Saw Ralph Nader on FAUX News

[Thelakedoctor]

Flipping channel came across a show called "The Big Story"

The host was interviewing Nader about the CA recall and the Dem candidates for prez.

I noticed Nader put in a good plug for Kucinich and railed against the party elites.

[truebrit71]

1. Fuck Ralph Nader

Sideways.

Twice.

Happy yet Ralph you fucking idiot??

[Catholic Sensation]

2. Wow, you're not misguided

Just like the Republicans like to blame everything bad on Clinton, you seem to be one of those misguided people who thinks it's Ralph Nader's fault Bush is in office. Okay let's look at this rationally: If the idiot senior citizens in Florida had read the fucking ballot correctly, and didn't vote for PAT BUCHANAN, Gore would be president (notice I didn't say he would have won, because he did win). Nader isn't the reason some old people become incredibly stupid.

In fact, had Gore not brought Joe Lieberman on his ticket, maybe the leftist democrats who voted for Nader would have voted for Gore. There's nothing like ticking off three percent of your constituency by bringing in a conservative to seem more "moderate."

[ComerPerro]

4. Its not just people reading the ballot

Please, don't leave out the purged voting roles, eliminating thousands of likely Democratic and legal voters. There is also the shady issue of absentee ballots.

But if you want to keep thinking it was just a bunch of old people who couldn't read the ballot, thats fine I guess.

[Catholic Sensation]

7. i meant aside from

Katherine "Prostitute's Makeup" Harris stealing thousands of African America votes, using a list of "possible felons" to exclude legitimate voters, etc. The fact of the matter remains, 10000 old people fucked up because they're stupid. Bush "won" by 700 votes or something, it's hard to claim victory when you're down by 9300 votes, but it's much easier to claim victory when you have 700 "more" votes than the other guy. More in this instance means "more illegal ballots."

[random]

29. Nader told us over and over again...

there was no difference between the two candidates. Do YOU believe that after all of this? If so, kindly check in at GreenUnderground, and FUCK NADER, he sucks!

PS, I'll bet dollars to donuts he runs again, just to hear the sound of his own voice and to screw us yet again. Somebody needs to put him out of his misery.

[ComerPerro]

34. Actually, Bush didn't even win Florida

He lost by several hundered. The problem was, he stopped the counting of uncounted votes.

But its a moot point...

[Demoiselle]

36. HEY, Fella!

"10,000 old people fucked up because they're stupid"....Clearly you've never seen that butterfly ballot. You sure as hell don't sound like a Democrat to me.

[janekat]

9. Nader campaigned in the states that were "close"

he made the Gore campaign spend money and time in states that were close. He spent the last day of the campaign in Florida. He WANTED Gore to lose - thinking that it would cause a backlash against Bush & Co - benefitting him.

He spent a lot of time and effort in Minnesota - trying to unseat Wellstone - the most progressive Dem. in Congress. He almost succeeded in this.

[Catholic Sensation]

12. I blame John Hagelin

HE GOT 2500 VOTES IN FLORIDA, AND GORE "LOST" BY LESS THAN 1000!!!

[Old and In the Way]

38. Neo Progressive, eh?

Nah, I'm not going to take your bait.....

[wakfs]

19. Totally correct

Nader the Traitor should be his moniker. He DID deliberately target those close states for the express purpose of helping Bush win.

He is a traitor. He is irrelevant. He should be made to pay for his political misdeeds.

[bitchkitty]

15. Idiot senior citizens?

I agree with you that Nader didn't steal the election, but I think that is a despicable thing to say. I hope you keep your faculties when you get old. Saying things like that is terribly bad karma, IMO.

Edit: punctuation

[Catholic Sensation]

21. I have family members who are over 90 years old

and were able to pick out Gore from the list of names on the ballot. If one is unable to figure out who they're voting for, then, yes, they are an idiot. Considering PAT BUCHANAN looks like a much longer name than AL GORE, it should have been obvious that maybe, just maybe, they're not voting for the right guy. Missing something like that almost makes the person an idiot. But yeah it is harsh of me to call a group of people who can't follow simple instructions and are unable to see the obvious idiots...

[last_texas_dem]

31. Confusion had nothing to do w/ name lengths...

People didn't screw up the ballot because they couldn't read names; they screwed it up b/c of the awkward positioning of the holes w/ the arrows. If you've ever seen a photograph or live shot of the ballot positioned on the voting machine, it is obvious that it was even more confusing than simply looking at the ballot printed in the paper or online, and it already looked confusing enough to me that way. A LOT of very intelligent people got mixed-up reading that piece of shit ballot, hardly making them stupid.

[FlaGranny]

41. Interesting. Obviously you have NOT seen the ballot.

Your relatives may THINK they voted for Gore. Many people thought they were voting for Gore. How do you know your relatives punched the right hole. Were you in the booth with them? Unless you were a Republican (the only folks who didn't have a problem with the ballot)in Palm Beach County it was a requirement to check twice or even three times when you saw Gore's name. Because the check box for Buchanan was on the line with Gore's name on it! I know. I caught myself at the last minute, poised over the wrong punch hole. That's when I absolutely knew for a certainty that there would be an uproar. Mentioned this to everyone near me on the way out.

Check this out: Florida law states that the party of the sitting governor be first on the ballot, i.e., Republican this time. The opposing major party (Democratic), is second on the ballot - by LAW. Order of holes on punch card: 1 - Bush, 2 - Buchanan, 3 - Gore (due to the butterfly ballot). If that were not bad enough, a short person's angle of view to the voting card was such that the Buchanan punch hole was closest to Gore's name. There actually appeared to be two punch holes in Gore's column. Are you absolutely, 100% sure your relatives voted for Gore? Many Democrats in Palm Beach County are not certain, to this day, that they actually voted for Gore.

[last_texas_dem]

37. Not sure I understand

If the gist of your argument is that the reason Gore "lost" FL is because old people were "stupid", I consider it false upon its face b/c it is obvious that it wasn't only "stupid" people who hassled with that horrible ballot.

Certainly Nader had a right to run, but the fact that he targeted a "swing" state like FL shows he cared less about victory than acting as a spoiler, which he certainly succeeded at. The shift of a miniscule number of votes from Nader's tens of thousands would have meant a victory for Gore in the official tally. Many have argued on here that Nader voters weren't guaranteed to support Gore, but I'm willing to bet that atleast 600 of Nader's 98,000 (I believe) supporters would have jumped ship to Gore had Nader not been in the race, or possibly had he simply not tried to campaign in a close state needed for a Gore victory at the eleventh hour.

And finally, I don't like Lieberman much at all, but I see little proof that it was simply his inclusion as VP that caused liberal Democrats to jump ship to Nader. Had Gore chosen to run w/ someone politically in line w/ Nader as his VP, I'm willing to bet most of these folks who voted for Nader would have still voted for Nader, because they didn't like Gore, the liberal was only the inconsequential VP candidate, they disagreed with others in the Democratic party, etc. And also, had Gore chosen a more liberal running mate there's just as good of a chance he would have lost as many conservative Democrats to Shrub as he did to Nader by running someone more conservative. And I've never seen any proof that Lieberman hurt Gore in FL; I had thought the conventional wisdom was that that was one of the few states Lieberman actually helped him in (thought I'm not certain about that).

[poskonig]

3. Hey, I proudly voted for Nader.

In addition, bashing the few fighters against the MNCs, which will eventually have complete control over everything from culture to politics, is counter-productive.

[Aidoneus]

5. time for Two Minutes' Hate already?

DAMN THAT GOLDSTEIN! THE TRAITOR! TRAITOR! BAH! BAH! BOO! BOO!

:puke:

[ulysses]

6. LOL!

:D

[jpgray]

8. Nader has done about as much for leftist politics as Goldstein

No question about that. :)

[Tinoire]

23. Not as happy as the fucking DLC- that's for damn sure

Gee... didn't even see Nader out here in California... Instead we saw the DLC all over the place pushing their little Mecha Boy Bustamante. Well he lost god-damn it. That fucking Centrist LOST but somehow it's still Nader's fault. :eyes:

People like you make this Dem want to go Green just to get away from the pathological hatred of people who won't take the time to see how our own performance is less than stellar, less than appetizing, and less than attractive to voters.

If Dems don't want to fix the fucking problem, don't expect people to keep hanging around!

Love always,

One pissed off Californian.

[Old and In the Way]

39. Looks like you left a long time ago...............

"If Dems don't want to fix the fucking problem, don't expect people to keep hanging around!"

It's conceivable that our last opportunity to have free elections ended in 2000 when the ideological elitists decided to follow the Pied Piper. Now that this criminal Party has control of all 4 branches of government, ownership of the voting machines, andd the media, we may never have the opportunity to regain our democracy....

But, hey, keep blaming it on Democrats for voting Democrat.

[Rashind]

10. Nader is the man.

Boring old sop, but he's got vision. He knew exactly what he was doing last election, he was trying to pull the party left. People are too chicken to make the jump, though. Imagine if Nader had gotten 20% last election and Bush had won for real. Easily 20% of people liked Nader's positions. If it weren't for all the fraidy-cat dems who refuse to vote their conscience, it would have been incredibly clear that the party base is disenfranchised. The party is falling apart, and the Liebermans are responsible. If the Democratic party wants to exist in 2010, it had better get left.

[jpgray]

11. Too bad allowing his workers to unionize isn't in that "vision"

Making money and being famous is, though. Those two things he has done very effectively. It's not that he's any worse than any other politician, but for those who proclaim him as a man with unique vision--I have a bridge to sell you. :)

[Rashind]

14. I don't agree with everything Nader ever said...

But he had more things right than Gore did, that's for damn sure.

Kucinich, now, there's a man! Now that he's pro-choice, the only problem I have with him is his support of that damned flag burning amendment.

[jpgray]

18. Oh I agree there

But Nader had the luxury of not having an elected record, and also not having to make an effort to actually win. Plus he didn't have a passle of corporate sponsors that needed whoring done for.

I also like Kucinich a lot, and he has really worked hard against this administration. And he has been elected, and he has proven himself to be a stalwart supporter of leftist values. The flag vote is a little odd, but I don't hold it so much against him.

[janekat]

35. Nader does not even to be mentioned in the same breath as Kuchinich

n/t

[Old and In the Way]

40. he had more things right than Gore did, that's for damn sure

Please explain your opinion.

I'm hoping Ralph decides to take on George this time....perhaps he will run against Bush in the Republican primaries. Maybe you could persuade him?

If he win's, I promise I'll vote for Ralph in the general election.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

13. "Easily 20%........"

If you are going to pull numbers out of your ass why don't you say 98% ......

Then he could have a victory like they used to have in the Soviet Bloc countries.....

[Rashind]

16. Read the green party platform.

I'll admit that that number did come straight from my ass, but look at how many mainstream democrats want everything on the green party's laundry list. It's not a small number.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

24. I Like You...

You have a sense of humor....

[Rashind]

27. Thank you

It comes in handy for diffusing potential flame wars.

[ShaneGR]

17. Nader is NO friend to liberal causes

No friend at all. He only helps to elect Republicans, PERIOD.

[Name removed]

20. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[janekat]

32. Nader stabbed Environmentalists and Progressive in the back...

http://www.internationalism.org/inter/115_electioncircus.htm
"Nader made a deal with the established environmental groups and the Democratic Party that he would not seek to impact the result of the election, and promised not campaign in states where it might effect the outcome. For whatever reason – some of his critics in the left of the Democratic party and the environmental movement charge egomanial movement charge egomania – Nader reneged on this agreement and concentrated his campaign in key battleground states that were crucial to a Gore victory but were also most receptive to Nader’s "progressive message" attacking big business, .

Realizing that Nader was poised to threaten the Gore victory, about two weeks before the election the environmentalists and the left of the Democratic party began an all-out campaign against Nader for reneging on the deal, urging him to withdraw from the election, and calling upon his supporters not to "waste" their votes and help elect Bush.

...The Green party candidate managed to screw up the electoral college vote on the state level in at least three states: New Hn at least three states: New Hampshire, Oregon and the all important Florida, with its 25 electoral votes. For example, in Florida, where Bush had a 1700 vote popular vote margin on election day (before the first recount which brought him down to 330), Nader got 96,000 votes. ...... if only 3 percent of the 96,000 had voted for Gore, Bush would have been easily defeated on election day.

-snip-

[Thelakedoctor]

22. No he doesn't

Nader stands to the left- where most of us want to but we are too afraid to vote our principles. We just vote for who can win and the bitch that they don't represent us.

[Tinoire]

25. Another brilliant post

:eyes:

[Skittles]

26. party elites?

what the f*** is PARTY ELITES? Sounds like RNC code words.

[JohnKleeb]

28. That was good of him to put in a word for Kucinich

[random]

30. Agreed, so he won't win!

[JohnKleeb]

33. huh now

You know I am not a green but I dont find Nader devil incarnate, John Conyers praised Nader last night when I was in DC at that rally where I met DK. I find it interesting as a liberal democrat who agrees with the greens on issues that many dont like that we lose votes to them yet they dont think we should go back to the left, we cant just tell them its a two party system and thus they must vote democrat, you cant tell people that. I am not a green but I do think its good that Nader had kind words for Kucinich, I am just saying if we want the greens back we need to be what made this party great, a defender of social and economic justice.

[roguevalley]

42. nader is the biggest disappointment of my political life

RV, a former Naderite when he was into science, not
fame, wealth and power.

[FlaGranny]

43. I totally agree with everything Green (except Nader)

but I also realize that if the Democratic party gains the 2% of the voting population that voted Green by catering to the left wing of the Democratic party, they will lose a like percentage, at least, of the central wing of the party. It's a no-win situation.

[Iverson]

44. you put your finger on it

"... if we want the greens back we need to be what made this party great, a defender of social and economic justice."

Your audience doesn't want Greens back, except as repentant supplicants.