That would be a start.
I can imagine that most Greens are laughing hard right now.
Chuck0
Nathan Newman wrote:
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: <portsideMod at netscape.net>
>
> Election Crisis and Electoral Reform
>
> * Leon Wofsy - Greens, Dems and Electoral Reform
> * Center for Voting and Democracy - VOTING SYSTEMS STUDY
> * David McReynolds - reflections on the election mess
>
> =====================
> [Hi, This Op-Ed piece was sent to the SF Chronicle
> yesterday [Nov. 16] and was rejected on the same day. Left
> progressives who voted for Gore or for Nader are still
> bashing each other. Maybe it's time to put down the brick-
> bats and talk with each other about the problems ahead.
> Best, Leon Wofsy]
>
> GREENS, DEMS AND ELECTORAL REFORM
>
> Election 2000 saw Greens and progressive Dems at each
> other's throats, but its bizarre outcome should lead them
> to bury the hatchet. This crazy election makes a most
> powerful case for electoral reform. That might just
> provide common ground where mortal combat gives way to a
> truce on the political left.
>
> Of many questions about electoral reform, from chad-
> counting to debate over the Electoral College, two are
> absolutely fundamental to democracy. One is freeing
> campaigns from domination by big money; enacting McCain-
> Feingold legislation would be a start. The other is opening
> the electoral system to more voices and making every vote
> count. Right now candidates picked by Republican governors
> or the right-leaning Democratic Leadership Council (DLC)
> command the only votes that count (and the only voices
> heard in presidential debates). It was the two party lock
> on electoral politics that forced Greens and progressive
> Dems to behave as enemies despite many shared aims, and
> that made both fall short of their goals on November 7th.
> The system operates to squeeze voters into a "lesser evil"
> choice. If you dare to vote for "other", you pay a heavy
> price -- your vote helps the candidate you favor least.
> What's more, you suffer abuse as a "spoiler", even from
> people who may agree that the person you voted for is
> actually best. Though many voters may be dissatisfied with
> both major presidential candidates, and about 50% choose
> not to vote at all, the system effectively squelches
> alternative candidates or parties.
>
> Are there reforms that could broaden choice and make every
> vote count? One such proposition is called Instant Runoff
> Voting (IRV), a system used in Ireland, England and
> Australia. It could be enacted by states without any
> constitutional change. With IRV, the voter could designate
> a second choice. It would kick in if no candidate won a
> majority and if the voter's first choice was out of the
> running. Despite the closeness of Election 2000, the
> results show that a majority did not want George W. Bush in
> the White House. It is likely that many voters who
> preferred Nader cast "lesser evil" votes for Gore. Still,
> the small Nader vote in Florida was much larger than the
> margin that separated Bush and Gore. With IRV the will of
> the majority would have prevailed without chad disputes and
> court battles.
>
> There is something very wrong with a system that can't
> tolerate a 1.6% vote for Nader in Florida without
> nullifying the will of the majority in selecting our
> President. For Democrats to berate Nader and his supporters
> for daring to pursue their anti-corporate message and hopes
> for a viable third party makes a travesty of democracy. It
> is just as myopic as Nader's reluctance to acknowledge
> significant distinctions between the major parties. It's
> the exclusionary electoral system that's at fault and
> that's what needs reforming.
>
> IRV is only one of many possible ways to open the electoral
> system to more voter power. Harvard Law Professor Lani
> Guineer has written pioneering articles on altering our
> winner-take-all system to make room for minority input. The
> road to electoral reform is hard, shown by fierce
> opposition to McCain-Feingold. For those who seek a strong
> third party, the road is even harder. That goal may be
> possible only if joined to cooperative efforts to make
> election practices more democratic. That holds too for
> progressive Democrats who may hope to rescue their Party
> from stifling control of the DLC and corporate lobbyists.
>
> I woke from Election 2000 with a dream: a coalition of all
> progressives -- Democrat, Green, or neither -- to push
> democratic electoral reform state by state. Why not
> California first for Instant Voter Runoff? We're famous
> for propositions other states follow for better or worse.
> It might take multiple tries and lots of dialogue, but
> Californians could put IRV in the nation's electoral
> sights.
> Leon Wofsy
> 11/16/00
> ===================================
>
> What's Next?
>
> Democratize our electoral system through Proportional
> Representation, Instant Runoff Voting and other reforms.
>
> Join the VOTING SYSTEMS STUDY now being conducted by
> the League of Women Voters (men welcome, too)
>
> contact:
> Center for Voting and Democracy
> www.fairvote.org
>
> subscribe to:
> Ballot Access News
> www.ballot-access.org
>
> ====================================
>
> Thu Nov 16, reflections on the election mess
>
> THE ELECTORAL STALEMATE: NOT THE END OF THE WORLD
>
> This was a fight out of which I thought I would stay. But
> watching the flow of impassioned emails crossing my modem,
> maybe it would be worth weighing in. I have a small supply
> of pomposity left over from my recent campaign - let me put
> it to use.
>
> First, this election is the most remarkable I've ever seen.
> I'm old enough to remember the 1948 election when, as a 17
> year old youth, I was working in Finney County Kansas,
> organizing for the Prohibition Party. It took me days to
> recover from the impossibility of Trumans' victory. (There
> was a lesson buried in that election, which Al Gore
> remembered - fight until the last instant. Bush's handlers
> are angry that, unlike Gore, Bush rested on his laurels,
> coasting to what he thought would be a clear victory).
>
> Yes, we are all caught up in something historic and of
> course we want to talk about it. But a good deal of what
> I've read is irrelevant There was no conspiracy in the
> Florida voting - if anything Bush was hurt by the early
> call, giving the State to Gore - it demoralized his own
> voters in the far West. Those in charge of the now infamous
> ballots in Palm Beach (where Mary Cal Hollis and I - and
> the Socialist Party - have gotten more media coverage
> after the campaign was over than at any time during it!)
> were Democrats, not Bushites. They were trying to simplify
> things and failed.
>
> Second, the media is in deep shit. To call a state wrong
> twice in the same night, and then to award the Presidency
> before all the votes had been counted - it will be many
> years before the media or the pollsters will be trusted
> again. The media should not "call" an election. Express an
> opinion, sure. But "call a state", let alone an election,
> is something they will want to stay away from. Far away.
> Never have so many talking heads been so covered, head to
> toe, in egg.
>
> Third, there is no constitutional crisis. We don't have a
> conflict between a party of the far right and the far left
> - even though many of the folks whose posts I've read are
> treating it this way. There were no major divisions during
> the election.
>
> Let's assume Gore wins (I won't deny I'm uneasy about
> George W. sitting in the Oval Office - he is not a moron,
> but he is incredibly ill-cast for the office of President).
> Executions will still go on throughout the nation. Many
> thousands of children and the elderly will continue to die
> in Iraq because of our sanctions. The economic situation in
> Cuba will remain serious because of the sanctions there.
> Military spending will increase. If Gore wins, we are more
> likely to have an interventionist foreign policy than if
> George W. wins. (The daily death toll in the Occupied
> Territories of Palestine will be more likely to rise with
> Gore - since the Democrats are more deeply indebted to
> the Jewish vote than the GOP).
>
> Let's look back to 1952, when many on the Left felt that if
> Eisenhower was elected we would have a quasi-military
> dictatorship, a terrible supreme court, and the triumph of
> McCarthyism. In fact, Eisenhower ended the Korean War,
> pulled the rug from under McCarthy, and appointed Earl
> Warren as Chief Justice.
>
> With the exception of Bush and Reagan, both of them bloody
> minded in their foreign policies, the Democrats have
> historically been more likely to send our youth to war.
> (Have we forgotten Vietnam? Kennedy and Johnson?). The much
> hated Nixon presided over the end of the Vietnam War, he
> didn't start it. (And on the domestic front, Nixon was to
> the left of Bill Clinton).
>
> Regardless of who finally wins this weird contest, they
> will have little power. The media has been telling us how
> effectively Kennedy governed despite his narrow (and
> possibly illegitimate) victory. But he DIDN'T govern
> effectively. He was a weak president who left the CIA and
> the FBI untouched, who authorized the Bay of Pigs, set us
> on the path to intervention in Vietnam - with bi-partisan
> support. Only his murder has caused his history to be
> re-written.
>
> At this point it honestly doesn't matter who wins. If Bush
> wins, he won't dare submit bad supreme court nominations -
> the Senate won't confirm. (Remember Nixon lost two fights
> over weak nominations). There will be so much anger about
> whoever wins, that there will be a sense of illegitimate
> rule. Congress will either find a way to get along, or we
> will have a stalemate. But it is certain Bush can't ram
> things through - nor, if he wins, could Gore.
>
> If we are radicals, and this writer is, then it is fun to
> watch the fuss, but we don't have much stake in it and
> should not spend too much time on it. Nothing much will
> change. The political framework is too evenly balanced.
> Yes, if Gore had won a clear victory, things might have
> been better for labor and minority groups. (But then again,
> look at Clinton's record on welfare reform). The left is
> behaving as if Al Gore was really their candidate - he
> wasn't. If the Left had a candidate it was Ralph Nader, who
> is currently "everyone's favorite enemy" for costing poor
> Al Gore the election.
>
> A more careful observation suggests that Nader might have
> pushed the political framework a tiny bit to the Left. Yes,
> I know that organized labor had a stake in Gore's victory -
> and I do understand angry Democrats who say that "voting
> one's conscience is fine if you are white and middle class
> - but what about working folks?". This suggests a couple of
> things the Left should be careful to avoid. One is the
> assumption working folks and communities of color don't
> have a conscience, only economic interests. That sells them
> short. In the long run do American workers want to increase
> their share of the pie if it means more dead kids in
> Baghdad? Do they want to turn away from the murderous
> military actions of the Barak government?
>
> In any case all of this is moot. The fury of Florida, the
> butterfly ballots of Palm Beach, the battalions of lawyers
> being air dropped into Miami by both parties - all are fun
> to watch but anyone who thinks this will make much
> difference in how the country is run has a different view
> of reality than I do. (Yes, if Bush had won an overwhelming
> vote, then his hidden right wing agenda would have gone
> public, but he didn't, and it can't. And yes, if Al Gore
> had won a resounding victory we might have somewhat better
> judges appointed. But he didn't. What we have is a standoff
> and to our immediate interests, moral or economic, the
> results aren't that important.
>
> What will happen is that the key forces behind the scenes
> will compel a fairly early end of this mess. It isn't good
> for the stock market. It isn't good for the US image
> abroad. My hunch is that since November 8th some phone
> lines of people whose names we barely know have been
> humming with working out the agreement they will then
> impose on both Bush and Gore.
>
> We are better advised to find ways of bringing pressure to
> bear on whoever becomes president on issues ranging from
> Star Wars to the Middle East, from the drug wars to capital
> punishment, from decent health care to a rising minimum
> wage - all things where we found ourselves, all during the
> campaign, in opposition to BOTH "major" parties.
>
> David McReynolds
> Socialist Party candidate for President - who has conceded
> and is not demanding a recount /
> web site: www.votesocialist.org
>
> ==============================
>
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-- << Chuck0 >>
This was the year *everything* changed.
-- Commander Ivanova, 2261
Mid-Atlantic Infoshop -> http://www.infoshop.org/ Alternative Press Review -> http://www.altpr.org/ Practical Anarchy Online -> http://www.practicalanarchy.org/
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"A society is a healthy society only to the degree that it exhibits anarchistic traits."
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