Today, Ralph Nader announced he is, yet again, throwing his hat into the Presidential ring. I welcome his voice in the political dialog, but I dread his candidacy. Anyone who thinks Nader is harmless is not paying attention. Given the certainty that Nader has zero chance of victory, his candidacy can serve only to pull votes away from the Democratic party nominee.
Lest we forget, Nader pulled 2.9 million votes in 2008, including 97,000 from Florida and 22,000 from New Hampshire, enough to throw those states from Gore to Bush (Bush “won” Florida by only 537 votes and New Hampshire by 7,211.) Thus, despite winning the popular vote, Gore lost the electoral vote 271 to 266.
Had Nader not run, without question Gore would have won both states, resulting in an electoral vote victory of 295 versus 242, an impressive 55% of the vote. Had all Nader voters instead voted for Gore, he would have had a comfortable popular vote margin of about 3.5 million votes. Bush would have returned back to Texas to spend his declining years butchering some other pet project, never to be seen again on the national stage, and the neocons, failing to achieve empowerment, would have slithered back under their rocks.
Imagine, without Nader, the world would have avoided 8 years of the worst Presidency in US history, a trillion dollars of war expense, hundreds of thousands of casualties, continued environmental ruin, extensive damage to international relations, a worsening dependency on fossil fuels and the terrorists those fuel purchases fund, a sustained attack on the Constitution, a growing theocracy and war on science, and a dangerously right-wing Supreme Court.
No margin for error is left. We can’t afford the possibility of McCain carrying on the George W. Bush legacy. Even if you prefer Nader’s ideology, please vote for the Democratic nominee and not for Nader. Voting for Nader will help his ego, but it won’t further your ideology by a centimeter.
20 Comments
February 24, 2008 at 4:21 pm
Well Gorn, I won’t blame Nader for all the wrong’s that happened…..I would put more blame on the judge’s and little brother bush..I do agree that Nadar shoulden’t be running, I would vote for him if I thought there was a good chance he could win…Perhap’s he is trying to get a 3rd party started or atleast be able to get them included on the balott..Hell I’m still pissed for what the Dem’s did or allowed with out a wimper to happen to Kucinich and then Edward’s..And let us not forget the way the Dem’s treated Nader last time, they were the one’s that kept him off many state’s balott’s…..We are still 9 month’s away from voting so i’m not goint to get to excited at this point…..Blessings
February 24, 2008 at 4:33 pm
I agree with you witch. I don’t blame Nader, I blame the system as it’s currently configured, and I blame individuals for essentially throwing away their votes instead of making best available use of the system that exists.
And I agree the SCOTUS and Jeb’s Florida machine bear direct responsibilities for how 2000 played out. On the other hand, things wouldn’t have been left up to them had people not voted for Nader in the first place.
I mean, the guy has already run four times before, and couldn’t crack 3% of the vote. He’s never modified his method or his message for the past 20 years. Why would anyone expect different results this time?
February 24, 2008 at 6:25 pm
Ralph is a closet Republican. He has acted as a spoiler in three elections, ensuring two Republican presidentual victories (2000 and 2004). Pat Buchanin did trip the vote in 2000 with the Palm Coast butterfly ballot in Florida.
February 24, 2008 at 6:38 pm
I hope voters are smarter this time, and realize how voting for Nader got us George W. Bush.
(barring manipulated voting numbers, of course)
Great post, Gorn!
February 24, 2008 at 6:53 pm
I posted this over at C & L and I’ll repeat myself here.
Ralph Nader should stick with what he does best… protecting Americans from corporate greed. What has he done in the last seven years? I haven’t heard him say anything about all the toxic products lining the shelves in our stores… toxic pet food, toxic toys, toxic drugs, etc… Exposing corporate greed is what Ralph excels at. This doesn’t make him presidential material.
February 24, 2008 at 6:58 pm
Ralph Nader has become too enchanted with himself. I will never forgive the Green Party for taking Rick Santorum’s Republican Party money for a Senate run against Bob Casey Jr. I equate this to the Lieberman Republican Money. Maybe Ralph wants a third party but I’ll tell you, the Green Party is not a good third party. They are just as dirty as the Republicans and the Democrats. I would be more prone to support the Progressive Party.
And who will Ralph snooker money from for his 2nd run for president? Didn’t he get the message when Edwards dropped out? There is no second chance. Get over it.
February 24, 2008 at 7:00 pm
Walt – you are right. Ralph is a closet Republican. It was the Republican party that sent financial aide to the Green Party in Pennsylvania in 2006.
February 24, 2008 at 7:57 pm
I do blame Nader for his quad-annual ego stroke. And as Cats said he was accepting most of his money from Republican operatives in 2004. He is nothing but a hypocrite that likes to think he is a revolutionary. Anybody want to look into his stock portfolio? Last I knew the late great Occidental Oil was not a clean, green, ethical corporate citizen. Didn’t stop him from making a killing on the stock. Nader disgusts me.
February 24, 2008 at 8:25 pm
Whatever anyone may think of Ralph Nader as either a person or a candidate, I would really like to see people stop blaming him for Bush winning Florida in 2000. It was not Nader’s fault (or Michael Moore’s for encouraging people to vote for Nader) that Gore failed to get enough votes to win Florida. There is plenty of evidence to show that the Republicans systematically lied and cheated to win. (And why blame Nader for getting, what may have been, legitimate votes, and not the former Republican-temporarily-turned-Democrat who designed the infamous Butterfly Ballot that resulted in accused-Nazi Pat Buchanan getting some 13,000 votes in Palm Beach, Florida, an area with a particularly dense population of elderly Jewish people who even Buchanan admits probably didn’t mean to vote for him?)
Vote for the candidate of your choice. The two-party system must be brought to an end. We need more political parties from which to choose, and neither the Democrats nor the Republicans should be among them.
That’s all I’m going to say about that. I’m going to watch Jon Stewart host the Oscars. Have a good evening, Everybody!
February 24, 2008 at 8:45 pm
I think Nader is payed off to run and disrupt things by the right. I think Ron Paul should run as an independent too since he has more money and support than Nader.
February 24, 2008 at 8:52 pm
My three reasons to vote for Ralph Nader:
1. You are sick of the two party system and want to throw your vote away.
2. You are thrilled with the last seven years of BushitCo and want at least four more.
3. You still, really, really hate the Corvair.
February 24, 2008 at 9:20 pm
Shayne, I am not sure about that but if you are a candidate running to the left of Democrats and you are accepting a large part of your contributions from Republican operatives…you might want to reconsider what you are doing.
February 24, 2008 at 9:25 pm
Hey we have an old Corvair!
February 24, 2008 at 9:26 pm
I am still angry with Nader about the 2000 election but I am a bitter old woman, and proud of it. Wanttomakesomethingofit?
February 24, 2008 at 9:28 pm
Well, he keeps defending his stance that there was no difference between Gore and Bush. After 7 years of Bush he is either delusional, in denial, or a liar.
February 24, 2008 at 9:33 pm
Well JP, when in doubt I tend to assume the worst. I’m rarely disappointed.
February 24, 2008 at 9:47 pm
I have owned two innovative GM products – the Corvair and the Vega. When I first got the Corvair, I could not drive over ten miles in the winter without either leaving the windows open or the gas-fired heater off (GM retrofitted a VW Bug style heater at about year 2). The Vega mixed gasoline and crankcase oil in equal proportions after 20K miles.
February 24, 2008 at 10:04 pm
I’m thinking when we want to sell that Corvair we’re not going to be able to do it here.
February 24, 2008 at 10:06 pm
A collector will pay you a ridiculous amount of money for it.
February 24, 2008 at 10:24 pm
I hope you’re right!
Can’t sell it to any of these informed types though. My husband spends his time off work watching Barrett Jackson Auctions on tv. He’s just a little obsessed with cars.