> "...though he had good ideas and positions, he didn't have the ability
> to put them across to the public in a believable, compelling way..."
>
> how much of "the public" would agree with that, never having heard him
> put forth those "good ideas"?
>
> "... Nothing is more death to a U.S. presidential candidate than taking
> the stance of "educating the public on the issues" -- most Americans
> absolutely hate a candidate
> who tries to drag them into a classroom..."
>
> again, when did "most americans" make this clear, by hearing, and not
> responding to, such an educational candidate?
I don't recall how much media exposure Nader got in 2000, but I grant that it wasn't nearly as much as the major party candidates got. This is a real problem for 3rd-party politics -- without breaking through into TV, which is the circus ring the audience mostly focuses its attention on (the Internet being a second ring that gets a little attention, and the print media, the ring that gets less and less attention as the U.S. public becomes more and more illiterate), it has a tough slog ahead of it.
But it doesn't help to run a candidate who is far more at home testifying before a Congressional committee than doing the presidential-candidate circus act. I don't blame the guy at all -- I would be even worse at it myself. (BTW, the fact that Kerry is very uncomfortable in that role is another reason I like him, besides his playing classical guitar.) But what were the Greens thinking of when they nominated him? I suppose it was because they liked his "positions" on the "issues." Third-party folks (left or right) are, almost by definition, folks for whom "positions on issues" are the most important thing in the political universe. But hardly anyone else likes someone who reminds them of the teachers they detested when they were in school.
Perhaps if they could find some one who had very good positions on the issues, but who also had some real media presence -- and most of all, some sort of gimmick that would get them a lot of attention by Leno, Letterman, et al. -- they could get somewhere. Kucinich is eccentric enough to qualify, almost, but perhaps his problem is that he falls victim to heightism.
Jon Johanning // jjohanning at igc.org __________________________________ A gentleman haranguing on the perfection of our law, and that it was equally open to the poor and the rich, was answered by another, 'So is the London Tavern.' -- "Tom Paine's Jests..." (1794); also attr. to John Horne Tooke (1736-1812) by Hazlitt