Nader's Presidential Run - Impact on McCain

[turbo]

Nader is running for President again. There is little chance that he will pull away much McCain support, but he could manage to hurt the Democratic nominee in an otherwise tight general election. McCain's got to be rubbing his hands together with a grin on his otherwise botoxed, frozen face.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080224/ap_on_el_pr/nader;_ylt=AtdLytJdPz35H2d1uHKE8FKs0NUE

 

[lisab]

He's two years older than McCain!

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Pffft, no one cares about Nader any more... I see him pulling about two votes from Obama.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

... I liked what Obama said about it: ~ "In 2000 he ran on the premise that there was no difference between Gore and Bush. But now it's clear that he didn't know what he was talking about."

 

[CaptainQuasar]

I think Obama http://www.abs-cbnnews.com/storypage.aspx?StoryID=110210" : “I think the job of the Democratic Party is to be so compelling that a few percentage of the vote going to another candidate is not going to make any difference.”

I think that what Nader is doing, besides bringing up issues, is establishing a clear record that the two major parties really do intentionally (and frequently using rather undemocratic means) force third parties out of the running and exclude them from debates and other parts of the presidential race, in both technically legal and illegal ways.

⚛​

 

[CaptainQuasar]

Oops, not trying to upstage you, Ivan.

⚛​

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

My hope is that every time a Democrat speaks out on corporate greed, they convince one more sucker to vote for Nader.

 

[CaptainQuasar]

“http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIFEceopAUI"”

 

[Ivan Seeking]

“http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIFEceopAUI"”

That is great!

And frankly it does remind me that Nader has done great things for which we all owe him thanks, but it also makes the point well that he will be remembered as the guy who made Bush possible.

Sorry Ralph, but Bush has proven to be far more dangerous than the Corvair. You will never live that one down.

 

[Astronuc]

“http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIFEceopAUI"”

That made me cry - sometimes - I was laughing so hard, it brought tears to my eyes.

Ralph is back with an ego bigger than his nose.


Draft Ralph - and ship him overseas.

 

[turbo]

Both major parties stink. I would vote for a presidential candidate from either party though, if they were realistic and reliable. Someone like former senator and former defense secretary Bill Cohen would be a great choice, had he chosen to run. Now, we're stuck with McCain, Clinton, and Obama. Obama's the clear personal favorite, in large part because of his stance against the Iraq war, but if the Rovians in the GOP roll out their caging lists and other voter-suppression tactics in the general election, they could make the general election tight enough for Nader to play the spoiler. Not good. Ralph, go away!

 

[lisab]

“http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIFEceopAUI"”

oh my freakin' god, I almost fell out of my seat laughing!

But seriously Ralph, you're unsafe at any speed. Just quit it. Now.


..."here are your laurels..." !

 

[jaap de vries]

“http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIFEceopAUI"”

dammit now I will be watching youtube again till 2.00 am thank a lot!

But seriously he got about 0.5% in 2004 and that was against Kerry, a duck hunting windsurf nerd that inspired nobody.

Its is not going to be that close this time.

 

[Bigman]

a few years ago i was pissed off about nader's actions in 2000, but after talking about third party candidates in the U.S. in political science i think I'm going to vote for him this year :D

of course nader knows he has no chance in hell of winning, but his running does have some real (good)consequences none the less: when candidates see that some people in their constituency would rather throw their vote away on nader then cast it for the party candidate which better reflects their opinions, those candidates see that there is a pool of voters out there which they can tap by bending less to corporate interests and the like.

personally, i see the dems as the lesser of two evils and i want obama(or hillary) to kick mccain's ass, but i live in new york so my single vote doesn't make one god damn bit of difference in determining the outcome of this race. so i might as well cast my vote for nader, and ever so slightly increase that number of the voting population who is fed up with both parties

 

[Ivan Seeking]

On Meet The Press, Nader did a fairly good job of justifying his actions. He also makes the point that if they dems can't beat the reps by a landslide this year, they might as well hang it up. So even he agrees that this time the impact of his candidacy will be insignificant.

But again I have to agree with Obama: In 2000 Nader claimed that there was no difference between Bush and Gore. That's looney and now everyone knows it! So at the least Nader lacks a certain clarity of vision, if not a few marbles.

 

[devil-fire]

But again I have to agree with Obama: In 2000 Nader claimed that there was no difference between Bush and Gore. That's looney and now everyone knows it! So at the least Nader lacks a certain clarity of vision, if not a few marbles.

i don't think you can fault him on that though. there are millions of other americans who not only thought bush wasn't a bad candidate, but thought he was the Best candidate. i consider it a democratically unhealthy sign when people scorn a 3rd party candidate not for what he does as a politician, but actually what his presence as a candidate allowed the majority of the american people to elect. meaning that i think its absurd people use Nader as a scape goat for bush's presidency yet he's been elected by a majority! twice! and he has been consistently an idiot since day one!

 

[OmCheeto]

That made me cry - sometimes - I was laughing so hard, it brought tears to my eyes.

Ralph is back with an ego bigger than his nose. Draft Ralph - and ship him overseas.

My first nickname was based on his name at the bright early age of 7. I guess he is an old f**k.

Sorry for my language...I did once write a short story where he became president.
It pissed a libertarian off.
I do not know why.
Well. Ok. That was 8 years ago. Since then I've learned that everything pisses libertarians off.

Anyways. Welcome back Ralph! I still luv ya!

 

[Ivan Seeking]

i don't think you can fault him on that though. there are millions of other americans who not only thought bush wasn't a bad candidate, but thought he was the Best candidate. i consider it a democratically unhealthy sign when people scorn a 3rd party candidate not for what he does as a politician, but actually what his presence as a candidate allowed the majority of the american people to elect. meaning that i think its absurd people use Nader as a scape goat for bush's presidency yet he's been elected by a majority! twice! and he has been consistently an idiot since day one!

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.

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

And, frankly, I fault anyone who couldn't see that Bush was a dangerous idiot.

Perhaps they felt, like me, that he was almost the worst person in the entire United States for the job.

 

[Astronuc]

In terms of support, Nader is about as credible as Ron Paul.

Bush didn't win as much as Gore and Kerry lost. Both Gore and Kerry failed to inspire enough voters, and they failed to make a compelling case for themselves. The margins were thin and perhaps Nader took some votes from the Democrats.

I distinctly remember Gore and Kerry by-passing states which were considered leaning more to the Republican/Conservative side. That is wrong for someone who plans to be president - a national office.

Year     Eligible    Voted      %
2004  215,694,000 122,295,345 56.69% 
2000  205,815,000 105,586,274 51.31%

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_2000

                    Bush      Gore
Electoral vote       271       266 
States carried        30      20+DC 
Popular vote  50,460,110   51,003,926 
Percentage          47.9%     48.4%

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_2004

                    Bush       Kerry
Electoral vote       286        251 
States carried        31       19+DC 
Popular vote     62,040,610  59,028,111 
Percentage         50.7%       48.3%

 

[devil-fire]

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... Nader should have been smart enough to recognize the impact of his candidacy before it was too late.

this is my point though. people point at Nader as a factor in Bush's victory when there are many factors that are much more relevant then Nader and they go unreported. take for example that Nader 'stole' 3million votes. to me this sounds significant until someone looks at the 100million people who didn't vote at all. i would blame the 100million people who abstained 30 times more then i blame Nader. also you can blame Bush for stealing 50million votes and blame bush 16x as much as Nader for letting himself get into office.

but no, i always hear "oh my god, Bush won. if it wasn't for Nader this wouldn't have happened". it should be "oh my god, Bush won. if the other half of our country voted, this wouldn't have happened" or "oh my god, Bush won. why did the majority of voters consider him the best candidate even though he is an idiot?"

its looking like Bush was a vary poor candidate for president and people are asking themselves how he came to be president but they don't seem to be putting much thought into it. people come to the conclusions "he stole it" and "Nader made the other guy lose" and the investigation stops right there. i think it would be more sensible if people asked "why did Kerry get so many more votes then Nader while Nader was the better candidate?"

 

[BobG]

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.

 

[chemisttree]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIFEceopAUI" - Ralph Nader

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nCM85ndyI84"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CyfSN7B4lYI&NR=1"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fz7EkulVyHo&NR=1" - Barak Obama

Man, I really love Nader. I voted for him in '00, but what do I know, http://www.kinkyfriedman.com/" ...

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

i think it would be more sensible if people asked "why did Kerry get so many more votes then Nader while Nader was the better candidate?"

Excellent point. Why vote for Clinton/Obama, when you agree with Nader on every point of difference between them. Nader gets it on Iraq, on fairness, on equality, on global warming, on the Corvair and especially on corporate greed. If you agree with Nader and yet vote for Clinton/Obama, then you are going to get McCain and deserve it.