February 27, 2004
Nader's Responsibility
Daily Kos || The Ethic of (Ir)Responsibility:"Nader refuses to entertain any discussion of the real-world effects of his actions as presidential candidate in 2000, either as it affected the voting or in terms of the results of that campaign. He repeatedly blames Katherine Harris and the U.S. Supreme Court for the fact that Bush became President, while refusing to consider that had he not been in the race that Gore would probably have won New Hampshire and would have won Florida by a margin too great for Harris and Jeb Bush to undermine. He says little about what he would do as President, revealing that he has no expectation of winning. He repeatedly make the absurd claim that those who've implored him to not run are just "hostages to an antiquated winner-take-all system" trying to "deny democracy and free speech," when in reality they are just pointing out that millions of people could bear he costs of his irresponsible exercise of democracy and free speech. In essence, he's painted a picture of himself in as a martyr, but he refuses to see that his saintliness will result not in his sacrifice but in the sacrifice of the legislative and consumer protections he's achieved, the ideals he claims to embody and protect, and the people on whose behalf he claims to act."This is a great entry. There's a section down below on how to determine whether someone really does have a calling to politics.
I used to be a huge Nader supporter, am a registered Green party voter and yet, have completely lost interest and respect for Nader recently. His agenda has become more important than his voters so that he exudes a pissed off energy at the very people who supported him in 2000. I recently saw him interviewed on "Meet the Press" and was utterly turned off by his meaningless but dramatic complaints about the "liberal intelligencia" and the "corporate paymasters." What? What the hell does that mean? As soon as a politician starts resorting to these inflated, meaningless statements like that, they've lost me. And my confidence. Is he just trying to show off his creative vocabulary? This is how I heard his speech, "blah blah blah blah liberal intelligencia blah blah blah blah blah corporate paymasters blah blah blah blah blah...." And then he talked about how we need to give people an opportunity to vote for him.. an opportunity to vote for someone besides our two choices. Um, okay... why? Just for kicks? Just because it's fun? Just to make a statement.. a statement that could cost us another 4 crappy years with Bush? Is it really THAT important to make your statement now, this way? So people can go to the polls and vote for a guy who won't win, because there's no chance of him winning and there's really no point in his running.. only to make it look like we actually have a choice? Kermit the Frog might as well enter. He's not going to win. And he's a lot more fun to vote for. And he uses words that make sense, too. How can you offer an option to people that has no chance of having results? That's not an option. That's a distraction. Look, this comes down to who we want for president- Kerry or Bush. This isn't a fun little game in how nice it would be if we actually had a third party that could gain the presidency. Nader is doing this for the mental sake of it.. as if he's sticking his fingers in his ears, yelling, "nyah, nyah, nyah, I can't hear you! I'm running!!" Nader has shown me that he is the one in denial about our present situation. There is a time and a place to fuck with the system. Now is not it.
Posted by: Tamara at March 4, 2004 03:42 PM