"In any event, the policies in Iraq, on civil liberties, on labor rights, on free trade, and all the other issues on which we share a common concern, can be influenced by the building of a mass movement in the streets, as well as by the election results. Let's agree to work together and build a movement to fight around those issues regardless of who's in the White House."
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This is the best thing said by Paul Felton. It's an important reminder that there's some shit to do whatever happens in November. Most everything else Paul said about Nader and the Greens was kind of irrelevant from my perspective. It really doesn't matter very much who is elected, for obvious reasons, though I'll vote for Kerry. Big deal!
I know Paul Felton in Detroit. He's a good and dedicated man, respected in local progressive and labor circles. But here's my rub. Paul was one of many around the country who were Labor Party activists before Nader/Greens, 2000, and who followed the "Nader action" and jumped the Labor Party ship at a critical and delicate time in the LP's development. Like many other devotees and leaders in the LP, Paul was disillusioned with the ambiguity of the Labor Party at the time. For good reason. He became part of the informal "Labor-Green" network that emerged. I fail to find any kind of serious political motion emerging from this tendency. More recently, Paul seems to have turned pure Green, if I have this correctly. Now, I would approve of a Green marrying my daughter, but I'll bet we would have some pretty heated dialogues whenever there was a family get-together.
Bob Mast
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