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I will never understand people like Krieger.

Luckily, people like him who are so VERY far to the left that it's not actually possible to tell the difference between BushCo and the democrats from where they stand are ALSO so many deviations from the norm that their total number can only be measured in fractions of a percent.

Most Green voters, I am convinced, CAN tell the difference.

Last election, votes for Nader were completely understandable and justified. I was never one who blamed anybody for voting their conscience. After all, from that vantage point, Bush looked like just yer average republican candidate... A term with him in office was hardly a thing to be desired, but definitely no disaster. Gore was no prize himself. It was and is vitally important that a third party get off the ground, one that would NOT be so much in the hip pocket of Big Business, as both current parties are. Nader's candidacy was an admirable attempt at doing that. I didn't vote for him, but I certainly understood why someone would.

This time, though... This time is different. Bush has proven himself to NOT be a regular run-of-the-mill republicanite. BushCo, in point of fact, has proven, in my view ast least, to be one of the greatest dangers to American democracy since the founding of the republic.

This time I absolutely plan on blaming anybody who does not vote for the democrat presidential candidate. This is not a matter of anybody commanding anybody any more... This is a struggle for our national survival.

So, to all you who are still planning on voting for the green party candidate... I would beg you to reconsider.

From a practical point of view, no green party candidate will ever be elected president unless and until he has a broad base of pre-existing support inside the government. In other words, for a green presidential candidacy to have any chance in the world, you must first have green state governers, green senaters and representatives, hell, even green dog-catchers would help. Once you have that kind of a support base, a green president will be a real possibility. Not before.

So why not take THIS election as an opportunity to work on THAT aspect of party-building? Nobody ever said you have to vote straight-ticket democrat... Remove the theif-in-chief and that danger is averted. Outside of that, vote green for every other candidate. I mean really, what have you got to lose? There's not a chance in the world that Nader will win, and if he couldn't get the 5% (or whatever the target was) last election when both serious candidates were blah at best, there's not a chance he'll do it this time either.

Another practical concern... Politically speaking. If Nader takes this opportunity to NOT run in order to help insure BushCo's defeat, it will be reported all over the land, and the impression left will be that Nader was a force to be reckoned with, a candidate who had the power to take enough votes away from the democrat candidate to actually make a significant difference. This will make a large difference for any other greens running for office, and people will remember next election, and vote accordingly.

If, on the other hand, Nader runs anyway... Well, from what I can see, a lot of people who voted green last election are gonna vote democrat this time. Which means Nader's numbers are gonna go down... Possibly WAY down. This will most certainly be noted and remarked upon. Most likely as the 'Death of the Green Party' or some such. And people will remember THAT next election. Perception is king in politics.

Now, having said all that... If Lieberman gets the candidacy... Never mind. Vote for who you want. The important battle will be over.

-me

Shake

:notworthy

Bra-vo! My dad once said something similar to me, too. I'd only change that by adding the words, "or woman" to that second quote above.

Right now, I'm pulling for Dean as well. But I've yet to hear of a Libertarian candidate for President this time around.

Never

I'd add the words "or woman" also, but my great-grandfather passed away in 1953, so I'll cut him some slack on that. My grandmother was relaying the advice he had given her. She voted in the first election that woman were eligible to vote in. She said that her dad told her to be sure and register and always vote because it was a priviledge. I don't think she ever missed a vote until she went into a nursing home in '92 at age 94.

praetor

In regards to religion, my mother has asked me (in frustration)
why I can't simply accept the 5% of Christianity I think is tolerable, and compromise by looking past the 95% I find silly, backward, or grossly hateful. How could someone, I would protest, profess a belief, especially a personal philosophy, which they could not whole-heartedly endorse! Why even have a personal philosophy, a religion?

To me this makes sense, because you are talking about a
personal belief.

However, politics is not about unwavering convictions. Politics, if you want to be successful, is about consensus, diplomacy, and stategy, the greatest of these being consensus.

Everyone talks about the importance of having a third party, like that will be the end-all and be-all to democracy. And while it is true that in many European goverments where there are 20+ political parties vying for tiny slices of the electorate, you will find a more representative leadership: socialists, christian democrats, labor, ect..

At the same time, what you don't find as easily is consensus. After an election, where there is no true majority mandate, the winner must try to pull together a ragtag bunch of parties to form a coalition. You can say that a government with only two or few parties, has to form that coalition under the larger umbrella of the two major parties, thereby strengthening and cementing the ability to make policy, however big a compromise that policy ends up being-but the same compromise happens in multi-party coalitions.

The Democratic party will never be as liberal as I'd like it to be, which is probably a good thing, and it makes sense because America is not as liberal as I'd like it to be.

But I'm not America, and while I believe strongly that the managing of our environment is one of the major issues of the 21st century, I think creating a political party around one major issue is as effective as belonging to the gun party or the abortion party or even the atheists party. Politically speaking, viability wise, Greens are a special interest group, not a political party.


Kudos to those who refuse to compromise their political ideals.

Krieger

I'm assuming that you are under the false assumption that being a member of the Green Party means being an environmental activist (or at least having some kind of "environmentally friendly" worldview). While ecological responsibility is an important part of the party, it is only one of many issues that are important to Greens. Historically, the Greens wanted to offer a political alternative to both Washington and Moscow during the later years of the "Cold War." The Greens have a social democratic reformist political ideology (they want an economic system that has a weak capitalist class with no real political power). They also support equal rights for GLBT community, oppose the death penalty, support alternative forms of energy, and various other basic left-wing positions - along with their social democratic economics.

In short, the Green Party is hardly a "special interest" group, unlike the Democrat/Republican parties - whose "special interest" is serving America's wealthy ruling class.

- Green Party Platform (2000)
- Ten Key Values of the Green Party

dcwolf

I'm no big fan of Gore's but a lot of people have the opinion of 'Bush or Gore, no difference'. I don't share that opinion because it's too simplistic.
Dean fought for and passed the civil unions law, and he advocates renewable resources for energy independence. A sense of community plays a big role in the Ten Key Green values and also in Howard Dean's local, federal and global policy. Perhaps these are some of the reasons Nader would not run if Dean is nominated.

Krieger

That is doubtful.

I suggest that everyone who thinks Howard Dean is "liberal" should read the article below (written by a liberal activist from Vermont).

Meet Howard Dean
The Man from Vermont is Not Green (He's Not Even a Liberal)
by MICHAEL COLBY

praetor

Why, yes, indeed I am. One would wonder at the Reform Party candidate who objects when asked what they want to reform. "We're not only about reform Dammit!"

I know the Green Party is not simply about the environment. I'm sure you have many members who are not in the green wing of the green party. (I think the gentleman doth protest too much) I know the Green party has a platform, most organized parties do. But, whatever the platform is, you can be sure that not every self-professed 'Green' out there knows exactly what it is or would agree with all of it.

While I admit I was a little insensitive in my comment about Green party political viability, my main point remains the same.
Having numerous narrowly focused political parties is not a meaningful improvement over a couple of large umbrella parties, and can be a hindrance.

In fact, a small, focused, idea driven group who acts within the Umbrella party may be more effective than if it were to splinter off to form its own group. Case in point: Christian Conservatives, who, it can be declared, have succeeded in placing a member of their minority into the highest office in the land. Would George W. Bush have ever gotten close to the presidency if he had ran under the Christian Coalition Party. Of course, you can say he ran deceptively as a moderate conservative, however that is what the respectability of centrist politics can lend to active minorities within the larger party.

I am not advocating not having a multi-party system, only putting their benefits into context. Simply being against the status quo is easy- changing the status quo is another thing entirely.

RED DAVE

Several quick points:

1) The level of debate concerning Dean, Nader, the Greens and the Democrats has risen in seriousness in the past few weeks.

2) I put this down to the increasing exposure of the venality of bush and co. and the continued impotence of the Democrats as an opposition party.

3) It has become clear that the sole tactics of the Democrats in opposing bush & co. will be to run a candidate almost a year and a half from now. In the interim, we may face an invasion of Iran, the continual deterioration of the economy, continued occupation of Iraq and more corporate scandals. In addition, the right-wing hegemony over the media will continue.

4) Even raising the spector of the Green Party improves the political atmosphere. As the Democrats rally round the flag of some right-centrist canddidate: probably first Dean, then Lieberman, the party will become less and less effective and more conservative as it tries to win votes away from bush.

5) If you truly want to move the Democrats to the left, oppose all these neolibs and provide a pole of attraction outside the donkey's stable.

6) By now, the canard that the left was responsible for bush becomes less and less viable. As the Democrats stuck to the corrupt system, and let bush get away with even more than the usual shit, they became co-creators of the current regime.

7) The Democrats have supported every stinking measure bush has put forth. That's SUPPORTED, as in voted for. Not OPPOSED, as in voted against.

8) Dean, etc., are just the moderate, chicken-shit wing of the Democrats. Ask yourself, after the effort to nominate Dean is over, where will the party go? If he's nominated, it will lurch to the right to try to pick up bush voters. If he's defeated, it will move to the right to attone for its sinister left-wing reputation.

9) Remember, Dean, etc. have made no attempt to distance themselves form their party. Will a Dean platform unequivocally repudiate the war when his own party supported it, or will they waffle, as, say, Hubert Humphrey did in '68, which resulted in Nixon being elected.

Ta-ta.

RED DAVE

Krieger

Sigh, did you even read my reply? The Green Party is not "narrowly focused" (it is a not a "special interest" group). The number of members that are in a political organization has nothing to do with whether or not that organization is a "special interest group" (e.g. NOW, the Sierra Club, The Planetary Society, NRA, etc) or a political party (e.g. the Libertarian Party, the Green Party or the Labor Party).

The difference is in how many different issues the political organization is interested in advancing. The Sierra Club is only interested in the environment and The Planetary Society is only interested in space exploration - these are examples of special interest groups. A political party, such as the Green Party, is interested in advancing a wide variety of issues (such as: environmental protection, electoral reform, social democracy, civil rights, etc). The Green Party works to advance all of those issues and to advance its own power as a political entity. That is what makes a political party unique, it has nothing to do with the size of membership.


The Democratic Party is not an "umbrella party", it is not a coalition of different ideological forces. It receives its funding from big business (just like the Republicans). The Democratic Party supports a specific agenda (that is, maintaining and increasing its own power as a political entity). In order to do that it has to continue getting more and more money from big business. That primary interest of the Democrats differs from the Greens, because the Green Party seeks to reduce the power that big business has in politics! So just voting for the Democrats will never advance or help the Green Party's primary political goals.


Supporting the status quo (the Democrats) will never advance the left in this country. Voting for a big business party will not reduce the political power of big business. It is as simple as that.