If history is any guide, the Greens (and others) will not be able to change the American electoral system, and the Green Party (or any other Third Party on the left) will not be able to replace the Democratic Party, by agitating for Instant Runoff Voting and proportional representation in abstraction, whether or not the Greens form an "alliance of ALL the third-parties in the U.S., including maybe the right-wing ones" as Art advocates.
A new political party -- the Republican Party -- emerged and became a major force in the United States in the mid-19th century, because of the split of one of the dominant parties -- the Whigs -- over slavery (as well as the Mexican War), an issue of politico-economic substance rather than issues of electoral process like IRV and proportional representation.
When electoral systems were changed in the late 19th and early 20th century, the changes were imposed due to the white elite fears of political powers of freedmen, immigrants, "scalawags," populists, etc., rather than because of any changes in voter preferences about electoral procedures.
That being the case, the Green Party should focus on the issues over which the Democratic Party is sharply divided (between the Democratic Leadership Council leaders and rich liberals on one hand, and rank-and-file working-class Democrats on the left and left-wing Democratic politicians like Barbara Lee and Cynthia McKinney on the other hand): the rights and powers of the working class; and imperialist wars and interventions. Struggles against white supremacy are the key to both. Forget trying to win the established Black leaders and other leaders of color for the time being (some of them -- for instance, Manning Marable -- will come around again after four or eight years of the Democratic White House). Go and talk to the kind of regular working-class Black voters -- poorer than Black Democratic Party stalwarts -- who are not loyal to the Democratic Party: e.g., "Willie May Roberts, 30, a housekeeper and laundress at a Jonesboro nursing home, voted for Ralph Nader in 2000. She'll vote this year, but has not decided for whom" (Gayle White, "Black Women Form Backbone of Democratic Party Support," February 14, 2004, <http://www.ajc.com/news/content/news/0204/15women.html>); and Black voters -- especially young Black voters -- who do not regularly vote (43.2% of the Black voting-age citizen population and 46.5 of the total Black voting-age population did not vote in 2000, <http://www.census.gov/population/socdemo/voting/tabA-1.pdf>). Talk to them, register them, and make Democrats on the left compete for their votes, which will deepen the divide within the Democratic Party.
The reigning Democrats will not change the electoral system, much less change it in a way that facilitates Third-Party growth (e.g., adopting IRV and proportional representation), unless they feel they must do so to save their political lives. How do you threaten their political lives? By actually threatening their chances at elections and re-elections. That is why it is important for Ralph Nader and the Green Party to run a presidential campaign and run it well in the battleground states, rejecting the "safe state" strategy of David Cobb, et al. (see Cobb's "Green Party 2004 Presidential Strategy" at <http://www.gwu.edu/%7Eaction/2004/cobb.html>).
As it happens, Nader and the Green Party may fare best in the battleground states (= the "purple states" in the Gallup parlance, where the margin of victory for either candidate in 2000 was five percentage points or less) in 2004:
"In the red states, Bush leads among likely voters by six points, 51% to 45%, but he trails badly in the purple states (52% for Kerry, 39% Bush, 4% Nader) and in the blue states (55% Kerry, 43% Bush, 1% Nader)" (David W. Moore, "Kerry Maintains Small Lead, Bush Approval at 49%: Nader Candidacy Hurts Kerry," <http://www.gallup.com/content/default.asp?ci=10942>).
The segments of the US voting-age population who are the most likely to vote for Nader are Arab and/or Muslim Americans, whose votes are concentrated in the battleground states but for whom John Kerry and the Democratic Party cannot and will not make any policy concessions in favor of Iraqis and Palestinians: "Nader Courts Latino, Black Vote + Muslim Political Muscle," <http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/pipermail/lbo-talk/Week-of-Mon-20040315/005683.html>; and "Nader among Arab, Black, & Latino Voters," <http://www.mail-archive.com/pen-l@galaxy.csuchico.edu/msg86819.html>. Run a strong anti-war/anti-occupation campaign in the battleground states, and Nader and the Green Party will have a chance to force political changes in the electoral process. -- Yoshie
* Bring Them Home Now! <http://www.bringthemhomenow.org/> * Calendars of Events in Columbus: <http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/calendar.html>, <http://www.freepress.org/calendar.php>, & <http://www.cpanews.org/> * Student International Forum: <http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/> * Committee for Justice in Palestine: <http://www.osudivest.org/> * Al-Awda-Ohio: <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Al-Awda-Ohio> * Solidarity: <http://www.solidarity-us.org/>