Watching "Real Time" - realizing I really don't know jack about Ralph Nader. The only prevailing opinion seems to be he's "sucking votes away from the Democratic party", which seems like a reasonable concern. In your own words/thoughts: what SHOULD I know?

Two words: old meme

I don't believe in the idea of "stealing votes away from some other candidate." By that reasoning, voting Democract is just stealing votes away from the Republicans, which is true but banal at best if you consider that voting for a more diverse array of candidates will increase the chances those candidates will be have a chance of winning in future elections. That is, why vote at all if you're just using your vote as a bet on who will win? It's an election, not a horse race.

i was gung-ho about Nader in '00 (as a sophomore in college in RI, which was a completely safe Gore state).  later i remembered something a knowing music prof told a lot of us in class one day:  it's great to be idealistic, and pursue those ideas, but at a certain point, you have a responsibility to elect somebody.  if Nader hadn't been on the ballot in florida (or hadn't campaigned there), Bush would never have come to power, and a lot of things would be different, and most likely way better.  certainly not better to the extent Gore would have you believe (he's been a much stronger post-candidate than he ever was a candidate), but inarguably Bush, especially with 6 years of republican majority, fucked things up in concrete ways that the abstractions of Nader distracted us from thinking about.

Nader wants a revolution, basically.  but what we have a better chance of getting is incremental improvement through electable candidates who can slowly move "the mainstream" back towards progress.

(my two cents)

@le sacre: wow. my poli sci professor would have *freaked* over that statement.

okay, no, I kind of freak over that statement. I think we "have a responsibility to elect someone," sure. And that process is voting and participation, not putting up a "winnable" candidate. any type of "extreme" or, even off-center-ish party allows a more diverse expression of the political landscape. They're necessary and vital components of the whole mechanism, whereby people feel they have representation of their ideas. And they involve a lot of people in the political process that might not otherwise be involved (be that rightly or wrongly).

I voted for Nader in '96 (when not many knew he was running) and I actively campaigned for him and my local Greens chapter in 2000 (damn, I was campaigning in the delivery room at the hospital), so I've had to "defend" my vote for the past 8 years (funny how no one cares about my "wasted" vote in 2000... guess votes only matter in times of crisis and change, fuck all those other years when you're vote didn't count for anything). And I don't bend. And I don't regret my voting history. Didn't vote for him in 04. And I rolled my eyes ever so slightly at this year's bid. But I don't begrudge him the run in any way. Has he gone a bit megalomaniacal? yes, I think perhaps, a bit. But that process is his right.

The franchise is something pretty amazing that people had to fight for, against amazing resistance by people who thought that the vote of their "inferiors" didn't matter. People have a right to execute their vote as a representation of self.

he came across a little lame/pathetic last night...like that older relative/party guest who just wants to be heard...and repeats the same message over and over again...largely about large corporations, big business, that sort of thing...he seemed to say a few key phrases as afterthoughts, just to remind people he's still running and what he stands for...

but he did have and make some valid points

bugger, I was so high on my dudgeon that I put down the wrong year of my "non-wasted" vote in 1998.

pardon.

it courts leftist voters. and the righties have their "fringe" candidates as well. once, a guy who hassled us while we were registering voters yelled "two parties is enough" and my ex (who, incidentally, doesn't care for Nader's politics) replied "that's only one more than Soviet Russia."