I can hear the bluster already. Ralph Nader's run for the Presidency will elicit one of two immediate responses:

"Thanks a lot, sucker!" from the Republicans

"You egotistical bastard!" from the Democrats

Surely, it isn't as simple as that, as the Terry McAuliffes, Ed Gillespies, Mark Racicots, and Bill Richardsons want us to think. What about...

"Hooray!" from voters who want more choices and do not want the status quo.

Will Nader be the spoiler that many partisans predict? Who knows, but what's also interesting is that another person, Roy Moore, is considering and/or being courted for a non-Dem/GOP Presidential run. "Big deal," you're thinking, "Who the hell is Roy Moore?" Roy Moore is the Alabama judge that tried to erect a stone slab of the ten commandments on state "no preference shall be given by law to any religious sect, society, denomination, or mode of worship" property. There are a lot of conservative, Christian, constitutionalists out there who are upset with the Bush Administration's attack on civil liberties, expansion of federal goverment, and increased federal spending. If Roy Moore is tapped for a third-party run, will the media paint him as a spoiler, too? Of course! What else would you expect from the corporate-run duopoly?

For an interesting point of view on third-party / independent candidates, see John Nichols' most recent column of The Online Beat.

I encourage Roy Moore's run for the White House. I hope that the Constitution Party recruits him aggressively, and I hope Moore accepts. I state this not because I want him to draw votes away from Bush to even out the siphoning that Nader may do to Kerry or Edwards. I support it because it would make for a great national debate. Four candidates, two in the middle and two away from center, will give the American people a nice spectrum of ideas to hear and from which to choose.

Now, of course, we know how difficult it is for third-party or independent candidates to get involved in the Presidential Debates, but that's a whole other blog entry...

These are good times. Ralph Nader announced that he's running as an independent for the office of President of the United States. As long as he gets on the ballot, which will be a tough road to travel in Illinois and everywhere else, Nader will bring a much-needed choice to our electoral process, and his candidacy will raise issues that the duopolists skirt or avoid entirely. Sure, sure, the Democratic front-runners (Kerry, Edwards) and the sitting neo-con puppet (Bush) will float Naderesque rhetorical balloons that corporate-owned media outlets will snatch from the air and hang on their respective mailboxes, but will The Chosen Ones earnestly try to do anything about the issues that are important to the ones who don't follow the Dem or GOP herds? Considering their past deeds and current "stamped with Corporate Party approval" wind-bagging, will Kerry, Edwards, or Bush honestly:

1. Restore and expand civil liberties and constitutional rights: As Nader writes on his website VoteNader.org, "[...] repeal the Patriot Act, end secret detentions, arrests without charges, no access to attorneys and the use of secret 'evidence,' military tribunals for civilians, non-combatant status and the shredding of 'probable cause' determinations, (contract the) concentrated power in the executive branch, and [...] expand civil liberties to include basic human rights in employment and truly equal rights regardless of gender, sexual orientation, race or religion."

2. Remove the inherent media bias in public elections. As Nader writes, "(This is) real campaign finance reform, which means public financing of public elections; some free access to ballot qualified candidates on television and radio; vigorous antitrust regulation and enforcement; ending broadcasters' free licensed use of the public airwaves; and the reversion of some organized time on our publicly owned airwaves to establish audience-controlled radio and TV networks to ensure the diversity of voices and solutions necessary for a really free press and a true civic democracy."

3. Introduce true electoral reform that encourages participatory Democracy and opens the doors for more choices on the ballots

4. Punish corporate crime, fraud, and abuse (including compaines that incorporate in tax haven countries and territories such as Bermuda, Cayman Islands, Luxembourg, etc.) (For more details, see Globalpolicy.org)

5. Remove "person" status and "equal rights" protection for corporations [Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad (1886), where Chief Justice Morrison Waite dictated off-handedly that corporations were deemed "persons" and, thus, protected under the 14th Amendment's "Equal Protection" Clause]

6. Remove big business from agriculture policy and pass legislation that protects and empowers non-agribusiness farms

7. Strive toward better consumer justice and halting predatory practices of big business (see Starbucks and Wal-Mart)

8. Remove insurance and drug companies from the administation of health care and provide coverage for all Americans

9. Pass a federal budget that puts the citizenry ahead of corporations

10. Institute a fair tax where the wealthiest people and corporations pay their fair share, the burden is not placed on the broad middle class, the poorest pay little to nothing until they reach an income milestone

11. Create jobs by investing in Americans in both the manufacturing ("blue collar") and office ("white collar") worlds

12. Strive to end poverty in the US by creating a "living wage," implementing a more progressive tax system, providing more affordable or free education to the lower to middle classes, and creating more affordable housing so that lower classes eventually may own in their neighborhoods and take advantage of our most accessible tax shelter, the writing off of home mortgage and equity loan interest

13. Establish fair trade practices that protect the environment, labor rights and consumer needs

14. Oppose the invasion and occupation of Iraq, Afghanistan, and any other sovereignties

15. Reform the racist and classist criminal justice system

16. End the war on drugs

17. Create environmental and energy policies that protect citizens, especially the less fortunate and disenfranchised, and punish violators

All of these stances have been clipped or summarized for this entry, but are explained in much more detail on Nader's candidacy website: VoteNader.org


Now, some may be thinking, "Wait a second, bucko, didn't you write that the 'herds' must not get their info from candidate-generated websites like JohnKerry.com? You're doing the very thing that you admonished--nay, ridiculed--now that your candidate threw his hat into the ring. Hypocrite! Sophist! Charlatan!"

The difference is that those who have paid attention to the issues of consumer rights, upholding civil liberty, citizen democracy, corporate crime and welfare, corporate-owned media, free trade, etc. realize that Nader has been TAKING ACTION on these issues for over FORTY years! What you read on his campaign website is the SAME INFO that has been in his writings, speeches, and activism for over FORTY years. In 1959, when Nader was taking on the auto industry, making a name for himself, and pissing off Corporate America, Bush and Kerry were still in prep school, living off the family fortunes and taking advantage of the family connections!

The "planks" in Nader's "platform" have been publicized long before the 1992 NH write-in initiative and the 1996, 2000, and 2004 campaigns. All of you have to do is build your awareness of Nader's life-long activism and social criticism, activites executed not just for the sake of getting elected to an office. Need proof? Here are two places to check out:

Citizen.org

and

The Ralph Nader Reader, 2000, Seven Stories Press

As for me, I'll do everything that I can to get Nader on the Illinois ballot, and, if successful, he will get my vote, whether it supports or defeats the Bush re-election campaign.

(I'm C&Ping an e-mail I recently sent to some folks. Forgive me, those who proclaim, "Rip off, artist! I've seen this crap before!")

(I just can't keep politics off my mind or out of my "Sent" folder. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that I won't be F-in' the D anymore come Feb 11th? Could be. Until then, blog on!)


One of the things I learned in college was that, to have a point of view, you must understand the other points of view equally well.

One of the things I learned in the real world was that, to speak, you must listen first.

Now, because it's fun to gaze at the whole spectrum, not just the middle band that Fox News, The NYT, and Tim Russert want us to see, here are some interesting critiques of our current President and a wanna-be:

On Bush...from the ultra-conservative/libertarian, very Christian Joe Farah:

On Dean (and with a jab or two at Kerry)...from the radical left, very environmental Jeff St. Clair:

Enjoy the far ends that don't want either a Repub or a Dem in the White House!!!

Well, well, well, John Kerry wins again..and again...and again. Yaaaawn! The Dems are getting all fired up about the candidate who has "the best chance to beat Bush." Fine. I want Bush to lose, too. But, really, how different are these guys? Sure, we can go to the Kerry campaign website and read all about his stances, or we can go to kerry.senate.gov and read all about what he's done in the Chamber. Hardly unbiased, of course, but think about how many people really go to similar places to learn about candidates. Think about how many people REALLY think there is a difference between the Republican and Democratic nominees for President. I'm sure the partisans out there will click to the aforementioned websites (or to their favorite biased pieces of cyberspace), read all the issues, and create a sturdy list of points that show how Bush and Kerry differ GREATLY from one another. Booooring...and obvious.

The real challenge is to go out there and find a well-rounded take on the candidates. The well-rounded approach will certainly take more time and, inevitably, lead to some fictitious garbage, but it may open minds (gasp!) to new ideas ("He did NOT just write..."). The more that one reads proves that Bush and Kerry are just different sides of the same coin.

For starters, how about pedigree and privilege. Thanks to, for example, the AOL Time-Warner empire, Americans have an understanding--not accurate or thorough, however--of the Bush Family History. (For other takes, read Russell Bowen's The Immaculate Deception or J.H. Hatfield's Fortunate Son.) But what do people really know about John Forbes Kerry? By now, everyone must know that Kerry comes from patrician ancestry [The Boston Forbes family (maternal)--and not the publishers from NY/NJ--gained wealth from real estate development & holdings and from Boston-China trade; the Winthrop family (also on mother's side) settled Boston and produced one of Massachusett's first governors, if I remember correctly). It's true that these familial ties did not make Kerry rich in the Kennedy-Bush "My Daddy made a lot of money illicitly or unfairly" kind of way (Kerry's dad was Foreign Service and mom didn't work/volunteered), but he certainly lived a life of privilege.

Kerry thanks his rich Forbes and Winthrop aunts for providing boarding school, prep school, Yale, and access to summer homes in NE and Europe, high culture, and unlimited...well, everything. Even more than that, this link to the Yankee Brahmin society (from which the Bush Clan also hails) provided access to families--rich, powerful, influential families like the Kennedys, the Bundys, the Pershings, and others. Of course, we all know that the access didn't stop there. Thanks to the right women, Kerry kept on being a boy from modest means--as I'm sure the DNC will promote--who just happened to fall into wealth, power, and privilege.

I'm sure that everyone knows that he married into enormous wealth twice (Thorne Family = $200-400M on Wall Street; Heinz Family = $500-600M in consumer goods). Sure, we've read that campaign finance laws and a pre-nup preclude him from dipping into the Heinz fortune and that we'd be fools to think that Julia Thorne will give him any money. Buuuut, there are loop-holes and work-arounds for everything. For example, Heinz said that she'd use the fortune ONLY if the Repubs starting slinging mud and attacking her husband in the media. (Get ready to write those ketchup-colored checks early, T-Mama...) And, as for the Thorne riches, well, John Kerry is very close to his two daughters from the first marriage, and those two aren't fond of Teresa's intrusion into their post-divorce happy li'l father-daughter relationships. Speculating a tad here, the daughters are both over 21 and--surprise!--would be willing and able, I'm sure, to tap into the Thorne fortune to help dad's run for the White House, but, more assuredly, to try to one-up Teresa in the attention-getting department (meeeow!). Campaign finance reform be damned! John Forbes Kerry has a lot of money (he mortgaged his $6M house for the campaign..big deal!), and the elite rich have always had ways of getting around everything (see Bush, George Walker).

"So what?" I'm sure you're asking, or maybe you're thinking "You must be jealous or paranoid or worse...a communist!" Hardly. I just like to announce that the emperor wears no clothes. The populace is hoodwinked by Kerry because he's a Democrat, the candidate that helps the working class, the middle class, single mothers, inner-city children, over-worked farmers, and so on. Running as a Democrat doesn't make all that "help" become reality though. The American public, as it stares into the blue flicker of CNN or Nightline or Fox News, must remember ALL these Kerry biographical tidbits as they watch him hop around the country, with his shirt-sleeves rolled up, relentlessly bleating Primary rhetoric (go to the left/right in the primary; come back to the center at the convention) and getting in touch with regular folks west of Beacon Hill or south of the Russell Building. I hope that people take the time to see beyond JohnKerry.com or Kerry's Senate website or The Washington Post or that declawed Tim Russert (Et tu, Brute?) because, if they do, they'll see, once again, that the duopoly serves up two candidates with just different sides of rhetoric.

So what does all this mean to me? Well, for Bush to lose, which is what I want, there must be support for the Democratic nominee. If Kerry is the nominee, then, I want to hear all sides of his story, the good, the bad, and the ugly, before I'll punch the card for him in Cook County. I'm not going to vote for this guy just because he's a potential Bush-Killer. My choice takes into consideration more than one issue and MUCH more than the corporate media or partisan sheep-herding offer up.

As I ramp up for the baseball and racing seasons, I'm also getting into the details of the presidential race. I follow the Democratic primaries and caucuses and pay attention to Bush in the media. I know for certain that I won't vote for Bush and that I'll tell those who will listen that he must lose in November for a multitude of reasons. The only problem is that I'm not convinced that I'll vote for the Democratic nominee to ensure that Bush goes down.

For many years, I've been a raging independent who won't vote for Dems or Repubs, especially for President. Both parties are beholden to special interest money, and both are whores to the mainstream media that elect them. Regarding my presidential voting history, in '96, I went to the polls and did not choose either Clinton or Dole. In 2000, I voted proudly for Nader, and, to this day, I don't have any regrets for that choice. I think it's funny how fast Dems say "You bastard!" and Repubs say "Thanks!" to all of the Nader voters. This behavior is an example of how most people are too dumb, lazy, or weak to research and analyze all of the information out there and make up their minds themselves.

Nader voters did not lose the election for Gore. Gore lost, stating only a few reasons, because 1.) He ran poorly 2.) The conservative media and the RNC did a good job of painting him as the Second Coming of Clinton 3.) The Florida Elections Commission and its Secretary of State were corrupt and racist 4.) The Supreme Court was partisan 5.) Gore rejected progressives and independents who might have voted for a Democrat 6.) An estimated one million members of the GLB community voted for Bush in 2000. Did some of these points siphon off votes from Gore and give them to Nader? I'm sure they did, but Nader voters are not accountable for ALL of the issues that prevented Prince Al from setting up shop in the White House.

Unfortunately, there is a large portion of this country that only thinks in black or white, in terms of both politics and daily lives. It is not as simple as "I hate Dems so Repubs must win," or "I hate Repubs so Dems must win." The mainstream media also like to create a two-horse race and make people think that it's either one or the other. There are also very partisan people out there who believe that voting for any candidate outside of the Dem Party or the GOP is just throwing away a vote. That's asburd. Vote for whomever you feel best represents what you want or whom you want in the White House. There's so much more to the process than just selecting "the puppet on the right or the puppet on the left" (to paraphrase the Prophet Bill Hicks). The devil is in the details, and proper investigation of a lot of the information that's out there will open the eyes of many who walk our socio-political landscape fast asleep.

The sleeping people claim that they're too busy to dig into the details. Too much is going on to research non-mainstream publications or put some rigorous thought behind issues, philosophy, policy, and history. Like the stereotypical American lifestyle of consumption, better-faster-now, and jingoistic hubris, people just want sound-bites, argu-bites, quick fixes, immediate gratification, easy answers, "America First," celebrity, and non-challeging debate. "You can't tell me how to think." "I don't care what you say. I'm not changing my mind." "You're an idealistic, arm-chair philosopher, and I don't have time for this." Yes, I've heard all of those things when it comes to politics and, hell, life in general. Why? I believe that Americans have been lulled asleep, thanks to our standard of living, relative political stability, safety (yes, even after 9/11, we're still a VERY safe country compared to, for example, Brazil, Argentina, the UK, Spain, Israel, the Phillipines, and Russia) and the emphasis on consumption, religion, and the superficiality of wealth and celebrity. Americans love to glide through their days, wearing blinders, ignoring problems, consulting gods and preachers, and avoiding the rigor of criticial and analytical thinking. They want an easy choice to be made for them, instead of using our unique ability to reason and making difficult decisions in the face of opposition, resistance, confrontation, or unpopularity.

So, in the end, I'll wait to see what Nader does. He said that he's not totally ruling out an eventual run for the White House (see http://www.naderexplore04.org). His entrance will certainly make it interesting for Kerry, Edwards, Clark, Dean and their lot. In the mean time, I challenge everyone to read independent publications and websites to find out what independent "bastards" are thinking and doing. For starters, check out:

http://www.citizen.org/

http://www.publicintegrity.org/bop2004/

I've been spending a lot of time on both, but it won't end there. I continue to look at as many sources as I can, including conservative, liberal, centrist, and independent. Instead of going in whichever direction you've always gone, why not blaze your own trail and make up your own mind?