Nader

Dhlazare at aol.com Dhlazare at aol.com
Wed Jun 10 08:39:15 PDT 1998


Good God, do you really believe this? I think Nader is shallow and boring. Rather than criticizing capitalism, he criticizes something called the corporate structure. His rap is an endless lament about all the terrible things corporations do -- the consumers they rip off, the rivers they poison, the air they pollute, etc etc. This is true enough, but it begs the question: if corporations are so uniformly terrible, how can society, any society, tolerate them for more than instant? Nader's endless bleakness is belied by all those fruits of corporate production that fill our lives, everything from running shoes and blue jeans to appliances and computers. Not even the most relentless naysayer can maintain that this stuff is all bad, yet Nader comes as close as is humanly possible. This is precisely what make conservatives of so many undergraduates. The listen to Nader and his message of fear and depression, and they just laugh and move on.

His message is one of defeat and despair. The more the economy grows, the more consumers take it on the chin. Do you think this guy ever kicks his shoes off, pour himself a beer, and put some dumb rock-n-roll record on the stereo? I doubt it -- he's probably too angry at brewers for pushing what is in fact another addictive drug, too beside himself with worry that his amp is drawing electricity from some distant nuclear power plant.

Dan Lazare

<<

We had hims peak at OSU law last year. He was here testifying against the

awful tort reform bill the legislature passed. I thought he was

mesmerizing, just wonderful. And yes, he talkeda bout some of those things.

I am sorry to see you joining in the pack baying against tort lawyers,

which means plaintiff's laywers. Of course the defense tort bar and the

unsurance lawyers do not love Ralph. Sure, a lot of plaintiffs' tort lawyers

are sleazy. But what they do is help injured people recover from harm done

to them, often by large corporations. Yeah, if we had national health we

wouldn't have this problem. But tort reform anad damages caops are no

substitute for national health. Ralph is is on the side of the angels, a

real American hero. He has probably done as much for as many Americans as

any living human being.

--jks

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