Nader's Nadir

What’s up with Ralph Nader? He’s making less sense every day. While he eschewed the Green Party this time around to run an “independent” presidential campaign, and even as he insists he’s capable of peeling off substantial numbers of disgruntled Republican voters, Nader nevertheless tapped Peter Camejo, a Green Party honcho with an exclusively leftist appeal, as his VP choice today.

Camejo, a Bay Area-based fund manager, has been a dusty fixture on the radical left for literally decades. Back in the sixties, Camejo ran for president on the ticket of the Trotskyist Socialist Workers Party. Camejo got 5% of the vote as the 2002 Green Party candidate for California Governor. Last fall he ran again in the recall election but by the end of the race was mostly polishing the apples of doomed Democratic candidate Cruz Bustamante.

If Camejo could muster more than 100 Republican or conservative votes (disgruntled or not) nationwide it would be a miracle. So much for Nader’s notion of appealing across ideological lines.

The Nader campaign – what there is of it—now seems to be driven by the same bureaucratic imperatives of any traditional campaign, albeit on a micro scale. Ralph now just wants to get on as many ballots as he can, at whatever cost, and with whomever it takes to get there.

My colleague Dougie Ireland, already outlined earlier this year Nader’s grim alliance with whacko cultists – a marriage cooked up to get Ralph on the New York ballot. Now Nader’s choice of hack Camejo is aimed not at winning any serious number of voters but rather at picking up the Green Party’s formal endorsement, along with its ballot line in 22 states.

The Greens meet in convention this week where in between “twinkling” at each other they will decide whom if anybody to nominate for president. Lawyer David Cobb has been leading with a plurality of delegates promising to run a “strategic” campaign that would not draw votes from John Kerry in key toss-up "battleground" states. But Nader now might also pick up the delegates that had been pledged to Camejo.

Nader could very well then finish this weekend as, once again, the official Green nominee. But the Party itself is almost certain to emerge from the convention weakened and split.

I don’t think much of this matters very much as I wrote earlier this year. The Green Party, like Western Civilization, is a good idea that never really got off the ground. Nader, meanwhile, seems to be rapidly squandering a lifetime’s worth of well-earned respect. Running a third party campaign during this election cycle would have been tough enough even if conceived and implemented in the most thought-out, strategic, and serious manner. Now, with Camejo as his running mate, Nader’s lonely quest threatens to turn into nothing more than a carnival sideshow.

Comments

[rosedog]

"....The Green Party, like Western Civilization, is a good idea that never really got off the ground...."

(sound of laughing....sobbing....laughing...sobbing....)

Okay, Marc. It’s time your BLOG had a Products section and the above text is the obvious choice for your first line of mugs and refrigerator magnets.

[Marc Cooper]

Im taking orders. Shall I put you down for a gross?

[Tucker]

I didn't realize John Kerry was entitled to my vote.

My bad.

[rosedog]

Heck, yeah. My Christmas shopping issues solved in one fell swoop---with a few left over for unexpected birthday gifts. Cool! Doesn't get better than that!

[Clare Quilty]

Shoulda picked the other Peter, what's his face... oh yeah, Coyote.

[Marc Cooper]

Ticker.. Precisely BECAUSE Kerry is not entitled to your vote it is such a shame that the Nader-Green project is headed for nowhere. I saw your blog item on Camejo.. quite a rosy view. And I dont think that Kerry is going to be "eating his heart out" because Camejo is bi-lingual and born in Venezuela. So what? Bush is also bi-lingual.And Ms. heinz-Kerry speaks five languages and was born in Mozambique. Thanks, btw, for the link to the Gephardt posting.

[Tucker]

Marc, I'd first like to thank YOU for great resource. It's tough to find strong, independent thinkers, especially this election cycle.

This includes Nader, who I tacitly support because the Democrats marginalized the man who drove the debate and had the greatest grassroots funding machine during the primaries. Howard Dean "gave the soul back" to the party, yet Terry McAuliffe and the DNC worked to bring him down in favor of another Washington fat cat who switches positions like they're ice cream flavors.

My belief is that there is a middle ground with respect to the "Nader Effect" in this election. The Democrats overstate the effect and Nader understates it.

With Comejo, Nader has chosen a man who is a terrific speaker and has faught for many of the same causes as Nader for many years. (To correct you, he was born in New York - his parents were Venezuelan immigrants.)

What's exciting is that we'll get to see this week where the Green's priorities are: to they want to be a REAL party and play with the big boys, or they simply democrats in disguise? We'll find out.

[Pug]

Marc..To say Bush is bi-lingual is a bit of a stretch. He tries to trot out a little pidgin Spanish at certain events, but I can tell from my own limited knowledge of Spanish that even mine is better than his.

It's hard to figure out Ralph Nader. His only real accomplishment in the November election would be to play spoiler again. Republicans surely welcome his help in a year when a couple percentage points could turn the election again. You wonder what makes this guy tick. Doesn't he have something better to do?

From reading what you write, it appears you have a problem. You don't like Bush, Kerry or Nader. What's a guy to do?

[Eric Blair]

If you can't find somebody to vote for, then pick somebody to vote against. But vote.

[Markus Rose]

FYI -- The Ramones first album was released in 1976, not "back in the sixties." Ditto Camejo running for president.

[Doug Purdie]

Camejo ran in 1976. It was the Gerald Ford - Jimmy Carter election. I remember because that was the first year I was eligible to vote in a national election. He spoke at the Community College where I was attending (San Jose, CA). I was young and under the influence of academia. He impressed me (He still is an impressive man and speaker, just a lousy policy maker.). I voted for him. He may have run previously in the sixties, but '76 was the first year I remember hearing about him.

[Marc Cooper]

Doug... I stand partially corrected. Camejo indeed ran for Prez in 1976.. but he was definitely an SWP national candidate in 68..probably VP. I'll try to look it up.

[Jack M]

As a conservative, my views are suspect around here. But it appears that there is one big issue about Nader that few are willing to discuss. Nader and the Greens represent a distinct group of ultra-leftists with very little in common with todays (or yesterdays) Democrat party. Nader is, of course, a waaay-left leftist and now he has picked another ultra-lefty. The views of these two men are, basically, antithetical to the modern, corporate Democrat party. Nader is NOT a Democrat, AND he and the ultra-left probably benefit more with a conservative administration than with Democrats (just as Rush and the hard-right benefit when the dems are in charge)

So I have to laugh when I see Democrats criticise his reasons for running and expect him to pull together to beat Bush. I think he WANTS Bush to win, it energizes the ultra-left.

[sagebrushsammy]

The tone and quality of this discussion board has improved markedly in the last few days - I wonder why. It would undoubtedly be an oversimplification to attribute the entire effect to the glorious and welcome absence of "steve" who I hope has found a girl/ or boyfriend to distract him. Perhaps the fact that Marc is patiently undressing all the candidates for American Idol and forcing us to recognize that not only the emperor but also all his alternatives, half his critics and 9/10 of his subjects have no clothes is generating thought.

[Marc Cooper]

Holy cow, Sagebrush, I KNEW something was different. Yeah...now that you point it out!

[Michael Turner]

I can remember exactly where I was standing when I heard the news that Jonestown had committed mass suicide. (Center Street, outside Bongo Burger, in Berkeley, if you really must know.) Jim Jones supplied campaign shock troops to certain Democratic party members in San Francisco politics. I'm no stranger to the notion that leftist politicians can be odd bedfellows with "whacko cults."

Still, when I read of Ralph Nader's tie-up with the New Alliance Party, run by one Fred Newman, who, according to an LA Weekly reporter Marc cites, said that Jews are "storm troopers for decadent capitalism," I had to wonder if somebody hadn't gone a little over the top. Nader, tied up with proponents of the International Jewish Conspiracy?

In a story by Thomas Edsall in the Washington Post on March 15th, 2000 I found the following clarification:

-----

One point of convergence for Buchanan, Fulani and Newman is that each has been accused of anti-Semitism. Newman, who is Jewish, denies the charge and stands by past comments, which he said are critical only of certain elements of Zionism. In 1985, he said some Jews agreed to "function as the storm troopers of decadent capitalism against people of color the world over . . . in the forefront in the war against the empowerment of black people, of Puerto Rican people." Noting that the Anti-Defamation League "was aghast at this remark," Newman said, "Frankly, I've never understood why it's anti-Semitic."

Newman alleged that in response to the Holocaust, "some of the leadership of the Jewish community" entered into "arrangements with international capital so as to make sure that it would never happen to them again. . . . It puts Jews, unfortunately and tragically, in the position of supporting American oil interests and other interests in the Middle East. And [thus]. . . in the position of making war on oppressed people . . . not unlike what happened to them."

----

Leftist cant? OK. Standard issue leftist critique of Zionism? No doubt. Inflammatory? Absolutely.

Anti-semitic? Sorry, I don't see it.

Read the rest of the article. All I see is a bunch of leftists becoming relatively pragmatic (i.e., horse-trading) party hacks. Relatively, I must stress. How many leftists do you know who'd help a Jesse Ventura ally get elected? The man's practically a libertarian.

[steve]

The tone and quality of this discussion board has improved markedly in the last few days - I wonder why. It would undoubtedly be an oversimplification to attribute the entire effect to the glorious and welcome absence of "steve" who I hope has found a girl/ or boyfriend to distract him.

--i'm in new orleans on vacation, sorry to disappoint--i live yet. interesting, when the echo chamber doesn't have to deal with opposing points of view, suddenly the 'quality' of 'discussion' is seen as 'imporoving'.

[steve]

Nader and the Greens represent a distinct group of ultra-leftists with very little in common with todays (or yesterdays) Democrat party.

--are they really that 'ultra-left'? they seem pretty classically american populist to me. i'm curious what defines nader or the greens as 'ultra-leftist? they tend to be defensively anti-big, pro small-business (and all the mythology that that calls for), pro-competition. an odd notion for 'ultra-leftist' if you mean that.

[Michael J. Totten]

Steve: "when the echo chamber doesn't have to deal with opposing points of view, suddenly the 'quality' of 'discussion' is seen as 'imporoving'."

News flash for ya! You are not the only person who comes over here to argue with the blog host. See above thread.

[steve]

News flash for ya! You are not the only person who comes over here to argue with the blog host. See above thread.

--i know that, but the excuse that there is something about 'the way' i argue that makes people upset is unique. the arguments people make above in their disagreements with marc are not any different than the type of arguments I've raised or the way I've raised them.
i'm still curious how Nader is 'ultra-left', or is raising that question what you mean by unreasonable and 'trolling'? Doug Henwood's done some fine pieces picking apart the idea that Nader is all that left-wing. Have anything that would refute Henwood?

[steve]

from henwood on nader in 2000:

"For a campaign, if you can call it that, that foregrounds economic issues, Nader's economic analysis is actually quite thin. In fact, he's a prisoner of his own legalistic view of the world. He devoted over 1,000 words of his over-15,000-word acceptance speech to the beauties of litigation. He asked his audience, rhetorically, if they realized that "the two pillars of the American legal system are the Law of Torts and the Law of Contracts." Now of course he wasn't celebrating the right of one firm to sue another, but of citizens to sue corporations that wrong them. But he has far less to say about the systemic imperatives that lead corporations to manufacture exploding cars and to poison rivers - the drive to lower costs and fatten profits. Litigation is an individualized solution to broad economic and social conflicts whose proper arena is politics, not the courtroom.

If Nader has ever ventured into serious economic analysis, he's kept the result well hidden. He denounces monopoly and promotes competition, without much apparent understanding of what these terms mean. There's little question that the economic scene today is more competitive than it was 20 or 40 years ago. Then, during the Golden Age, price leaders like U.S. Steel and GM set the terms for their industries, and smaller firms followed their cue; now, those orderly mechanisms have been replaced by a war of each against all. This is not to argue for a return to oligopoly, but it is to say that capitalist competition is a very nasty business. The increase in competition has resulted not only in an assault on labor and nature, but in an increasingly coarsened, atomized culture. Do Nader and his supporters really want to turn up the heat on that?"

http://www.leftbusinessobserver.com/Nader.html

[Marc Cooper]

steve.. how preposterously pompous! The "echo chanber?" You, who blindly rubber stamp anything that issues forth from Chomsky-Zinn-Etc, call this site with its absolutely open debate and free inquiry an echo chamber? What an inflated view you must have of yourself as the only standing truthful antidote to a mass of deluded others.

"are they really that 'ultra-left'? they seem pretty classically american populist to me. they tend to be defensively anti-big, pro small-business "

Your frame of reference is a little weird. Of course they are ultra-left. They represent the teeniest, most leftist extreme 2% or 3% of Americans. They are waaaaay out of the mainstream and certainly make no pretense about it.

"Classically populist"? No. Ruthlessly interventionist and willing to seize personal freedom? Yes. Support all others against America" Of course!

The Greens are run by Camejo who: "Back in the sixties, Camejo ran for president on the ticket of the Trotskyist Socialist Workers Party."

And clearly, the "environment" has become the new wedge issue to impose socialism on Americans.

Greens and Nader and ANSWER despise the fact that Americans can choose things, they are anti-personal-choice except for abortion. They hate ALL business and the freedom that enables Americans to pursue the American dream.

In their world it is much worse to fill in a duck pond than to behead an American. (of course it is fine that Saddam destroyed the marshes and blew up Kuwait's oil fields because he was Stalinist).

But my basic point remains that Nader WANTS Kerry to lose because the ultra-left is energized during republican administrations. Do you doubt this? Discuss.

[Tucker]

Personally, I think Nader feels the way many Americans do with regard to Kerry: he wants him to lose. But he also wants Bush to lose.

Forced to choose, he'd go with Kerry - but that's not Nader's idea of democracy - he doesn't think the American electorate should be "forced to choose." In fact, Nader's favorite initiative with regard to the election process is to include a "none of the above" box, giving voters the opportunity to reject lousy candidates. (We have two of those - some might say three - right now.)

Nader's campaign is as much above challenging an unfair election process as it is challenging the viewpoints of the two major parties.

[steve]

You, who blindly rubber stamp anything that issues forth from Chomsky-Zinn-Etc, call this site with its absolutely open debate and free inquiry an echo chamber?

--odd, i just sent something from doug henwood. is that what you mean by the chomsky-zinn etc.?