[lbo-talk] Tariq Ali Endorses Kerry . . . for the Battleground States

Doug Henwood dhenwood at panix.com
Sun Oct 31 21:04:02 PST 2004


Yoshie Furuhashi wrote:


>Changing only the occupants of the White House without changing the
>most egregious policies of the present occupant -- the root cause of
>much of anti-incumbent (aka ABB) sentiments -- is largely symbolic.
>What's purely symbolic is leftists such as yourself and Thomas
>voting for John Kerry in such one-party states as New York and
>California, when your votes do NOT even contribute to "evicting the
>present occupant of the White House" AT ALL. Thomas says that "if
>Bush wins, in the same manner as 2004, [he] want[s] to be able to
>point out that he lost the popular vote" -- "winning" the popular
>vote while losing the electoral college is also nothing but symbolic.

Getting more votes than the other guy is purely symbolic? That's ludicrous, unless you consider popular consent and legitimacy purely symbolic.

The subject heading is really misleading. Tariq thinks it's very important for Kerry to win the election, and he thinks Nader is a "joke" afflicted by "narcissism" with no sense of a national politcal strategy. Did you forget that part?

Doug



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