A Conditional Pledge for a Conditional Candidate

…from Reuters News Service:

http://tinyurl.com/2sv4u9

“Former presidential candidate Ralph Nader on Sunday left the door open for another possible White House bid in 2008 and criticized Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton as ‘a panderer and a flatterer.’"

…from Democracy Now!, Ralph Nader on Senator Hillary Clinton:

http://tinyurl.com/2qby8w

“I don't think she has the fortitude to stand up to corporate power, whether it’s ripping off Washington by corporations or the bloated military budget or corporate crime, fraud, and abuse. It has a lot of roots right in her backyard, in Wall Street, Spitzer prosecution land. I don’t think she has it. And she has this increasingly distasteful habit of pandering and flattering in her public appearances. And she panders to special interest groups that need to be given the straight truth, and she flatters people in her audience. And I think that is a sign that she thinks she’s a frontrunner and she can play cautious.”

This past week, we lost one of U.S. journalism’s brightest lights, Molly Ivins

I remember her advice to thinking voters back in 2000: Vote for Nader where you can afford to. Vote for Gore where you must. Living in Blue New York, I enjoyed the luxury of the former and followed Ms. Ivins’ prudent advice. As my vote was not pivotal in bringing about the current disaster on Pennsylvania Avenue, I’ve no regrets.

To this day, I am still angry over comments by Gore operatives that Nader was “stealing” Gore’s votes. No! It was MY vote and I cast it with much care and after much study and research!

Such is the type of arrogance on the part of Democrats that has infesting the District of Columbia with the worst Neo-Crazy elements of the GOP.

Failing to learn from the exodus of the “Reagan Democrats” of 1980, the Democratic Party continues to take “their” traditional constituencies for granted. Perhaps, in their ignorance of history, they themselves are like the GOP, which for its first decades had been the political refuge for African Americans.

While I can’t join the Hate-Hillary bandwagon of the Neo-Crazy Right (Why do the detest her so?), I acknowledge that Senator Clinton’s return to the White House would be a disaster not only for the Democrat Party, but for the United Stated, the Middle East, and indeed, the world, crushing the hopes of many who really believe that a DLC-approved candidate would substantially redirect the Nation’s current course to collective suicide, rather than merely reduce the speed of our oncoming collision with hell.

Foolishly, I wondered how the Senator would distance herself from her belligerent voting record. She has managed to do so most adroitly, of course.

As Senator Clinton gains strength among Democratic Party apparatchiks, another Ralph Nader candidacy looks more and more appealing.

The de facto “two-party system” is an accident of history, not a mandate of the Constitution.

Votes for “third parties” are an important part of our political history and are often resorted to by thinking, but disgusted, citizens.

It’s quite possible, however, that the proliferation of minor parties handicaps them in the face of the two political giants on the scene.

Before even a single primary election, Hillary, Inc.’s public relations handlers have portrayed her as “electable” to real and potential investors, who alone will reap the dividends of a new Clinton Presidency.

Even rank and file Democrats are buying into this “strategic” reasoning, desperate to see the Republican Neo-Cons leave the West Wing.

Ralph Nader, a longtime critic of such false advertising, has done well by casting an early shadow on Hillary, Inc.’s aspirations.

There are ways, however, that he can crank things up even more, with our help.

The first thing would be to approach several minor parties and to begin discussions about a fusion/coalition/cross-over campaign, in which several parties would unite behind a single candidate for President. This would be in the interest the small parties themselves, as it would raise their profile.

Secondly, I would strongly urge Mr. Nader to begin now to collect Pledges. Postcards or coupons can be completed and signed by those of us willing to pledge our votes to him in the event of Hillary Clinton’s nomination next year in Denver.

These forms can also provide space to check off for a second pledge, to change one’s enrollment from the Democratic Party, either as an independent or as a member of another party, on Friday, August 29, 2008, the morning after the final day of the Denver Convention.

Each pledge collected by Mr. Nader would, in effect, be an anti-contribution in the coffers of Hillary, Inc. Each would make the Senator one vote less electable.

I hope that Mr. Nader, a real democrat worthy of the name, would cast his eyes on my proposal and seriously adapt it or some other plan to involve the citizenry early in his candidacy and in the national debate.

In fact, I trust that that he will.