Nathan Newman wrote:
>But heck-- let's just say I vote for Nader for prom king. He's a
>heck of a guy.
-No he's not. He's an austere one-dimensional petit bourgeois who's -largely gone missing since November 2000. And if he's the reason Gore -lost, you're really in trouble!
Austere yes and I disagree with him on a lot of issues, but he is still one of the foremost activists of the last generation. Except for a few heated comments at points when I was particularly pissed off, I never went in for the personal bashing some folks did on Nader. I just think he picked a terrible strategy and he and his supporters contributed to Bush being elected. Yes, Gore being a lousy candidate was an even bigger factor, but his supporters -- and that's what we are talking about -- moved heaven and earth to stop Bush despite that and almost succeeded. And the fact that the Naderite activists weren't helping and even hurting rightly pissed them off. And the fact that the Greens are seeking to kill off actual progressive folks like Wellstone-- with Nader's approval -- just adds to the rightful anger that one group of activists is deliberately undermining the work of union, civil rights and other progressive activists.
For all people cite the possible votes Nader may have won for other candidates in increasing turnout, how many votes were lost because progressive groups felt they had to waste funds and energies convincing their left supporters to stay with Gore, rather than spending the funds convincing moderates to abandon Bush? Again, people promote this individualistic conception of politcs-- it's my vote and it's your fault you couldn't convince me -- rather than looking at mass movement energies and strategy and addressing any obligation of collective accountability for those strategies.
== Nathan Newman