other third-party or no party candidate for running, or for any of the Dem losses. It is their right to run. I save my scorn for those citizens…”
I agree with the scorn of those citizens who like to blur the line between D’s and R’s. While I certainly agree that the parties share certain unpleasant characteristics, the last 6 years have conclusively demonstrated that the differences between the parties are night and day. Anyone who thinks the country would be in the same shape with D’s in office is genuinely delusional.
The Nader-voters to me embody the ‘self-loathing’ stereotype that conservatives like to paint liberals with – the Naderites hate nobody more than a liberal who doesn’t agree with their particular policy views. A Naderite at the voting booth would say, “Aha! I’ll vote for Nader this cycle! Maybe eight more years of economic downturn, war, and fascist governing will teach you lousy D’s to pay more attention to (insert pet project here).”
I personally do blame Nader, as well: sure, he’s got a legal right to run for President, but something being legal doesn’t mean it’s morally just. Nader damn well knows he can screw up elections – I suspect he’s trying to hold the D’s hostage to his particular political interests, and he’s willing to bring the rest of the country down with him.
“What third parties can do is bring young people in, set standards on how to run a presidential election and keep the progressive agenda in front of the people,” he said. “And maybe tweak a candidate here and there in the major parties.”
I can see this being a very strong reason for different people to keep trying, as I’m all for more choices, but dude, Nader, please, just stop. After all these years you haven’t managed to even sustain the enthusiasm of the minorities you once had, much less increase support. There’s optimistic and then there’s delusional. You’re starting to become an embarassment on the level of that nut who thinks he’s a Democrat, LaRouche.
“…he foresees another Tweedledum-Tweedledee election…”
And anyone who makes a statement like this, knowing what we all know now and what has occurred over the last 6+years, should forfeit any and all rights to ever participate in the public discourse ever again, until they are dead PLUS 10 years, let alone be allowed to run for office. But if he does run, he should be referred to as ‘Tweedledouche.’
In defense of third parties, don’t blame Nader for Bush, it’s not his fault Bush got elected. It’s the Bush supporters’ fault Bush got elected.
Blaming Nader is a concession that there should only be the two parties, Democrat and Republican. I don’t believe there should be a two-party system. Instead we should reform more of our elections to make it easier for a multiplicity of parties to be able to competently participate, and for voters’s interests to be better reflected on the ballots. That gives everyone more choices on who to vote for rather than the bare minimum democracy we currently practice. Fusion voting, for example, or instant runoff. There’s a ton of ideas, all of them better than the status quo that only benefits the two major parties.
“It’s the Bush supporters’ fault Bush got elected.”
Especially those in 2004. I save both scorn AND contempt for those 60,000,000+ numbnuts.
Nader. Vader. That’s the only Tweedle-Dum, Tweedle-Dee I see. But the only way that “Nader-Vader” can save us from the Empire is to throw himself into the core of his imaginary Death Star….
“Third-party candidate Ross Perot, who won 19 percent of the popular vote in 1992, surely lost Repugnican King George Bush I a second term”
This is a fantasy Naderites like to tell themselves.
Ross Perot took about equally from Bush I and Bill Clinton. That is reality.
“It’s the Bush supporters’ fault Bush got elected.”
The reality is, in any Titanic-scale disaster like electing Bush, there are in fact many people who bear culpability for the mess. On the Titanic, a dozen independent factors coalesced into the stunning loss of life, and the captain, the ship designer, and the man who didn’t put lifeboats on board all bear some responsibility for what happened. Everyone who did (or did not) do something that one could foresee leading to tragedy earned their share.
Bush’s election in 2000 was the result of similar confluence of events. Bush supporters should have known better, and Gore should have been more aggressive and less tame as a candidate. Nader and Nader supporters also bear the blame, because in the two party system we currently live under, it was obvious that the only significant outcome of his candidacy would be to siphon votes away from Gore. Our system sucks, but as long as it works the way it does, a third party candidate will always be a potential spoiler.
As to there being no difference between R’s and D’s, someone probably said it before, but I’ll say it again: 100K deceased Iraqis would probably argue that there was a big difference.
“100K deceased Iraqis would probably argue that there was a big difference.”
As would 3,500+ US families of deceased soldiers, and tens of thousands newly and permanently disabled (physically and mentally) vets.
“As would 3,500+ US families of deceased soldiers, and tens of thousands newly and permanently disabled (physically and mentally) vets.”
Indeed. The consequences of the 2000 and 2004 elections are all around us. Those who seem to think that elections don’t mean anything should think about that a bit.
Nader cost Gore the 2000 election. Voites for Nader came out of the progressiive side of the vote. Nader received 97,000 votes in Florida, and that would have been enough to swing Florida for Gore.
The votes Nader pulled in New Hampshire cost Gore that state as well. Gore takes New Hampshire and Florida becomes irrelevant.
racerx@ 9
it was the purists staying home that caused that low turnout.
Those that came to the poll to vote down ticket punched Nader as a protest.
6 years later, Democrats are calling themselves “progressive” to get the purists to come back to the polls. They used to call themselves liberal.
Oh well, I’ll take “progressive” and chicken.
If Hilary wins, I’ll vote Nader safely assuming the Democrats have taken me for granted AGAIN. Anybody but her, I’ll punch blue.