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Home Front
Captain Corvair Strikes Again!
2003-12-12
Consumer advocate Ralph Nader said Thursday he is leaning toward another independent run for the presidency and will make his decision public in January.
Hurrah!
"We’re testing the waters," Nader said in an interview with CNN. "It’s a high probability but that is yet to be determined."
"The water’s pretty cold at the moment; we’ll get back to you."
"No! Wait! It's warming up! The water is... faintly yellow, with a slight whiff of ammonia, just a couple degrees less than body temperature..."
Nader has formed an exploratory committee for a 2004 run and said he would gauge his support through the success of fund-raising efforts and the number of volunteers who come forward.
"That, and how to best outflank Dean on the left!"
The consumer advocate last made a bid for the White House in 2000 on the Lunar Green Party ticket, when he won about 3 percent of the popular vote nationwide and got 5 percent or more in 12 states.
And saved us from the Gore administration. You’ve served this country with distinction, thank you very much.
In fact, some Democrats blamed Nader, 69, for siphoning off votes that might have gone to Democratic candidate Al Gore, especially in the hard-fought state of Florida, where Nader took 97,000 votes.
LOL
"Gore beat Gore," Nader says to those charges. "He didn’t get Tennessee, his home state. That would have made him president. And he blundered in Florida and didn’t ask for a statewide recount."
Facts are stubborn things...
"I would say to Democratic voters the following: If you think that a third party candidacy is going to take away votes and cost the Democrats the election, you’ve got the power entirely within your own franchise when you go to the voting booth and vote for the Democrats," Nader added.
"I weep for you, the walrus said. I deeply sympathize..."
He said if he and his ego were to run, he would focus his efforts on the third of the electorate that’s not aligned with either party and with the 100 million adults who are non-voters.
How’s Nader possibly going to capture the middle?
By sneaking up on it from the left?
Nader was in Princeton Thursday for a strategy session with Green Party activists to consider the pros and cons of another race. He said his decision will be twofold: whether to run for the presidency at all, and whether to run again on the Green Party ticket.
Seems to me the Dems won’t have squat to do with a Nader candidacy unless the bigwigs at the DNC, who will all be kicked out if / when Dean captures the nomination, use Nader as their firewall.
Hmmm... Y'know, Publicans are only allowed to give so much to the Bush campaign. If they gave nearly as much to a Nader campaign — ... Forget I said anything. Never mind.
Meanwhile, the party is divided on another Nader candidacy.
You mean that freak that lost in S.F. Tuesday?
Green Party member Larry Barnett, the former mayor of Sonoma, California, and now a member of its city council, said the party’s priority should be defeating George W. Bush.
No, but I was close...
"Any diversion from that, even rooted in principle, interferes with that goal," he said, explaining why he’s against another Nader run. "I would urge him to throw his weight behind whoever the Democratic Party puts up," Barnett said.
Unity, what an interesting concept...
In assessing the current field of presidential hopefuls, Nader hasn’t stopped laughing in weeks said he supports some of their platforms, but something’s missing.
Yes, like credible positions in the War on Terror, or anything credible out of John Kerry’s mouth.
Or coherence... Or seriousness of purpose. When did they start runing a laugh track at debates?
"I like some of the things that the Democratic candidates are saying, but you have to hold their feet to the fire," he said. "Sometimes that requires indulging my ego competing candidacies, greater choice and breaking up that exclusionary presidential debate organization."
Get rid of everyone except The Big Three of Bird, McHale & Parish Dean, Kerry and Gephardt and it will happen.
In the 2000 campaign, both Nader and independent candidate Pat Buchanan ran vanity campaigns that sucked up some federal dollars were excluded from the fall presidential debates between Gore and Bush.
"Ya, you puny girly-men hav ta leavvv!"
"I think there’s a great need for another nutbag progressive candidate for the presidency," Nader said. "The two parties are very much dialing for the same commercial dollars. The two parties are ignoring issues like a living wage."
Or realizing it’s not a important, winning issue.
In the 2000 race, Nader raised $8 million. He said if he mounts another campaign he hopes to raise between $5 million and $10 million.
Tilting at windmills once again...
Or dipping at troughs...
Another factor in his decision will be how the two main parties respond to a 25-page agenda he has sent to them, to determine whether they are addressing issues he believes are important.
"Jeeves!"
"Yes, Mr. Kerry?"
"Circular file for this Nader document, and don’t fuck it up!"
"Excellent call, sir!"
"One of the justifications for this campaign is to preserve and expand the right of third parties and independent candidates to challenge the two-party duopoly system," Nader said. "I see it as a civil liberties issue of free speech."
I see it as the return of the three ring circus. Politics, if nothing else, can be quite entertaining.
Posted by:Raj

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