Nader Runs for President
I’ve got to admit that, although I disagree with Ralph Nader on virtually every issue, I respect the man. He believes very strongly in certain things, and he’s willing to do whatever is necessary to ‘fix’ his country (in his own eyes at least). Aside from that he greatly respects the American people and he has served them throughout his life. Did you, for instance, know that we’ve got seat belts in our cars because of Nader? Without him, thousands more would have died in car accidents.
So now he has decided to run for president again. Eight years ago he was dubbed the “spoiler” by Democrats who blamed him for Al Gore’s defeat. The fact of the matter is, of course, that someone running for office can never be a “spoiler.” To call someone a spoiler means that you automatically assign certain votes to Democrats (or Republicans). They do not, however, owe any votes. They don’t have the inherit right for certain votes. Instead, if they want people to vote for them they’ve got to convince them. Democrats failed in doing that eight years ago because many Nader voters believed that Democrats weren’t progressive enough.
As an aside, many of those voting and having voted for Nader in general elections - and people know and knew what’s at stake - would not vote for any of the mainstream parties. Many of them would not have voted if Nader would not have run. In the end, therefore, he simply offered Americans yet another choice. And he will do so again this year.
He didn’t prevent Democrats from winning in ‘00, the Democrats prevented themselves from winning (a sitting VP losing the elections, while he was the VP of an immensely popular president; he has no one to blame but himself).
Nader’s participation is, in my opinion, a very good thing. All too often members of the two mainstream parties think that it’s always between the two of them and they seem to believe that no one else has the right to run for office. Nader’s run is healthy for American democracy and it offers American voters yet another choice. There’s nothing wrong about that.
Instead, perhaps Democrats will learn a valuable lesson this time around; humility.
If Ralph Nader can use his run to challenge ballot access laws and debate participation rules, then I support him.
I don’t completely agree with his views, I don’t think they’re realistic, but I sympathize with some of his causes. Even though I would have supported Bush over Kerry, I didn’t want to vote for either, and did a write-in vote for Nader here in California, because I was angry the Democrats essentially sued him off the ballot. I wish you people against Nader, would let us vote for who we want to vote for.Creating a more open electoral system, with easier participation and ballot access, will be the most effective form of campaign reform, and will end the polarization and divisiveness more than any message of hope.I will not support Obama or McCain, unless they promise to undo repressive ballot restrictions, and agree to let Nader in the Presidential debates. If they do change their minds on this I’ll change my mind on them.
Mike, I don’t you understand what the term "spoiler" means. It’sa sports term, and it’s used to describe an entity that, while it has no chance of winning, messes things up for one of the favorites. Americans are fine with acknowledging that Nader had the right to run, But the role he played was most definitely that of a spoiler. And don’t forget, to have the right is not the same as to be right. Nader had the right o run, and he ran. And what did he achieve in futherance of his cause? Precious little. Most rational folks will freely concede that enabling the election of a republican was harmful to Nader’s anti-corporate agenda. Thankfully, Nader will be largely ignored except for when he raises a big stink over being excluded from the debates for not being viable. Other than that, he won’t get any press, because it would be the same story every day…"Ralph Nader was in _______ today, and he told everyone that corporations are evil." Nader is a total snoozer here in America. He’sbeen tuned out, and he’s tarnished what could have been a nice legacy with his repeated Quixotic runs for the white house. What’s he looking at, O for 5? Time to take NO for an answer, Ralphie boy.
So yes I do understand what the term means, you on the other hand don’t get my point. They don’t mess it up for any of the favorites since none of the favorites owns any votes. You get that? It’s called democracy.
Nor does any sporting team "own" the right to play in the championship game, Michael. And yet we still call it a "spoiler" when an unranked team with no chance itself of getting to the championship, defeats the team that is almost certain to get there. That’s not because the favored team had a "right" to get to the championship, only because it was considered very, very likely to, and would have had it not been for the "spoiler" team. So Nader, while he has every right to run, is indeed likely to prove a "spoiler," because he has absolutely no chance of getting to the championship (winning the presidency), but could well prevent a favored team (the Democrats) from doing so.
If you want to argue that nobody should use the term in the political context because it shows a lack of respect or something, fine, but it is incorrect to claim that the term "can never apply," because it applies perfectly here.
It’s not the word itself, it’s the usage. I think the distinction is that campaigns or candidates shouldn’t use the term as an excuse for their own poor performance. Spoilers exist because they have their own base of support, and often that base exists precisely because of the failings of one of the two main parties’ candidates. A current example is Huckabee- he’s obviously a ’spoiler’ in that he’s been dividing the votes of a group of conservatives who might otherwise have voted for Romney, but the fact is that those voters didn’t find Romney acceptable to them. And Nader was in fact that kind of spoiler in ‘00, and Perot split the GOP vote in ‘92. Those are facts, but it doesn’t mean that Gore voters or GHB voters should feel that those third party candidates had no right to be in the race.