Ivan Seeking said:
Yeah, you got me on that one; course he wasn't actually elected by a majority either time, and their was probably voting machine fraud, but your point is still valid. I guess it's hard to not be angry at anything that made Bush possible. But there are times when even third party candidates have to consider the common good over their own aspirations and causes - their patriotism should supersede their right to run. And, frankly, I fault anyone who couldn't see that Bush was a dangerous idiot. It shows that they aren't paying attention. It was obvious. Nader should have been smart enough to recognize the impact of his candidacy before it was too late.
1) We've had good Presidents and bad Presidents, but I think it would have been hard to anticipate how much worse Bush was in the competence department than other recent Presidents. Considering the experience level, a team of Cheney, Rumsfeld, Powell, and Rice looked pretty impressive in 2000. I'm still boggled at how badly Cheney and Rumsfeld performed, as both exhibited some intelligence prior to 9/11.
2) Assuming Bush would have been a bad President (based on his personal history and very short experience as Governor of Texas), it's usually safe to say the US can survive 4 years of weak leadership (in 2000, Bush looked like the classic single term President, as did Gore for that matter). Nader would have had to forsee a 9/11 level crisis to recognize the impact (and duration) of a Bush candidacy. Even given a 9/11 crisis and the Bush administration response to it, the US will survive the Bush Presidency.
3) The only power third party candidates have is the ability to throw the election to the opposing party. It keeps the party honest to its stated principles. At least in campaign rhetoric, both Bush and Gore seemed to have moved to the middle while ignoring the left and right wings of the parties - and this after 8 years of a relatively conservative (for a Democrat) Clinton Presidency. While Nader was obviously more effective than Pat Buchanon, both Nader and Buchanon were aiming to punish their party for abandoning a significant portion of the people who supported each party. (Ironically, Buchanon was only effective in "punishing" in Florida with a wholly unanticipated result thanks to "butterfly ballots").
Nader's 2000 campaign wound up having a pretty bad impact, but I certainly don't blame him for running. Nor do I blame Perot for running in 1992, even though the effects of his campaign were pretty frustrating as well.
I find it a lot more shocking that Bush won re-election and you can't blame that on Nader.
