>You see, you just revealed yourself, as well as other ex-Green
>voters in the Anybody But Bush camp, to be lacking in patience, by
>simply saying that the Green Party presidential campaign in 2000
>"didn't work." The campaign "didn't work" only if you look at
>nothing but the proportion (2.7%) of the total votes that went to
>the Green Party and conclude that, since it didn't amount to 5%,
>unable to secure federal matching funds, it "didn't work" at all.
It didn't work because it led to no party-building, and discredited Nader and the Greens among a large group of potential supporters. Just becuase the vote total increased doesn't mean there was any organizational progress. There was very little, in fact. In New York, they lost ballot status because of Aronowitz' dreadful gubernatorial campaign.
>As for how to gain "slightly better policies and a better discursive
>and organizing environment," what does theory of Marxism --
>especially the autonomist branch of the Marxist tradition, which you
>say you favor -- say about that? Elect a Democratic president,
>hoping that he will give them to you, even though he has not and
>will not promise any such things? Or get organized, so that any
>president will have to concede them to us? The latter is surely
>much more important than the former.
I don't expect a Dem president to give me or my fellow thinkers very much. It's no substitute for organizing outside the electoral realm, whether for unions or the global justice movement; it just makes it easier to organize, legally and environmentally.
>Campaign to elect Kerry if you like, but the ABB camp followers must
>*not* do so by compelling Greens to help Democrats elect Kerry.
>It's the job of Democrats to elect Kerry. The Greens' job is to
>build the Green Party patiently.
I'm not into compelling anyone to do anything, even if I were capable of doing so.
Doug