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News :: Miscellaneous |
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Liberals Losing It |
Current rating: 0 |
by Sam Smith, The Progressive Review
(No verified email address) |
14 Jun 2002
Modified: 20 Jun 2002 |
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[T]he liberal myth [is] that Gore lost the 2001 election because of Ralph Nader. In fact, Gore lost the election because he was a poor candidate, ran a bad campaign, and failed to separate himself morally from Clinton. Further, not only the Democratic Party, but the liberals within it, made it absolutely clear over eight years that they had no interest in, nor would respond to, the sort of politics espoused by Greens. |
 [T]he liberal myth [is] that Gore lost the 2001 election because of Ralph Nader. In fact, Gore lost the election because he was a poor candidate, ran a bad campaign, and failed to separate himself morally from Clinton. Further, not only the Democratic Party, but the liberals within it, made it absolutely clear over eight years that they had no interest in, nor would respond to, the sort of politics espoused by Greens. |
art by Mike Flugennock, http://sinkers.org/
Although liberalism has been on the skids for more than two decades, it has become the new fashion in that desiccated sect to blame Greens for the problem. Liberals don't worry about the dropping memberships and dramatic aging of groups like Common Cause and Americans for Democratic Action or the irrelevance of archaic liberal journals like the Nation (kept alive in part by charter cruises aimed at those who remember meeting Eleanor Roosevelt). Nor do they concern themselves with the declining viewership of public broadcasting or the chronic ineffectualness of the congressional black and progressive caucuses.
Who needs those concerns when there is yet another target - the Greens - to join all those other Americans that liberal leaders can't stand (and then wonder why they won't vote for them) such as gun-owners, church-goers, southerners, people who still believe in local government and so forth.
For example, Harold Myerson in the American Prospect leads with this: "Ask any liberal to identify the force in American politics most intent on destroying progressive prospects and causes and you're sure to hear that it's the Bush administration or the Republican right or some such reactionary power. Let me gently suggest, however, that a very different force has wormed its way onto this list, and may indeed be right at the top: the Green Party. There's something so very pure about the Greens' destructiveness."
This fits in well with the liberal myth that Gore lost the 2001 election because of Ralph Nader. In fact, Gore lost the election because he was a poor candidate, ran a bad campaign, and failed to separate himself morally from Clinton. Further, not only the Democratic Party, but the liberals within it, made it absolutely clear over eight years that they had no interest in, nor would respond to, the sort of politics espoused by Greens. That liberals should complain now is an example of the self-defeating arrogance that has done them so much damage. If you want people to vote with you, be nice to them. Just because you're god's gift to Manhattan or Georgetown doesn't give you an exemption from this basic political rule.
Myerson instead takes the stance that "la gauche c'est nous" - "When the Greens run a candidate against a Democrat, however, neither their campaign nor the effect of their campaign advances their agenda one whit. Their goal is simply to defeat Democrats, even the most liberal Democrats. Especially the most liberal Democrats."
Myerson, who gives no credit to the idea that Greens might have a few policy differences with his party, has one valid complaint: the fact that the Greens are running a candidate against Paul Wellstone. But liberal Democrats who gave blind allegiance to the most corrupt president in history who then set about dismantling a half century of liberal progress, are hardly in a position to lecture on wise tactics.
Besides, as a fully recognized party, the Greens have a legal, constitutional and moral right to run their own candidates and shouldn't have to ask the decadent liberal aristocracy for permission. And sooner or later - after Democrats like Myerson get over their childish tantrums - liberals will realize that one way out of their problem is to support proportional representation and instant runoff voting, rather than excoriating others for participating in American democracy. As it stands, liberals rest on the political landscape, as Disraeli once said the opposition bench, like a range of exhausted volcanoes.
Your editor was an early advocate of the Green strategy of finding tight races between Republicans and Democrats and then breaking up the party. While I think Minnesota was a poor choice, I have no apologies to make. After all, I didn't leave the Democratic Party voluntarily. It was made quite clear that people such as myself weren't wanted. And besides, I thought if I remained, I might be liable under the RICO statutes.
Myerson is upset because the Greens actually practice what they believe in: democracy, nonviolence, decentralization, ecological sanity. They don't want to go along with the moral charade of the Democratic Party. Myerson writes, "Beware this party. At the heart of Green politics is a novel - and ruthless - ethic: The means justify the end." You're confusing your parties, Harold. That's the Democrats. The Greens believe the means are part of the end.
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See also:
http://prorev.com/indexa.htm
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Comments
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Oh really? |
by ...
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
17 Jun 2002
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Pretend all you want. Nader promised the Sierra Club he'd duck out if the election got really close... until it got really close, and then he reneged. "The means are part of the end" indeed. Nader apparently cares nothing for the damage he's caused. The entire legal pretense that took the election for Bush was a result of Nader stealing away Gore's identifiable margin of victory. And he's planning on doing it to us all again.
When there are crosses atop the public schools and the White House - don't just blame the repubs. Wonder if the same people intentionally damning the US to religious rule could return to revitalize the democrats instead?
Guess that wouldn't be nearly as much fun - and might require work. |
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Oh really? is wrong |
by Miguel de Molinos
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
17 Jun 2002
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Nader made no such promise to the Sierra Club. That's ridiculous. The Democrats are happy with themselves. They don't want to be "revitalized." They have a cozy, mutually-beneficial relationship with the Republicans. Clinton and Gingrich were two sides of the same coin. Anyone with populist instincts and a more-than-superficial knowledge of U.S. political history understands that. If the Democratic Party weren't so corrupt and plutocratic and globalistic, it might get more votes from people who admire Nader. In other words, put up good candidates and you might attract the votes of Greens and other populists. You've got to EARN our votes. Grow up! Stop whining! |
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Oh Goody |
by ...
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
18 Jun 2002
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I always love debunking a liar. Here ya go, as per fair use I hope:
"
Sierra Club
urges Gore
vote
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON -- The
head of the Sierra Club
lashed out at Ralph
Nader for a letter to
voters in which the
Green Party candidate
criticized Democrat Al
Gore's environmental
record.
Nader also was accused of breaking a promise to
many of the supporters who helped get his name on
the ballot in most states.
"You pledged you would not campaign as a spoiler
and would avoid the swing states. Your recent
campaign rhetoric and campaign schedule make it
clear that you have broken this pledge," wrote Carl
Pope, executive director of the Sierra Club.
Nader dismissed similar claims during a news
conference Monday. He said he had promised to
campaign in all 50 states from the moment he
accepted the Green Party's presidential nomination --
and he has done exactly that.
Nader last week wrote an open letter to "concerned
environmental voters" in which he also criticized the
record of Republican George W. Bush but reserved
especially harsh criticism for Gore, whom he accused
of sacrificing environmental advancements for
corporate donations.
Environmentalists who ally with Gore, Nader had said,
"must acknowledge that any and all environmental
positions taken by the candidate will be subject to
mutation and subjugation to his corporate agenda.
...They tell future political leaders that the
environmental community is for sale."
Pope called the letter full of inaccuracies and its author
"flawed," like the opponents he criticizes. He urged
Nader to acknowledge the nation would reverse
environmental achievements under a Bush
administration and hurt "real people and real places."
"Until you can answer how you will protect the people
and places who will be put in harm's way, or
destroyed, by a Bush presidency, you have no right to
slander those who disagree with you as 'servile."'
Pope said. "You have called upon us to vote our
hopes, not our fears. I find it easy to do so. My hope is
that by electing the best environmental president in
American history, Al Gore, we can move forward. My
fear is that you, blinded by your anger at flaws of the
Clinton-Gore Administration, may be instrumental
electing the worst."
Nader's spokeswoman, Laura Jones, declined to
comment on Pope's letter, but said the campaign was
preparing a formal response.
"
As we can see, the Sierra Club and the Greens have a difference of opinion on this issue. I wonder why? |
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Do I Catch More Than a Wift of Hypocrisy Here? |
by a disgusted citizen
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
18 Jun 2002
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Yeah, I definitely smell some hypocrisy here.
A defender of one of the two dominant parties, which are far more alike than different, wants to complain about broken electoral promises... |
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Here's why |
by ...
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
20 Jun 2002
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Correct me if I'm wrong, but most political candidates wait until after the election to start breaking campaign promises. And at that point, supporters with conscience do an about face. For some reason, I'm not seeing that here. Can't we get a third party candidate we can trust? What's so difficult? You would think that with such an important mission, folks would exercise due diligence.
I'm not supporting a party as such; I'm tryin' to put out a freakin' fire here, get it? You can Ad Hominem me all you want, but *I'm* the monster in *this* monster movie, sorry. If you have a cogent argument, state it please; all this fluff is pretty boring.
"Far more alike than different" means exactly nothing. It's the differences that count - faith based initiatives, money for bad marriages, delayed wars for Unocal and Carlyle group instead of immediate CIA sanctions, Ashcroft rewriting civil rights by the boatload - you're saying Gore would have done this? I think not, and you can't prove otherwise anyway; all you can do is guess and pretend you know. This supposed equal culpability of parties is a sham - but I can understand you hanging on to it, because it seems to be the only justification you have left at this point.
At any rate, Nader can't get actually elected, so all that "evils of the Democrats" stuff is crap anyway. The point is to get a third spot on the ballot, not follow a burning ship down into obscurity because of some cult of personality. Too many failures in a row, and the great unwashed won't even be interested anymore. Then it's back to business as usual. |
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