Ralph Nader upsets a lot of Democrats. So much so, in fact, that it seems to have created a whole brand of psychosis that I like to call Naderphobia. An irrational fear, and hatred of, Ralph Nader. Anyway, this year we’re bound to see Democrats try their best to waste precious time, energy and money in an effort to keep Ralph off the ballot. So today I want to explain how Democrats can run their candidate (Clinton or Obama) against Ralph Nader’s candidacy. There are right ways and wrong ways to do this, and for that reason I’m writing this “do and don’t” list so that success is achieved.
- DO: Accentuate the differences between your candidate’s positions on the issues, and Nader’s.
- DO: Make sure to do everything in your power, big or small, to force your candidate to run on progressive policy positions.
- DO: Everything in your power to help get real progressives elected to public office, especially Congress.
- DON’T: Argue that your candidate isn’t John McCain.
- DO: Point out Ralph Nader’s ethical lapses in campaigning.
- DON’T: Threaten voters with four more years of Republican misrule.
- DON’T: Waste time, effort, or money trying to keep Ralph Nader off state ballots.
This one’s pretty tough, because it may have the detrimental effect of turning off progressive voters from your candidate. After all, you can’t expect most people to just vote against their beliefs — especially when the reasons you might give for doing so don’t stack up. So you’ll need to know a bit about the people you’re talking to. Since your candidate is a corporate Democrat, a “centrist”, you’ll want to target self-described “centrist” voters. This can be difficult to do, since the political pendulum is swinging to the left, and has been for some years now. But if you’re set on trying to convince people to go with your candidate instead of Ralph Nader, you’re going to have to find these voters. They’re not many, and their numbers are becoming fewer, but they’re out there. It’s just a matter of finding them.
Then again, if you insist on trying to falsely portray your candidate as a progressive, you might want to skip this first tactic altogether, since chances are no argument you can make is going to convince people your candidate is more progressive than Nader.
There IS NO fixed political “center”. It shifts as time passes and demographics change. Likewise, extremes of both right and left in politics have a habit of altering the politics of lay voters. Right now the electorate is moving to the political left, because twenty-eight years of Republican misrule in government have shown just how destructive it really is. It serves your candidate no purpose to run to the political right, speaking in complimentary terms of Ronald Reagan or putting out a health care plan that benefits the insurance and pharmaceutical industries. The American people are hungry for real change, and they demand it. That means your candidate must run to the political left. This shall not be an easy task; in fact, it may be an impossible one. But you must try anyway. Because if your candidate manages to squeak by this election and become president, the public absolutely will not abide being let down. And they will punish the Democratic Party for failing to live up to its promise of change.
Not even Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton is going to veto a health care bill passed by a Democratic Congress, no matter how good or bad it may actually be. So it is imperative that you do everything in your power to make sure enough progressive Democrats are elected to Congress, and that they sign on to efforts at passing HR 676.
Yes, people are aware that your candidate isn’t a registered Republican. They don’t care. Trust me on this. After all, Joe LIEberman is not a registered Republican, and we all know what he really is. The same may be said of DINOs such as Iowa’s Leonard Boswell, Maryland’s Steny Hoyer, and Illinois’ Rahm Emanuel. So trying to justify your candidate by saying he or she is not a Republican isn’t going to work. It doesn’t mean anything to voters who’ve lost jobs to NAFTA because of your candidate’s continuing support of that trade deal, or to voters who cannot get decent health care because your candidate worked to gut it as a state senator.
I mean, what is the purpose of making this ridiculous argument, anyway? It’s like asking people to pick diet soda over regular, “New” Coke over “Classic”. More often than not, people shall choose the real deal over some pretender. History bears this out. Yes, Republican politicians are evil bastards. Voters know this, and better than you care to think. But those same voters also know that Republican politicians don’t try to hide where they stand. DINOs do. And your candidate is, whether you want to admit it or not, a DINO. You’re better off not making the “he (or she) isn’t John McCain” argument.
This is very likely the best argument you can make when trying to convince voters not to support Ralph Nader. Why? Because there is pretty strong circumstantial evidence that, in spite of his claims that the two party system is corrupt, he is nevertheless willing to take money from one of the two political parties he regularly criticizes.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2004/07/09/MNGQQ7J31K1.DTL
http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/06/30/bush.nader/index.html
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0625-09.htm
See, Democrats aren’t the only ones who lie to themselves about how big an impact Ralph Nader has on electoral outcomes. Republicans appear to buy into it, too. Or perhaps they don’t, and are simply exploiting this unreasonable and factually challenged notion in hopes that they can get Democrats to waste time, energy and money trying to keep Nader off the ballot (as opposed to campaigning for their candidate). Either way, Ralph appears to be accepting assistance from Republicans.
Maybe he thinks, in a jaded and cynical sort of way, that if the Democratic Party insists on waging war against him he might as well fight back and stick it to them by taking Republican money and support. I don’t know. What I do know is that if you’re going to campaign on the argument that the two-party system is hopelessly corrupt, taking money and support from one political body does seem hypocritical. So Nader does have a weakness, and this is it: the lapse in ethical judgment.
For one thing, most reasonable people don’t believe this; they see it for the hogwash it is. For another thing, they wouldn’t care if they did believe it, because most people don’t like to be threatened and have a nasty tendency to respond negatively. So whatever you do, don’t threaten voters with another Bush term if they cast their ballots for Ralph Nader. It won’t work, and in fact is likely to have the opposite effect. Remember, too, that people subscribed to this argument in 2004 and they plainly saw that it turned out to be a losing strategy — Nader received far fewer votes that year than he did in 2000. So few, in fact, that any perceived impact upon it was negligible. And John Kerry still lost, because he was a weak candidate who ran a weak campaign. Threatening more Republican rule if voters don’t cast ballots for your candidate is a losing strategy.
This only serves to confirm to many voters that the Democratic Party really isn’t fundamentally different than the GOP. It is a proven fact that the Republicans have cheated their way into the White House, and are likely to do so again this year, because they denied voters the right to cast ballots and because they removed (or tried to remove) candidates from state ballots. In Ohio in 2006, the GOP tried unsuccessfully to remove Democrat Jennifer Brady from the state house district 16 race. Why should Democrats emulate that sort of bullshit behavior? The Texas party eliminated Dennis Kucinich from its primary ballot for refusing to sign a Republican-style loyalty oath, for crying out loud! When you engage in that kind of behavior, you really are proving Nader’s point. And you do NOT want to do that.
It is also time, energy, and money, that is far better spent simply trying to sell your candidate to the public. If you choose to waste it trying to engage in GOP-style efforts to keep Nader off the ballot, you have less time to make convincing arguments for your candidate.
Okay then, those are some sage words of advice for those of you who insist on trying to run your candidate for president by going after Ralph Nader. Later this week: “Do and Don’t” lists for Clinton and Obama.
