>>A strong Green ticket will force the
>>establishment to address the failures of the electoral system, and to
>>choose between the implementation of reforms such as Instant Runoff
>>Voting (IRV), and the continued loss of votes to the Greens.
[snip]
>You think the Democrats will willingly fight for an electoral system
>which advantages minority parties unless they are also disadvantaged
>by the present system? You have to be made to bleed until you catch
>on.
This is strategic thinking??? Maybe Wolfowitz-in-Iraq-style strategy....
Let's say a Green party activist knocks on my parent's door in Upstate NY. My parents are Dems who aren't far-left but aren't happy with the Dem party. They share a decent amount of values in common with most Greens. Imagine two different conversations:
* The Green activist tells my parents that they're trying to collect signatures for an IRV ballot (let's pretend for the moment you can do initiatives in NY even if you can't). The activist explains that if IRV passes, in the future my parents can send those Democrats who are too beholdened to corporations a message and build the possibility of a real alternative -- and that next time they could vote their conscience without helping Rightwing Republicans get into office & destroy everything they care about. And while they're at it, would my parents like to give money to a political fund that's funding a grassroots campaign for IRV in 15 battleground states so that the Dems and the mainstream media have a reason to start paying attention? If my parents had heard about this campaign from other friends who'd been visited by activists, if the campaign was being discussed at the liberal church my mom attends, and if the activist had their act together -- in short, if the Greens were running a decent grassroots campaign -- I'm pretty sure my parents would sign the iniative and write a check. They might even join the Green party in an election or two, if only to give the Dems a scare.
* The Green activist tells my parents that they're running Nader or some other candidate and ask for support. When asked, why are you doing something that might help Bush get reelected, they get a schpiel about needing to make the Dems bleed. My mom, who is one of the nicest people I know, thinks for a second about smacking the activist upside the head with a poker from the fireplace, then tells them to get lost and never come back (my dad rants about the encounter & the general stupidity of the Left for several days, and I get to listen to this story every single f**** Christmas for the next 3 years). The Green Party and Nader have now earned two enemies for life.
Why does the second conversation have such an unhappy ending? Because my parents know that in the short run, the people who are going to "bleed" are, for example, people like my brother, who's autistic and relies on state programs that Bush wants to gut.
I can understand how third party activists could decide to play the lets-make-the-Dems-bleed under Reagan: nobody knew how bad it could get. But now??? If Greens are serious about trying to build a grassroots party -- as opposed to just feeling self-righeous & posturing for the media -- this approach seems more like suicide than "strategy."
Anders Schneiderman