Unlike many of my compatriots, I am not really amused at the fact that Nader has decided to run for President again. There’s something vaguely depressing about watching a 70 year old man spend valuable lifespan campaigning for a single-digit percentage of the popular vote, not to mention the fact that he’s probably going to be as relevant in 2004 as Perot was in 1996. Only the real diehards are likely to vote for him: indeed, at least one person is claiming that he’d help the Democrats. Mind you, I don’t believe this, myself, as I expect that all the people who would have been motivated to vote against Belial/Nader would have already been motivated to vote against Lucifer/Bush. Still, the odds of him throwing the election one way or the other are nil. He must know this, which leads to two questions:
1, So why is he doing this?
and
2, Do I really care?
Tentative answers:
He is an idiot.
and
I hope not.
Well, I hope you’re right and you probably are re his ability to impact the election this time. But if Florida is down to 500 votes again…
It’s vanity, it’s ego, it’s overwhelming self-regard. Kleiman has an interesting take, and not one I’ve heard all that much:
Four years ago, when Ralph Nader ran for President, he got more or less a free pass both from his opponents and from the press. Gore didn’t want to alienate Nader voters, Bush knew that none of the Nader votes were coming from his column, and the press, after years of getting good stories from Nader and his colleagues, treated him as sacrosanct.
One of the bitterest lessons I learned as a young and naive liberal staffer on Capitol Hill was that the “public interest research” produced by the Nader groups was systematically fraudulent. Every time I actually got into an issue deeply enough to understand the details — nuclear power, toxic waste, pharmaceutical regulation — I discovered that the Naderites had no more respect for the facts than the industries they were fighting: in some cases, less.
So let’s hear a little less about St. Ralph this time. Someone should ask some pointed questions about how he got to be a multimillionaire. (Hint: What happens to the royalties on the books that the underpaid Public Citizen employees write under Nader’s by-line?)
… as relevant in 2004 as Perot was in 1996
With any luck, less relevant. Remember, Perot got 8.4% of the vote in 1996. Only George Wallace, Bob LaFollette and (of course) Teddy Roosevelt have done better as third-party candidates since 1900, and only Teddy Roosevelt has done better than Perot did in 1992.
What chance is there currently/in the distant future of a third party of any significant size in US politics?
And, would that be a good thing?
I like Nader for at least two reasons. The notariety of his book, Unsafe and Any Speed lent a added drama to a ride in a 1963 Corvair with a missing floor board I had about thrity-three years ago. I was seated in the back seat and the driver, who liked to make eye contact while talking, was explaining to me the differents landmarks as New York City flew by. So thanks to Ralph for adding the exclamation mark to one of the five most scary car rides of my life.
The other reason I like Ralph is that he, like Gordon Lightfoot and me, Bell’s Palsy (their’s was much worse in that the effects are still quite noticable on them).
So you see, I’ll always have a bit of sympathy for the man.
Answers:
1) Vanity and/or insanity (take your pick but both are plausible where Nader is concerned)
2) Since you saw fit to make this the topic of one of your rare political posts, the answer is self-evidently “yes.” 😉
I do not believe though that Nader’s entrance into the race will make much of a difference even in swing States since he is running as an “independent” without the infrastructure of even a laughable excuse for a party like the Green Shirts to get him ballot access. It could however put pressure on Kerry from the Far Left for his vote to authorize the use of force in Iraq and cause him to flip-flop even more, further demonstrating his unsuitability for the role of municipal animal control specialist much less commander in chief.
Last time around I agreed with Nader that it wasn’t his responsibility to worry about whether or not his candidacy helped Bush get elected. I admired his rationale that both Republicans and Democrats owe far too much to special interests and that a strong third party would be good for the nation.
Then he chose an inexplicably under-qualified running mate, and I thought, “He’s just poking fun.”
This time around, I can see nothing short of ego pushing him toward this. Again, it needn’t be his concern what his candidacy does to others’ campaigns, but if he were truly interested in a viable third party, he’d support another candidate and offer to be that person’s running mate or help in some other way. He can’t win, and there are more appropriate ways to raise issues than interjecting oneself into a process that should really be taken more seriously.
Where that leaves Pat Paulsen, I’m not sure, but…
While St Ralph’s run is not amusing, all the spewing by the left very much is. I particularly enjoyed the question about how St Ralph made his millions, a question which should be asked about a whole host of similarly situated people on the left.
I expect that within a month or so only FOX will still be hyping the Nader campaign but until then it is a great tabloid type story that is easier for the press to explain than the complex challenges that face our country.
You know, I’m pretty confident Nader wouldn’t run if he didn’t still see a gaping void in the selection of candidates. Is it really coincidence that he announced his campaign just days after Dean called it quits? Democrats need to stop falling over each other to see who can unleash the most vitriol on Nader and instead should think long and hard about why young, liberal voters jumped ship in 2000 and then got behind an independent-minded Democrat like Dean in this primary campaign. I fear the DNC is teetering on the brink of forgetting the lessons of 2000, if it ever learned them in the first place.
Probably. While Kerry may not have been the anti-liberation candidate like Dean and Kuchinich, he does have a voting record which is just as far if not further to the Left than either Kuchinich or Kennedy.
No doubt if the Dean Dongs had their way and Dean became the nominee, Nader would still run because Dean favored the death penality for terrorists or some other position that was too mainstream for the Green Shirts.
BTW: I hope that Katherine noticed that I just said something nice* about her preferred candidate 😉
TW
* Although on reflection, it may not be true.
Thorley, seeing as I noted a couple of weeks ago that ‘Rethuglicans’ was impolite, I’m going to have to do the same about ‘Dean Dongs’. We do have Dean supporters posting here, and I’d imagine that they don’t like being compared to vaguely chocolate-flavored sponge cakes. 🙂
LOL, I actually hadn’t made the junk food connection when I heard it on the Commish.
Unless of course he was referring to the song 😉
Actually, it’s “Green Shirts” that bothers me more. Unless the comparison to Brown/Black Shirts is accidental, but in that case I don’t see why the capital letters….
1. Christ knows. Ask Mel Gibson.
2. You should care: it means that the loser you endorsed* for the Presidency actually has a chance of being elected this time. Nader on the ballot means Bush may win (or at least come close enough that he’ll lose the way he lost last time and get to be appointed President again). Before Nader announced he was running, Bush didn’t have a chance.
*Still wondering if you’re ever going to explain the hypocritical reasons** you gave for endorsing Bush over Kerry.
**Not that you don’t have a perfect right to endorse Bush over Kerry: I’m not quarrelling with that. The reason you gave for endorsing Bush over Kerry was mindbogglingly hypocritical, though, and while it wouldn’t have been a surprise from Thorley or Timmy, it was, well, mindboggling coming from you.
“What chance is there currently/in the distant future of a third party of any significant size in US politics?”
“And, would that be a good thing?”
Not much, and not particularly. It’s not a parliamentry system, and while there are pros and cons to each, trying to make the one into the other isn’t particularly advantageous.
“Only George Wallace, Bob LaFollette and (of course) Teddy Roosevelt have done better as third-party candidates since 1900, and only Teddy Roosevelt has done better than Perot did in 1992.”
Wouldn’t Teddy be a dream candidate today? Militant on establishing democracy by war, but breaking up the trusts and fighting for protection of the workers and common citizens?
Where’s the new Teddy?
Not a whole lot of young liberal voters jumped ship in 2000–enough to make a difference in a very close race (but probably cancelled out by voters who jumped ship to Buchanan on the other side), but nowhere near enough to win an election.
Remember that if the Democrats move left, they will be losing votes too, and quite possibly more than they’d gain. Winning *your* vote won’t win a nationwide election.
In my opinion, what would make Nader a terrible President isn’t just that I don’t like his policies–it’s that he is an activist, not a politician. He’s used to suing his evil opponents and getting court orders forcing them to be good. That doesn’t work for a President in a democracy–no matter how good you are and how wicked the other party is, if they have enough votes, you will have to give them some of what they want. Because like it or not, those evil people get to vote too (for whatever value you assign to “those evil people”, which for Nader supporters probably includes me.)