In the September/October issue of the Washington Monthly, Timothy Noah sits down with Ralph Nader to discuss Nader’s new book Unstoppable: The Emerging Left-Right Alliance to Dismantle the Corporate State. As you can surmise from the book’s title, Nader is bullish on the electorate’s ability to roll back the degree of corporate power we see in contemporary America. Specifically, Nader believes we will soon pass a national hike in the minimum wage and break up the big banks, and he predicts that the Trans-Pacific Partnership will go down to defeat.
Nader also offers a strong defense of the U.S. Postal Service and supports the continuation of Saturday delivery of the mail.
The basic idea behind the book is that liberals and conservatives agree with each other a lot more than they may realize. Whether it is opposition to fighting undeclared wars, Wall Street crimes that go unpunished, or franchisees and their minimum wage workers who are getting screwed by the system, there are a host of areas where people can and should transcend the political divide and get things done.
I am optimistic person by nature, by I have almost zero confidence that Congress can transcend anything, now or in the near future. I’d like to believe that Nader’s optimism is well-founded, but I see no signs of the Republicans responding to popular opinion. The fact that they have behaved so atrociously during Obama’s presidency, and particularly in light of his strong reelection, and are still on course to make gains in the upcoming election tells me that there are no repercussions for bad behavior in Washington. The only popular opinion that matters is the opinion of people who actually vote. Only a little over a third of country is even having Senate elections the Senate’s seats are up for grabs this year. What people want and what they are going to get are two completely different things.
Still, it’s good to see Ralph Nader feeling upbeat for a change. Maybe he’s right.
Check out the whole interview here.
Nader. Wrong again.
Nader.
The answer to the question no one is asking.
Nader
Effective activist.
Dumbassed politician.
As a politician, he’s unsafe at any speed.
Back in the day, I really admired Ralph.
But, after his 2000 run for the Presidency I lost most of my respect for him – if not all of it.
I’ll believe it a couple years after I see it.
Was listening to him and Grover talking about this on NPR a few weeks ago and during the Q&A someone asked him about 2000. Man did he ever sound pissed off!
Yes, but unfortunately (as Voice observes), Nader doesn’t have much of a record of being right about anything. “wewill soon[!]…break up the big banks”?! Preposterous. He said this with a straight face?
By any reasonable definition of the words, our Congress is “corrupt”, large numbers of its members having been “bribed” by large cash payments from CEOs and other corporate actors, all described as “campaign contributions”. There is no mechanism to address this corruption (indeed it has been constitutionalized via “money is speech”) and people are basically aware of that.
Add in fear of Citizens United air-wave pollution being directed at candidates by CEOs, corporate “citizens” and other plutocrats, and one can see that the rollback of corporate power, which has not only paralyzed Washington, but perverted the system into favoring corporate interests, is not happening anytime soon—there’s no functioning vehicle for reform in existence, unless one counts the rituals of “elections”, for which Repubs currently are doing their damnedest nationwide to reduce the number of people voting.
I’d agree that there is some basis for a vocabulary of reform and rollback present in the Dem party–as their latest vote to repeal Citizens United demonstrated. But it is simply delusional to think that there are some (any?) Rightwing “partners” ready and able to work towards any of the ends discussed. Far from rolling back corporate power, we are more likely moving toward a new form of gub’mint: Corpocracy, government by corporation.
“liberal and conservative people agree with each other a lot more than they are being allowed to realize”
I tweaked this statement because I think that people from the left and right do agree. But to your point our congress is getting paid to ignore us.
“There is no mechanism to address this corruption (indeed it has been constitutionalized via “money is speech”) and people are basically aware of that.”
I am convinced this is why voters are so apathetic right now (as Josh Marshall worries)
They know the fix is in for real. Who cares, we tell ourselves, we never win.
Hell, a lot of people think Obamacare is a big loss.
Nader has fallen into the trap of thinking that what Nader says does because of that create reality.
There are emerging left-right alliance on particular issues that are not translating into any policy or electoral changes of direction. Most notable is the alliance between left civil liberties groups like ACLU and Cato on the issue of NSA phone and internet bulk dragnets. Although Lewis Lessig’s attempt with MaydayPAC to build this issue into electoral politics turned out to be as politically tone-deaf as Nader’s strategies over the past 50 years.
There should of rights be an anti-corporation backlash, but so far the ideologues on the right are holding it in check with fears of Stalinism. It would be easy for Democratic primary candidates to explore that proposition, if there ever were Democratic primary candidates who were not stalking horses for other candidates, who started with a knowledge of what it takes to do a campaign to win, who stopped with the nonsense about being a candidate to send a message to…whoever.
The most momentum I see is in the Fight for 15 movement and Rev. William Barber’s Moral Monday movement. Neither of those actually fit Nader’s white progressive fusion movement fantasy. Both are heavily rooted in minority communities and get the persistence and tactics from the legacy of the civil rights movement.
I suspect this gets at the heart of things. The idea of a “Blue/Brown” or “Green/Brown” coalition coming in with guns blazing and assuming the White Man’s Burden of saving our nation from itself is pure folly. My guess is if such an entity emerges, it will look every bit as clownish as the NazBols (National Bolsheviks) in Russia, and every bit as nasty.
This is like telling me if we elect Rand Paul that we will stop militarism and imperialism. It’s due to a false understanding of what “conservatism” means.
Ralph Nader is the reason for ISIS.
More true than some people are willing to admit, fourteen years after the election.
Nader’s framing is wrong. It’s not that there aren’t some areas of agreement between left-right and liberal-conservative, but those are mostly extra-party. A long-standing American value such as a preference for small business over large, including financial services, and local over national or international. Both the Democratic and Republican parties give a lot of lip service to “small,” but are totally owned by the “large.”
Another example, the official DEM and GOP party lines is that marijuana prohibition is good public policy. Realists in both parties, real non-partisans, and younger eligible voters disagree. By “realists,” I mean those that have no vested interest in legalized marijuana; not pot smokers and not those looking to make their fortune from pot. But a political party can’t be based on legalizing pot because half the supporters are social Democrats and the other have are anti-government types (and when push comes to shove the latter will always vote with the anti-tax folks).
While given a bad rap by both parties, there’s a strong anti-isolationist streak in the psyche of Americans. The Pat Buchanan/Ron-Rand Paul version is so infused with racism and nationalism that the bad rap is well earned. Anti-intervention is closer to what is advocated by those on the left — but “anti-” anything doesn’t sell well. Among the most prominent politicians in the past few decades, it was Obama that came closest to articulating that USian predisposition with his “no more dumb wars.” Then failed to listen to himself and plowed a lot more into Afghanistan. And Syria/ISIS is even worse.
UH oh!!!
Nader is making sense and the leftinesses are complaining.
Good call, Booman. Maybe you’re seeing the light.
There is indeed a “liberal/conservative” coalition abrewing in the United States. Will it come to fruition anytime soon? I dunno. Not if the two parties that have comprised the Permanent Government since the mid-’60s have anything to say about it. But…and this is a big “but”…those two parties are losing the confidence of the American electorate at an astounding rate.
This is rapidly becoming the mantra throughout the country. If someone manages to give these disgruntled voters a real choice other than “The Past vs. The Past” whitewash that will be what happens in 2016 if the mainstream DemRats and Ratpubs have their way…either as a viable third party or (much more likely) by taking over an existing party?
Hoo boy!!!
There’ll be hell to pay!!!
Watch.
Could happen…
Bet on it.
Watch.
Later…
AG
P.S. Above, DerFarm writes “Ralph Nader is the reason for ISIS. ” I suppose this is snark regarding his unsuccessful run for the presidency in 2000. Many people blame him for Bush II’s election. I do not. If the Dems had run on a non-PermaGov…even a less PermaGov…platform, they would have won. If they had possessed the foresight and courage to challenge the obviously crooked election results they also would have won. But they didn’t. They either totally blew it or they were at least
semi-witting partners in a PermaGov fix.Nader ran on principle. He ran on the truth as he understood it. He ran on moral grounds. In a recent post here (Is Morality In Government Possible? If Not, We Might Just As Well Give Up Now.), I wrote:
I stand by that statement. Had we refused to buckle under the force of this 50+ years and counting vast criminal enterprise that we laughingly call “The United Sates Government,” then there would be no ISIS.
But we didn’t.
And DerFarm blames Ralph Nader?
For at least trying to stand up to the hustle and speak the truth?
Nice.
Dream on.
Go vote for Hilary Clinton or whatever the RatPubs prop up in 2016 if it’s not Rand Paul. Then you’ll have even more chances to jerk off for snark when it all turns out just the same as it has turned out so far.
Snark yourselves right into the grave.
RIP Omertica/Onanica.
It wuz nice knowin’ ya.
Later…
AG
See! See! Did I not predict this, exactly?
Celebrating agreeing with yourself.
Nice.
Grow up.
AG
It’s going to have to get a lot worse before it gets better.
Oh, hi! Any relation to the famous Karl Pearson? He’s the man.
Anyway, Nader was pretty optimistic about Bush until he figured out that he had thrown the election to Republicans who actually exist rather than to the ones who live only in his imagination and that the real ones despised him and his life work and everything he ever stood for. Evidently he has decided to let bygones be by gone, or maybe he never really learned the lesson in the first place.
Either way there is no particular reason to trust his judgement this time around either.
Didn’t click the link.
Mr. Irrelevant.
Might as well get the opinion of Kim Kardashian.