Nader blabbering on MSNBC. Still not apologizing for Bush.

[onehandle]

Still has one eye in the mirror as he watches himself gavotte.

[corkhead]

1. Nader is not to blame

The people threw away their vote on him when they would have otherwise voted for Gore are.

We are stuck with a 2 party system where we have to choose the lesser of 2 evils. That is a fact. To vote for anyone other your view of the lesser of 2 evils is the same as giving your vote to the one of the two you least want to win. I learned that lesson in 1980 when I voted for Anderson which helped usher in the Ronny Raygun era. Never again.

[trumad]

2. Well I can say this with pretty good certainty.

If Nader did not run in 2000, the 90,000 votes that went to him in Florida would have helped Gore immensely.

Oh--I almost forgot--- Fuck Nader.

[joeybee12]

4. And I can say with certainty if the Dems didn't roll over and

play dead when Bush stole the election, we wouldn't be in this mess. Even with Nadar Gore got more votes than Bush in Florida...Nadar has no need to apologize...the wimps in Congress need to.

[trumad]

26. No mention of the 90,000 votes

which is very fucking typical of Nader apologists.

[11 Bravo]

35. Yeah, that always slips their minds. Anyone who refuses to admit that Nader, at a bare minimum ...

made Florida close enough for Jeb, Katherine Harris, and the SCOTUS to steal is intellectually dishonest in the extreme, and not worth the time spent arguing with them.

[trumad]

40. This is very simple

If Nader did not run---Bush would have never happened.

[11 Bravo]

45. Correct! Period. Full stop. End of fucking discussion.

[TheWraith]

139. Exactly. This is not exactly nebulous.

It's not a Rube Goldberg machine. It's not a butterfly flapping its wings and causing sunshine instead of a hurricane. It's more like "the cookies are all gone because you ate them."

[randome]

46. That's hindsight.

Anyone who wants to run for President is allowed to. Case closed.

[Javaman]

51. +1

I'm far from a nader supporter, but I will not fault the guy for basically exercizing his constitutional rights.

the bottom line is: Gore ran a bad campaign. If he ran a good campaign, it wouldn't have been even close.

katherine harris, the brooks brothers riot and sandra day o'conner fucked us.

I will never understand the blaming of nader, who followed the law is to blame while harris and o'conner who violated the law aren't held to account.

amazing.

[dsc]

114. that is badly false

His 'bad' campaign erased a 17 point deficit at the start of the race (when Bush announced) and he won by half a percent. His 'bad' campaign got a higher percentage of the popular vote than Truman in 48, Kennedy in 60, Clinton in 92, and Clinton in 96. He also beat all of our losers from 48 on. Had his win been recognized, his comback would have been second only to Truman in 48. He outperformed such campaigns as Ford who nearly beat Carter after falling behind by 18, and Bush 1 who beat Dukakis after falling behind by 15.

[Javaman]

132. if he ran a good campaign there would never be an issue as to why it was so close...

he didn't even win his home state.

[dsc]

135. neither did Bush 1

who won. The home state thing is just plain stupid. Again, he did better than Truman, Kennedy, and Clinton. He gained 17 points despite the media hating his guts.

[Javaman]

146. you know what?

this whole thread is blatant ridiculousness.

as I stated somewhere else in this thread, this thread is like beating a dead horse what has already turned to bones.

[dsc]

150. well then why did you post in it

the simple fact is you claimed, wrongly by any reasonable measure, that Gore ran a bad campaign. He simply didn't. He got a greater percentage of the vote than Truman, Kennedy, and Clinton. He overcame a bigger deficit than anyone other than Truman. He did this with the media constantly lying to make him look like a liar. He got a higher percent of the vote than any Democrat since Carter and the third highest of any since Truman. Only Johnson and Carter beat him. (and now Obama) Johnson was the heir to a martyred Kennedy and Carter ran against the man who pardoned Nixon. Obama who also beat him and he merely ran against a party which had caused the worst recession since the Great Depression.

[Javaman]

151. because yesterday, I stupidly believed it still mattered.

when in fact it's just and exercise in futility.

[SomethingFishy]

156. Funny, that's not what Gore told me...

I had a chance to speak with him a couple years after the election and even Gore himself admits they ran a bad campaign. That he listened to his "handlers" too much and was not "himself".

But what does he know, right?

[dsc]

157. I would imagine that he was still considering a run for office at that time

Blaming the voters for the outcome of the election or for that matter the press for the outcome would have been inpolitic. My guess is he felt he ran a good campaign, since he did. Perfect, no. Good, yes.

[WhaTHellsgoingonhere]

124. Even more simple. If Nader had not run, the SCOTUS would have appointed Bush anyway

period

[quakerboy]

163. This makes several assumptions

I will start with "fuck Nader". He has shown his colors, and his colors are pure self glorification. I haven't voted for him, and I won't vote for him.

However the arguments that he is to blame for bush are questionable at best. The assumption that those votes would have just defaulted to the Democrat is an unfounded leap. The assumption that the elections were actually fair is an unfounded leap. The assumption that the supreme court wouldn't have given the election to bush, no matter what the ballots actually were is an unfounded leap.

[dionysus]

142. .. and you can't even spell "Nader"...

[hfojvt]

10. it is a mistake to focus on Florida

Nader-defenders love to talk about Florida.

But what about New Hampshire? Gore lost New Hampshire by 7,211 votes. Nader got 22,200 votes.

And what about Wisconsin, Oregon, Iowa, and New Mexico? Yes, Gore won those states by a whole 16,983 votes combined - while Nader took 222,052 votes in those states. In other words, if Nader had taken 7.7% more votes, like he surely wanted to, the media could have talked about a "Bush landslide".

http://journals.democraticunderground.com/hfojvt/118

[trumad]

28. Nader apologists

never ever want to go there.

[Javaman]

53. I'll go there.

Gore ran a bad campaign. Really that simple.

it should have been a no contest for both moron* and nader.

but alas, those who choose to place the blame on nader instead of harris and the supreme court will always be a wonder for me.

FYI I voted Gore.

[hfojvt]

65. the trouble is

that if I could get a time machine, go back to 1999 and kill Ralph Nader, that Gore could have run the exact same campaign - and won in a landslide. It is really that simple. Take Nader and his evil deeds out of the picture and millions of Iraqis would still be alive today.

[Javaman]

80. If I had a time machine I would have admittedn hitler to art school.

so your point is?

[hfojvt]

85. that take away Nader, and Gore wins, in spite of his supposedly "bad" campaign

it was especially ironic when I got those letters in 2002 from Public Citizen. "Oh my gosh, hand wringing, sackcloth and ashes, please donate to us because we have to stop the terrible awful Bush administration".

Shoulda thought of that in 2000, eh?

The other political reality is simply this. If Gore moves to the left to capture the 2.73% of Nader voters, he could easily lose 5% of moderate voters. Especially when the M$M paints Bush (or Romney) as a happy-go-lucky moderate and just an all around decent guy.

[noiretextatique]

98. face the reality: the reason gore "lost' had nothing to do with nader

nader had nothing to with disenfranchising voters, stopping the recount, or creating a bogus scotus decision for bush. what *might* have happened *if* is irrelevant considering what actually happened.

[hfojvt]

112. again, that is all Florida

Nader was warned repeatedly that what he was doing might put Bush in the White House. He kept on doing it anyway. He said he didn't care, and he still does not care that he did what he was warned he might do. What might have happened matters, because one a$$hat had the power to make it happen, and he chose not to. For that, he should still be apoloigixing and begging for forgiveness.

Nader simply had something to do, a very, very large something to do with Bush winning New Hampshire and with Bush almost winning Iowa, Wisconsin, Oregon, and New Mexico.

And hell, I forgot Spain, er, I mean Poland, er the Maine (and Plymouth Rock and the Golden Rule).

Gore lost Maine by 33,335 votes. Nader took 37,127 votes. Take away Nader and Gore probably wins Maine and Bush is kept out of the White House.

[noiretextatique]

160. face the reality: the reason gore "lost' had nothing to do with nader

rinse. lather. repeat. in reality, it all came down to florida ans the scotus decision.

[hfojvt]

171. no matter how many times you repeat a falsehood does not make it true

Florida was simply not the only place the election was decided. Remove the evil scourge of Nader from the earth and Gore wins New Hampshire. That is reality. He could have done the right thing and he chose not to. 7,212 Nader voters in New Hampshire could have done the right thing, but they chose not to. They are at least as responsible as SCOTUS.

I don't know why people are vested in denial.

You might say the same things about me.

But what am I denying? That SCOTUS made a crapy decision? That they played a part, even a large part? No, I admit that, but they have an excuse - they are conservatives who wanted Bush to win. What is Nader's excuse? Did he want Bush to win? Because he also played a part. A huge part. A key part.

A bunch of conervatives in Florida and SCOTUS did what they could to put Florida in the Bush column. Meanwhile, Nader and a bunch of Nader voters helped to put New Hampshire in the Bush column. Nader and LaDuke also did everything they could to put New Mexico, Iowa, Wisconsin, and Oregon, in the Bush column.

Their actions had at least as much to do with the Bush victory as SCOTUS did. See how that works. My team lost the game for many reasons. For one reason because the opposing pitcher beaned our star player, taking him out of the game. A dirty trick, to be sure, but they are trying to win for their team. Meanwhile somebody who is supposed to be on our side, purposely struck out in the last inning with a runner on third.

Both SCOTUS and Nader could have done different things if they wanted to.

Nader, unlike SCOTUS conservatives, claims to care about many of the same issues that I do, and yet his actions undermined everything he claims to stand for.

Having done something so horrible I can understand why he is personally vested in denial. It keeps him from blowing his brains out.

I don't understand at all other people's resistance to the obvious.

I guess people are just plain not very rational.

[noiretextatique]

174. not false, just the stark, awful truth of what actually happened

not a "what if' anti-democratic fantasy. if scotus had not stopped the recount in florida...

[hfojvt]

179. What actually happened was that New Hampshire went for Bush

that actually happened, and it put Bush in the White House.

What also actually happened was that New Mexico, Iowa, Wisconsin and Oregon ALMOST went for Bush. Nader did everything he could to make that happen too. I did what I could to help Iowa go for Gore, and I prevailed over Nader, but Nader was definitely on the other side.

Yours is not a "what if"? Really?

"IF scotus ..." is no less of a what if than "IF Nader ..." I can give a big Fuck you to both Scotus AND Nader AND Chris Matthews AND other members of the media who took part in the "war on Gore". Because they all played key roles in putting Bush in the White House. None of them should be given a pass because of the others, because they all had key roles.

What is so anti-democratic about facing electoral reality? That in an election 100 + 4 is less than 101.

That is simply awful reality, except to those who are vested in denial for some mysterious reason.

[noiretextatique]

184. florida decided the election: face the reality

the state where shrub's brother was governor decided the election. scotus stopped the recount in florida, not new hampshire or new mexico, or oregon or iowa or wisconsin.

[girl gone mad]

108. Not exactly.

The people I knew who voted for Nader were never going to vote for Gore, period.

The problem with the Nader haters is that they feel Democrats are automatically entitled to every "not Republican" vote. Those votes have to be earned, and Gore was never able to do so, in large part because of the 8 years he spent serving in the corporatist neoliberal Clinton White House.

[hfojvt]

113. well logic would dictate

that if one votes for Nader, that one is on the left, and if one is on the left, then they probably are not gonna vote for George W. Bush. That if one did not like the Clinton corporatist White House that anybody who was not a complete idiot would have to realize that the Bush White House would be worse.

[girl gone mad]

137. They didn't vote for Bush,

they voted for Nader, which is still their right as citizens.

No, people on the left don't automatically owe their votes to a centrist simply because the other guy is worse. That's the reason this country is in such a miserable state right now. We're constantly asked to vote for the slightly less crappy corporatist tool since both parties are now fully owned by the oligarchs.

[hfojvt]

152. it amounted to the same thing

by not voting for Gore they helped Bush to win. They should have known what they were doing was gonna help Bush win.

The reason the country is in a miserable state right now, is because Bush won and enacted 8 years worth of bad policy, much of which still has not been reversed for some reason.

I think you have that backwards too. Neither party gives a damn about the bottom 60%, but they are not both fully owned by oligarchs. Look at the dime's worth of difference. The Republican Presidential candidates are all promising multiple trillions in tax cuts for the top 1%. My party's candidate, even though I call him Captain Caveman, even though he came out of his cave, saw his shadow, got scared and gave us four more years of the Bush tax cuts, is at least making half-hearted attempts to pass the Buffet rule.

[iverglas]

20. I'm not seeing the certainty

If Nader did not run in 2000, the 90,000 votes that went to him in Florida would have helped Gore immensely.

Those voters apparently did not want to vote for Gore.

Why not just line people up and hold a gun to their heads and tell them whom to vote for?

Surely politicians and political parties are responsible for getting voters to vote for them. Limiting electoral choice doesn't really seem like a particularly democratic thing to do.

One can blame third-party voters for the worst (in one's own view) candidate/party winning if one likes. But maybe the third-party voters sincerely don't care which of the other two win. Maybe (this being the case in mature multiple-party systems) they just don't have crystal balls, and choose to vote for the candidate/party they hope will win if they vote that way, rather than decide how to vote as if they were playing poker and trying to guess how everybody else is going to vote before playing their card.

I've voted strategically in Canada (once Conservative federally, twice Liberal provincially, in 40 years). I hate doing it. I'd undoubtedly vote Democrat if I were in the US. I'd probably hate doing it. But I'd sure be a lot more pissed at the people who voted Republican than at the people who voted for Nader.

[trumad]

29. "Those voters apparently did not want to vote for Gore".

oh---so they would have voted for Bush?

No fucking chance.

Let's play math--- I'd say that all 90,000 wouldn't have sat home on election day and maybe 1/3 would have voted.

30,000--- out of that I'd say with pretty good certainty that they would have all voted for Gore over bush.

Now how much id Gore lose Florida by?

500?

[iverglas]

44. like I said

oh---so they would have voted for Bush?
No fucking chance.

Why not just line them up and hold a gun to their heads and tell them whom to vote for?

Maybe they would not have voted. Maybe they would have voted for Gore and felt an odd kinship with people "voting" in an old Soviet bloc country.

In Canada, we refer to the Liberal Party as the Natural Governing Party - in its mind. Anyone who stands in its way en route to its rightful place in the sun - especially, you see, my party, the NDP - is a traitor and unCanadian.

You can read this noise in the archives of the Canada forum at DU2. The shills and hacks for the Liberal Party telling the socialists/social democrats that we're responsible for Stephen Harper being in the PMO. We stole their votes. And then, horrors, we used those votes to bring down their corrupt government, and we kept getting people to vote for us even then. How very dare we.

Well here's the news: votes do not belong to anybody but the people who cast them.

My sincere suggestion is that a party that wants people's votes do something to earn them.

I am not in 100% disagreement with you. We have a Green Party here too, an odd animal that has long fallen on the right-hand side of the political spectrum but recently made some effort to tip its hat vaguely in the direction of the left. People who fancy themselves clever enviro types sometimes vote for them. They really are stupidly voting against an actual slightly-left party, and potentially splitting that voting block to very ill effect. And the candidate they're voting for has all too often actually been a Conservative Party operative.

But I don't see the situation in the US as the same. The Democratic Party is not an actual slightly-left party. As I said, I would myself undoubtedly vote Democrat for lack of any other option to achieve my goal, ensuring a Republican defeat, just because I do see enough of a difference to prefer pretty-far-right to even-farther-right.

All I can say is what I said: if a party wants people to vote for it, give them a reason. And any party that can't do that has itself to blame. (With the caveat of a level playing field such as we have to a much larger extent in Canada thanks to very stringent election spending rules -- but it's not as if the Democratic Party actually operates on a shoestring.)

And blame the people who vote Republican for any losses you suffer to Republicans, if you really want to blame somebody else.


edited to add, and doesn't this really speak volumes?

US Presidential Election 2008


The US Presidential Election 2012
http://www.politicalcompass.org/uselection2012

You have to go there to see the current chart, and try to measure the distance between Obama and the Republican crew without a microscope ...

"This is a US election that defies logic and brings the nation closer towards a one-party state, masquerading as a two-party state."

Huh. Kind of what I was saying. And if you think that approach is going to attract third-party voters ...

[MineralMan]

83. Interesting. I had no idea that any of those

people had filled out the long questionaire that produces those results. I wonder when they found the time...

Here's the deal: I can go to that site and fill out the questionaire in a way that will spot me anywhere on that grid at all. So can anyone with a brain in his or her head and an understanding about how that test works.

So, unless Barack Obama personally took that questionaire and answered it honestly for himself, that point on the chart is absolutely useless. Truly. Nobody can complete that questionaire for another person and have accurate results.

[iverglas]

92. just for you

and right there at the site:

http://www.politicalcompass.org/faq#faq9

How can you determine where politicians are honestly at without asking them ?

How can you tell where they're honestly at by asking them? Especially around election time. We've relied on reports, parliamentary records, ... and actions that spoke louder than words.

We are occasionally asked about publishing the individual responses of politicians. We frown on this. The propositions are too vague to be considered statements of policy, and the individual responses are not significant in themselves. When summed to give an economic and social score, however, they provide an accurate profile of a mental state.

That may help.

Here's the deal: I can go to that site and fill out the questionaire in a way that will spot me anywhere on that grid at all. So can anyone with a brain in his or her head and an understanding about how that test works.

So what? Since you're (correctly) saying that no candidate took the test, what's your point? Seriously and sincerely, it eludes me.

The politicalcompass is not a contest. If you want to pretend you are Pol Pot or Ralph Nader while taking the test, you're quite free to do that.

http://www.politicalcompass.org/faq#faq2

Respondents are going to feel under pressure to be politically correct

Not really, because we've assured them that not only are their identities unknown, but their responses totally unrecorded. So the only actual pressure will come from themselves. We've found that a lot of people aren't comfortable with the first result, so they go through the propositions again, changing some of their earlier responses. It's a bit like an overweight person stepping back on the scales after removing their shoes.

You say:

So, unless Barack Obama personally took that questionaire and answered it honestly for himself, that point on the chart is absolutely useless. Truly. Nobody can complete that questionaire for another person and have accurate results.

and I'm just not quite sure whether you're saying you actually consider the plotting done for Obama (or any other politician) to be inaccurate. I don't.

Just fyi, for comparison:

http://www.politicalcompass.org/canada2011


NDP is mine. I personally score over and down, at around -8.something and -8.something.

Perhaps because Canada has emerged in better shape from the financial crisis than most other industrialised countries, the Canadian left has not enjoyed the reinvigoration of progressive parties in other democracies. The NDP has further lost its radical edge, sounding increasingly like one of the milder European Social Democratic parties; keen to be all things to more voters, perhaps presenting a safe pair of hands for coalition with the Liberals. The Greens, with their promises on labour rights and childcare, have moved slightly to the left, countering the otherwise rightward drift of the major national parties.

Sadly, the US does not have a progressive party to re-invigorate, and the Democratic Party has very much not stepped into that void.

[MineralMan]

103. I'm saying that unless Obama filled out the questionaire,

that point is just a fantasy.

[iverglas]

109. well, you know better

than the people who have worked very hard on that site for years, I guess.

What I am still not seeing is you saying whether you think the assessment of Obama is wrong. I don't.

Would it just be wrong about him, or also about the political parties in the 2011 Canadian election, the Republican candidates in the current primaries, and every other party/country/person it has analyzed?

I don't find it to be at all wrong about me. Or about Canadian politics over the years. Or about much of anything else. Well, except that Dalai Lama person. I think it's way wrong about him ...

[TheKentuckian]

165. This man was a state senator, a US Senator, and the majority of a term as President

He has a policy trail that tranaslates without being out of the ball park.

Closer to an estimate than a fantasy.

[hfojvt]

81. there's another layer to that as well

it seemed to me that Nader ran a "Gore bashing campaign". Everywhere he went he gave a speech and the local news and the M$M played a little clip of that speech and every clip seemed to be a variation of anti-Gore themes "Al Gore is a liar", "Don't vote for Al Gore."

When it came to convincing people to not vote for Gore, Nader was just another brick in the wall. My own LTTE in the Mason City Globe Gazette in October of 2000 started like this "First, I will give you 40 billion reasons to vote against Bush. That's the amount of money that his tax cuts give to the top 1%. I think that money should go to protect my social security so I can retire some day...."
(Not an exact quote, I cannot remember exactly what I said, or the exact number I used, but generally that was what I said.)

Nader knew that he had to run a bash-Gore campaign though, to convince people who otherwise would vote for Gore to vote for him instead. As such though, he just became another cog in the Republican Noise Machine.

I think this slogan came from the sixties - if you are not part of the solution, you are part of the problem.

[cherokeeprogressive]

140. If Gore lost Florida by 500 votes, then why aren't you also blaming and demanding apologies from

Harry Browne, the Libertarian Party candidate who got 16,415 votes in Florida?

Or

John Hagelin, the Natural Law Party candidate who got 2,281 votes in Florida?

Or

Monica Moorehead, the World Workers Party candidate who got 1,804 votes in Florida?

Or

Howard Phillips, the Constitution Party candidate who got 1,371 votes in Florida?

Or

David McReynolds, the Socialist Party candidate who got 622 votes in Florida?

Or

James Harris, the Soc. Workers Party candidate who got 562 votes in Florida?

Fuck, why not just blame them all? Why focus on Nader? WTF? If you believe one should vote for either the Democrat or the Republican ONLY, why aren't THEY culpable?

http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?year=2000&fips=12&f=0&off=0&elect=0&minper=0

[11 Bravo]

39. Holy shit! Is it REALLY your contention that of the 90,000 Florida votes cast for Nader ...

not even 538 of them would have gone to Gore? That takes denial and Nader defending to a truly absurd level.

[iverglas]

54. if it was really your intention

to ignore and/or misrepresent everything I said, you have succeeded admirably.



edited because my fingers got confused in the subject line, as usual

[Javaman]

82. so 538 vote for Gore...

whom do the rest vote for?

There is the rub.

no one knows.

I'm only defending naders right to run, not nader. I find it odd people can't understand that basic concept.

no one seems to have any problem with harris or the brooks brothers riot or the supreme court. so wierd.

[11 Bravo]

99. I haven't heard anyone say he had no right to run. I HAVE heard numerous of his defenders deny ...

that he made any difference in the outcome in Florida, and hence the nation; and that, my friend, is bullshit.

Hell, I'll defend his "right" to run. Will you defend my right to state that he is a lying asshole for having claimed that there was no difference between Bush and Gore as he exercised his right; and that Nader's inclusion in the race resulted in the election of the drunken frat boy?

[Javaman]

133. wow.

we're done.

people, such as yourself, still wish to insist that it was all naders fault. Fine, I don't give a shit. I didn't vote for nader, I voted for Gore.

But hey, what ever helps you sleep through the night.

frankly, the rehashing of this bullshit is really amusing.

bottom line, if the supreme court had done their job and stayed the fuck out of the election, Gore would have been our president.

I'm done with this truly idiotic thread. It's like beating a dead horse that is nothing but bones now.

[JackRiddler]

180. It wouldn't have mattered if Gore had had 539 additional votes...

One must be extremely naive to believe that the mobsters who stole the Florida election would not have beaten that margin as well. They would have done whatever it took. The fraud was committed over many hours and days. Tens of thousands of votes were lost and invalidated. It's likely that Gore won the state by 100,000 votes or more.

It is furthermore incredibly presumptuous to view Nader's votes as rightfully belonging to anyone else. It speaks to a highly undemocratic, authoritarian spirit, which may explain why the Democrats so readily capitulated to the Republican coup, and cooperated with the Bush regime's outrages for eight years.

The 2000 coup d'etat was a crime: by certain definitions, treason. Focusing on the legal and constitutional actions of Ralph Nader in his run for president obscures the event. You see the corpse of democracy and blame a bystander, and ignore the men who pulled the trigger and gained all the benefits. This is a pathological denial.

[Javaman]

55. +1...

it is amazing to me for some people to natually assume that if nader hadn't run, those votes would automatically go for Gore.

[Uncle Joe]

68. It's just basic logic that most, not all of the votes would've went to Gore.

No doubt some of Nader's voters wouldn't have voted at all but I believe it stretches the boundaries of common sense to believe the majority of Nader's voters would've went to Bush over Gore.

[Javaman]

79. neither you nor I can perdict how those people would have voted...

they saw something in nader, what I don't know, but they voted for him for a reason.

it was Gore's job to convince them otherwise. And he failed because he ran a bad campaign.

[Uncle Joe]

86. What they saw in Nader was far closer to Gore than Bush.

Has Nader ever gone to a Bush booksigning for an autograph?

We can't predict what they all would've done but we can certainly deduce what a plurality would've done.

As I posted above the corporate media had it in for Gore because Al was the primary political champion for opening the Internet to the people and they came to view the World Wide Web as a growing threat to their top down, one way, monopolistic business model.

If the corporate media as an institution decides to trash or demonize a candidate, it becomes impossible to run a "good campaign" they smeared Gore with continous slander and libel, "Al Gore claimed to have invented the Internet" being just one of a multitude.

I will wager that for every article, column or newscast that you can find actually giving Gore rightful credit for his legislative achievements in opening and promoting the Internet, I can find you 10 basically calling him a liar or exaggerator.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_gore

Gore was one of the Atari Democrats who were given this name due to their "passion for technological issues, from biomedical research and genetic engineering to the environmental impact of the "greenhouse effect."[33] On March 19, 1979 he became the first member of Congress to appear on C-SPAN.[49] During this time, Gore co-chaired the Congressional Clearinghouse on the Future with Newt Gingrich.[50] In addition, he has been described as having been a "genuine nerd, with a geek reputation running back to his days as a futurist Atari Democrat in the House. Before computers were comprehensible, let alone sexy, the poker-faced Gore struggled to explain artificial intelligence and fiber-optic networks to sleepy colleagues."[33][51] Internet pioneers Vint Cerf and Bob Kahn noted that, "as far back as the 1970s, Congressman Gore promoted the idea of high speed telecommunications as an engine for both economic growth and the improvement of our educational system. He was the first elected official to grasp the potential of computer communications to have a broader impact than just improving the conduct of science and scholarship [...] the Internet, as we know it today, was not deployed until 1983. When the Internet was still in the early stages of its deployment, Congressman Gore provided intellectual leadership by helping create the vision of the potential benefits of high speed computing and communication."[52]

Gore introduced the Supercomputer Network Study Act of 1986.[53] He also sponsored hearings on how advanced technologies might be put to use in areas like coordinating the response of government agencies to natural disasters and other crises."[54]

As a Senator, Gore began to craft the High Performance Computing and Communication Act of 1991 (commonly referred to as "The Gore Bill&quot after hearing the 1988 report Toward a National Research Network submitted to Congress by a group chaired by UCLA professor of computer science, Leonard Kleinrock, one of the central creators of the ARPANET (the ARPANET, first deployed by Kleinrock and others in 1969, is the predecessor of the Internet).[55][56][57] The bill was passed on December 9, 1991 and led to the National Information Infrastructure (NII) which Gore referred to as the "information superhighway."[58]

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Now how difficult would it have been for the corporate media to actually have acknowedged Gore's work?

[Javaman]

147. Frankly, I don't care anymore

this is like closing the door after the horse left 12 years ago. is there even a barn anymore?

this whole thread has been an amusing exercise in willfull frustration on the part of people not able to let go and move on.

I'm done.

you want to reply, knock yourself out, but it only highlights what I just said.

[Uncle Joe]

154. Never give up caring, Javaman

As for Nader, I've let go of any personal animosity toward him, just as Al Gore has, Nader did what he did and it's done but I still believe it behoove us to discuss the wisdom or lack thereof Nader's decisions in 2000.

The barn door on that scene has closed and it is frustrating no doubt on both sides, but nonetheless we're shaping history with our discussion.

Perhaps lessons can be learned from that history and wisely applied to future events.

Peace to you, Javaman.

[Jim Lane]

143. Actually, we CAN predict it, with at least some confidence.

Nader himself had at one point posted exit poll data on his website. People who voted for Nader were asked how they would have voted if Nader hadn't been on the ballot.

The answers were all over the map: vote for Gore, vote for Bush, vote for whichever candidate was on the Green Party line, vote for another minor-party candidate, write in Nader, write in someone else, vote in downticket races but leave the presidential line blank, stay home entirely.

Everyone not in the first two categories was making themselves politically irrelevant so we may ignore their fine and noble statement (while they wait expectantly for their act to upend the political establishment). Only the people in the first two categories matter. I forget the exact numbers but what I do remember is that (percentage voting for Gore) minus (percentage voting for Bush) equaled about 13 percent.

Now, that's probably not an accurate figure. The Nader voters were ticked off at the Democrats who'd been denouncing Nader and trying to keep him off the ballot. If Nader had announced in 1999 that he wasn't running, then, by the time of the election, Gore's advantage among those voters would've been a lot more than 13 percent. But let's take 13 percent as the minimum figure.

That means that, if Nader had exercised his right to decide NOT to run, the effect would've been to give Gore a net gain equal to 13 percent of the actual Nader vote total. In Florida, where Nader got roughly 100,000 votes, such a gain for Gore would have swamped the officially reported Bush total, and would have put the state out of reach for cheating by Harris et al.

In New Hampshire, 13 percent would not have been enough to make a difference, but a Nader withdrawal might have made the difference anyway if, for the reasons I said, the 13 percent estimate is too low.

Conclusion: It is more likely than not that, but for Nader's candidacy, Al Gore would have become President.

Furthermore, this result was foreseeable, not some Election Day fluke. Nader was widely warned about it.

My bottom line: I used to admire Nader a great deal, but his bad choice in 2000 changed my opinion (not that he's losing any sleep over what I think).

Obligatory disclaimers to try to pre-empt the strawman arguments the Naderites always raise:
* Nader had a constitutional right to choose to run.
* Nader had a constitutional right to choose to say things about Al Gore that were uncomplimentary.
* Nader had a constitutional right to choose to say things about Al Gore that were downright stupid.
* Nader's voters had a constitutional right to vote for him.
* Katherine Harris engineered an illegal and politically motivated purge of about 50,000 likely Democratic voters. She should have gone to jail.
* There were numerous other problems with the Florida vote, including but not limited to butterfly ballots, the Brooks Brothers riot, and one of the worst decisions in the history of the Supreme Court.
* If various other things had been different, then Gore would have become President despite Nader's bad choice. (As an aside, it's a wonderment to me how Naderites seem not to recognize the concept that an event can have more than one cause. This is a staple of tort law, the field in which Nader first made his mark.)

[Javaman]

148. and what does that solve?

that we can all enjoy acolades based upon something that didn't happen?

this whole thread has been a magnificant rehashing of frustration by all us dems and frankly, makes us all look really ridiculous.

will any of this make us sleep better at night? probably not.

2000 will forever go down a the year the supremes fucked up.

if you wish to reply it only highlights what I stated above. I choose not to rehash something I have zero influence over. that's just a crazy exercize in self flagulation.

[Jim Lane]

153. Rehashing what can't be changed: useless. Not making the same mistake again: priceless.

Even after the debacle of 2000, some of Nader's voters (admittedly, only a small minority) continued to believe that hopeless minor-party candidacies were a good idea. Some people holding that view have posted in this very thread.

On that subject, therefore, there's a live difference of opinion that relates to future conduct. Those of us who deplore Nader's choices are pointing to the consequences thereof, in the hope of averting similar ill-advised behavior in the future. As Santayana said, those who will not learn from history are condemned to repeat it.

As for posting in this thread, it illustrates William F. Buckley's riff on Santayana: Those who will not learn from history are condemned to listen to those who do.

[LanternWaste]

34. I guess it sucks that people run for office-

I guess it sucks that people run for office-- especially when it's not politically convenient for the established two-party system.


"Oh--I almost forgot..."
I imagine he allows your sentiment all the consideration it warrants...

[trumad]

41. Well Nader saying it's got to get worse before it gets better.

Or that Gore was no different than Bush...

Fact of the matter is---5000 US troops would be alive today if he did not run.

[emulatorloo]

117. And 9/11 might have been prevented, because Gore was in the habit of listening to Richard Clarke,

et al.

[lame54]

125. if Gore ran a better campaign he could have earned some of those votes

[corkhead]

128. What you said is true, but with the same logic you can also say that if Boosh had not run,

Gore would have most likely won in an indisputible landslide.

I would contend that Gore's choice of Lieberman did more damage to his chances than Nader did, and it was a fact that Gore did have enough votes to win Florida, except the minor detail that the Supreme Court stole it for Boosh... but those are entirely different subjects off topic for this thread.

[libinnyandia]

3. Nader ran a campaign saying Gore = Bush. That was a lie. Nader was respected by a lot of people.

They believed him and voted for him.

[randome]

5. Huh?

There are tons of DUers who say Democrats equal Republicans. I don't agree with that but to just baldly say they are 'lying' when expressing their opinions is wrong.

[libinnyandia]

22. When you run as a progressive candidate you have a higher standard than a DUer.

[A Simple Game]

119. So because this is a "two party system" you have the right to tell people who to vote for?

I didn't know that's how it works in a free democratic society.

No, I didn't vote for Nader, I voted for Gore. But it wasn't Nader that beat Gore, it was Bush. Funny with some people it is everybody's fault but the people that voted for Bush. Nor is it the fault of the Democratic candidate that can't inspire enough people to vote for him.

Can you figure this out? In 2008 I did vote for a third party Presidential candidate and he won. You don't have to vote for the lesser of two evils, that still gives you evil. Are you advocating voting for evil?

[corkhead]

127. Did you read my post? Where did I "tell people who to vote for?"

Where did I say that Nader beat Gore? There is plenty of blame to go around, including the knuckle draggers who voted for Boosh. I would never have voted for Nader, but he had every right to run and it is not his fault people wasted their vote on him when otherwise they would most likely have voted for Gore.

What election did you vote for in 2008? As far as I know, one of the 2 major party choices was elected, as has been the case since the days of Teddy Roosevelt if my history is correct.

I wish a 3rd party candidate had a realistic possibility of winning; I think we would end up with choices that more closely represent the true will of the people, not the interests of the bank-rollers who are funding their campaigns.

[aaaaaa5a]

136. I'm glad you recognize how much Anderson hurt Carter.

I think John Anderson is history's forgotten man. During the race in 1980 Reagan even debated Anderson on TV without Carter present. Carter had a tough primary fight (Kennedy) and was attacked from the left (Anderson) and still nearly beat Reagan in the general election.

[Upton]

6. Why should Nader apologize?

All Gore had to do is win his home state and Florida wouldn't have mattered..

[randome]

8. Nader. Vote fraud. Supreme Court.

Any one of those is a trivial change in electability unless perpetrated on a much more massive scale.

Gore should have easily carried the states he needed. It should not have been a contest.

He ran a poor campaign. One of his mistakes was Elian Gonzalez (spelling?). Another was to distance himself from Clinton.

[G_j]

13. & disenfranchising voters was a civil rights issue

turning the Voting Rights Act (that people suffered and died for) on it's head. But don't tell that to the Nader haters.

[joeybee12]

17. Had he not distanced himself from Clinton and let Clinton campaign

He would have taken Arkansas...those 4 votes would have put him over the top, Florida was not needed.

[Uncle Joe]

48. Gore didn't distance himself from Clinton, it was the other way around.

Clinton in his second term knew he would never have to run for another election and by his reckless, irresponsible behaviour Bill didn't give a rat's ass that Al needed to run for the highest office in the land.

Clinton whether consciously or subconsciously did what he could to sabotage Gore's chances.

The primary reason 2000 was a "contest" is because Gore was in fact the preeminent poltical champion for opening the Internet to the people and the corporate media made sure he paid for it with relentless slander and libel for the better part of two years prior to the selection while they covered for, camouflaged, enabled and gave Bush a free pass to the White House.

The owners and upper management of the corporate media knew the growing power and influence of the First Amendment magnifying Internet would come to threaten their one way, top down, authoritarian, monopolistic business plan, so they decided to play Zeus to Gore's Prometheus.

The corporate media strategy of transferring the sins of the President to the Vice-President by painting Gore as a liar ie; "Gore claimed to have invented the Internet" etc. etc. etc. was made all the easier after Clinton wagged his finger in the people's face saying "I did not have sexual relations with that woman," Gore would have been far better off if Clinton had either told the truth or kept his mouth shut.

Clinton even damaged Gore at the 2000 convention being consumed by his own arrogance he thought it necessary to waste precious televised primetime minutes walking down a f*&%!@ing hallway just so the American People could gaze at his elegance instead of just coming out to the podium like a normal person and touting and promoting the same loyal Vice-President that stood by him on the White House lawn defending his boss during the height of the impeachment saga.

When Clinton needed Gore the most, Gore was there, tragically the same can't be said in reverse.

[randome]

70. Corporate slander will always be a factor.

If Gore had not been tentative about his campaign, none of that would have mattered.

His stupid decision to try and make Elian Gonzalez his personal issue looked like pandering to many.

As for Clinton hogging some spotlight for himself, so what? Again, that doesn't explain why Gore didn't sweep the election.

[Uncle Joe]

78. When Gore was aggressive, they as an institution said he was ranting, when he found common ground,

they said there was no difference.

But the primary attack line was against Gore's credibility and integrity, with slander after slander by the corporate media, the final word was almost always colored in a negative light.

If the corporate media as an institution decides to trash or demonize a candidate, it would be impossible for any candidate to run a "good campaign," the message either doesn't get out or becomes distorted. That's not quite as true today as it was in 2000 because of the growing power of the Internet, but in general it still holds true.

This is the same institution that would go on to brain wash a large majority of the American People to believe against common sense, logic and credible information that Saddam Hussein was behind 9/11.

They did it just by continually mentioning his name in the same paragraph or sentence as 9/11, they didn't even need to directly connect the two for the propaganda to take hold.

Gore never made Gonzalez his "personal issue."

As for Clinton the issue is distancing and that's what Clinton by his actions did, not Gore.

I don't know why Bill did it, perhaps he wanted Hillary to run in 2004 or he thought Gore was too progressive but Clinton betrayed Gore not the other way around.

[randome]

84. We can't blame the media for all our setbacks.

Fine. The media is against us. If you go with that, then we have to try harder. It's that simple.

Yes, Gore did make Gonzalez an issue when he said he didn't want to return the boy to Cuba. It looked like pandering to the 'don't-go-soft-on-Cuba' crowd when the only humane thing to do was to return the boy.

And maybe Clinton did him no favors but Gore did seem hesitant to embrace Clinton too much, primarily because he was afraid to embrace someone who got a blowjob in the Oval Office.

With all these negative items swirling around him, Gore STILL should have won the election. He would have if he had tried harder.

He hesitated and then the gnats (corporate media, Supreme Court, Nader, etc.) brought him down.

[Uncle Joe]

93. We can blame the corporate media when they're at fault and they were certainly at fault.

To do otherwise betrays history and allows institutional bearers of false witness a free pass, should that fundamental truth be ignored our society can only become more dysfunctional and corrupt as a direct result.

The only journalist that I can think of that called the corporate media on their institutional slanderous and libelous behaviour re: the coverage of Gore during 1998-2000 was Paul Krugman.

Gore embraced Clinton when Bill needed Al the most preventing him from being convicted after impeachment and Clinton stabbed Gore in the back, that can only dampen any desire to give someone a bear hug.

As I stated above if the corporate media as an institution decides to trash you, running a good campaign becomes impossible, however I do believe with the growing Internet that dynamic is changing.

I also believe this gradual loss of power and influence of the corporate media to the Internet is precisely the reason they betrayed the American People's best interests in 2000.

[hfojvt]

11. oh, is that all?

That's no more difficult, than say, swimming to Cuba.

All Nader had to do was take himself off the ballot in New Hampshire, and Florida wouldn't have mattered either.

[Upton]

15. Yeah, that's all..

Gore was the first presidential candidate since McGovern not to win his home state. I mean, was it really too much to ask that he do so?

Tennessee is a state that Bill Clinton won twice. Though blaming Nader may be convenient, the loss is on Gore and his campaign..

[hfojvt]

43. Well maybe if Gore had gotten help from 100,000 Perot voters

he'd have won Tennessee too.

Kerry lost Tennessee by over 300,000 votes. Obama lost Tennessee by almost 400,000 votes. George Bush Sr. won Tennessee by 58% to 42%. In 1980, Reagan won Tennessee over an incumbent from the South. (Squeaked it out by 4,700 votes).

Sure, Gore could have devoted more resources to Tennessee and won there. Spend more time campaigning there.

But then what happens to Iowa, Wisconsin, Oregon and New Mexico? Resources are not infinite.

Gore won Iowa by 4,144 votes or .31% where Nader took 29,374
Gore won Wisconsin by 5,708 votes or .22% where Nader took 94,070
Gore won Minnesota by 58,607 votes or 2.4% where Nader took 126,696
Gore won New Mexico by 366 votes or .06% where Nader took 21,251
Gore won Oregon by 6,765 votes or .44% where Nader took 77,357
Gore lost Tennessee by 80,229 votes where Nader took 19,781 and was not really a factor, but Gore might have campaigned there or run more ads there if he was not worried about losing Florida, Iowa, Wisconsin, Oregon, Minnesota, New Hampshire or New Mexico.

Gore lost Nevada by 21,597 where Nader took 15,008. Not a difference maker, but without Nader, the Bush campaign might have worried more and devoted more resources to winning Nevada.

Gore did the best he could to win. I did everything I could to help Gore win (and he did win Iowa, and I take some credit for that. I think I helped. I think my LTTEs and phone banking made some difference.)

Naders actions though, just helped Bush to win. That is a simple fact.

I don't know why there is any argument about that.

Sheesh, it is like Nader is a wide receiver who dropped a whole bunch of passes on purpose, and people are saying, well if Tom Brady had done this, or the defense had done that, like the dropped passes had NOTHING to do with the loss. Gore might have done many things different, but at least he was trying to defeat George W. Bush. Nader, however, was not. Nader was trying to elect George W. Bush.

[randome]

47. So what?

Why didn't Gore rise to the occasion, then?

You're saying he didn't because Nader and Bush were ganging up on him? Shit, that's politics!

[hfojvt]

61. Where are those goalposts?

So now, it is not Nader's fault, even though he did everything in his power to help Bush win. It is still not his fault, because Gore should have won anyway.

Sounds to me like you have conceded the debate. You agree that Nader helped Bush to win. You just don't think he should be held accountable for doing so.

[randome]

75. Held accountable for running for President?

Anyone can do that. Many DUers say the more candidates, the better.

Except when it's someone they don't like. I think Nader is an idiot. But he or anyone else can enter the ring when they want.

[hfojvt]

87. held accountable for helping Bush into the White House

I think I probably agree with Nader 95% of the time. Many DUers are somehow foolishly enamored with 3rd parties.

I share their disgust with the Democratic Party in many cases, but no third party in a white uniform is gonna come into our factory and carry us off into the sunset, no matter how much we may long for it.

[randome]

105. I agree with that.

[surfdog]

25. Why ?

Cause that idiot did exactly what Kucinich and Ron Paul do , he ran for president knowing that was zero chance of him being elected in fact he knew he couldn't even win one state but he ran anyway

He needs to apologize and answer the question why were you in the race ? if he says he was in it to win it , then he is a delusional idiot

[G_j]

30. what part of the word Democracy don't you get?

or the word "choice" for that matter?

[randome]

37. Of course he's a delusional idiot.

So why did people vote for him?

[Rex]

64. Why do people vote for Republicans?

Seems like they like delusional idiots like GWB.

[randome]

73. You got me.

Have any progressive candidates tried to go 'full on' liberal lately? It seems to me that we've had enough hesitant campaigns and we might be ripe for a resurgence of liberalism.

I would like to think that.

[Rex]

116. Oh you got me onboard 100% for that!!!

I don't think anyone has ever tried 'full on' liberal!!! I can only hope our POTUS will move to the left in his second term. It is a great concept that needs to be tried out by one of our Dem candidates.

[Jim Lane]

144. Your slam at Kucinich is 100% wrong. Kucinich did what Nader should've done: run in the PRIMARY.

This is just a matter of being smart -- of analyzing the rules and of selecting the course of action that's most likely to work.

If you run in the primary and lose, then you and your voters can still support the better major-party candidate in the general election. The people who voted for Kucinich in 2004 and/or 2008 were, I'm sure, overwhelmingly supportive of Kerry and Obama in the general election.

If you run a hopeless campaign in the general election, then you and your voters are sidelining yourselves in the process that will choose the person who actually gets the office.

If Nader had run in the Democratic primaries in 2000, I would've voted for him. Even assuming his candidacy to be hopeless (not a perfectly safe assumption), I would've been willing to give up my chance to choose between Bradley and Gore for the nomination, because there wasn't much difference between them. I was NOT willing to give up my chance to choose between Gore and Bush, who were vastly different.

[grantcart]

88. Because he lied, and repeatedly lied.

He raised money on the principle that he would not spend the money in any closely contested state and then turned around and tried to get as many votes in Florida as he could.

He believes that the rules don't apply to him.

He is a fucking prima donna who has never been able to build or work with a team and politics ultimately is a team sport, not an individual one.

[Autumn]

7. Let me know when the supreme court apologizes for Bush

they owe the apology, no one else, except maybe the cowardly Dems who remained silent.

[hfojvt]

16. SCOTUS did not decide New Hampshire - Nader did.

With New Hampshire in the Gore column, Florida becomes a moot point.

Gore loss in New Hampshire - 7,211
Nader votes in New Hampshire - 22,198

New Hampshire - 4 electoral votes

Bush 271 - 4 = 267
Gore 266 + 4 = 270

Nader owes the whole world an apology, but I am not holding my breath.

But there are others who did their part too. Any one of them could be the tipping point. http://www.howhegotthere.blogspot.com/

The thing that really galls about Nader, is, that unlike Chris Matthews and other members of the M$M, who mainly care about stuffing dollars in their pants, Nader is supposed to be on our side.

[Rex]

67. +10,000

THAT is the correct answer imo.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

9. It was Gore's job to appeal to the left in Florida.

He failed to do so.

[EC]

12. Yeah,

now he's pushing Americans Elect which is a republican/hedgefund sham. I'm hoping it'll split the repub vote this time though. Since so many repubs don't like any of their candidates and Americans Elect is made up of moderate/money repubs, I hope it'll split the culture warriors and the monied hedge/trust fund repubs votes.

[AtomicKitten]

63. I suspected that was the case with Americans Elect.

[white_wolf]

14. This thread is pathetic.

Seriously, Nader has a right to run, people have a right to vote for whoever they want. The Democrats are not entitled to get votes, they have to be earned and Gore didn't earn the votes of the Nader voters. Blame Gore for being a bad candidate and not being left enough, but don't blame people for exercising their constitutional right to vote by their conscience and not the party line. Let me make this clear: Democrats are not entitled to votes, simple as that.

[G_j]

23. this is what Democracy looks like

or rather, should. It is also another form of CHOICE.

[hfojvt]

27. oh good grief. What ever happened to logic?

Here's the point - Nader put Bush in the White House.

Here are your refudiations.

1. Nader had a right to run.

Absolutely. He also had a right to put Bush in the White House, which is what happened because he ran. Having a right to do something evil and stupid does not make the action any less evil or stupid.

2. Nader voters had a right to vote for Nader. Or for Mickey Mouse. Or for Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Or for George W. Bush.

However, it is still a fact that Nader votes in New Hampshire helped to put George W. Bush in the White House. The fact that people had a right to do something evil and stupid, does not make that act any less evil and stupid.

The fact remains that in the 2000 election that any vote, except a vote for Albert Gore, had the potential to help Bush win the election.

Yes, every American does have a right to help George Bush become President, but they shouldn't delude themselves about what they are doing.

[ZombieHorde]

33. A vote for Gore was a vote for Bush.

Gore should have dropped out of the race and let a real liberal run unopposed.

[hfojvt]

57. yeah, sure, that makes perfect sense

Because the guy who got 48.38% of the vote was just a spoiler for the guy who got 2.73% of the vote, and a guy who couldn't win the Democratic Primary would be more likely to win the general election than the guy who won the Democratic primary.

I repeat. What ever happened to logic?

Why are so many so willing to grasp at any straw to avoid holding Nader accountable? Is it because they feel guilty?

[ZombieHorde]

60. Because Nader wasn't accountable.

Feeling entitled to votes has obviously not worked, and won't work in the future. A candidate must earn votes. You may not like that fact, but it is still a fact. That is what logic really dictates here.

[hfojvt]

76. who said anything about entitled?

That is the Nader defenders stupid defense.

All I am talking about is math. The simple math of New Hampshire, and the simple math of the electoral college.

Al Gore + 22,000 > George W. Bush
Al Gore + 22,000 Nader < George W. Bush

I did not want Bush in the White House. I worked to keep him out. Nader, however, didn't care if Bush was in the White House. The work he did, (and it was probably pretty hard work, although fun in many ways as well I am sure) helped to put Bush in the White House. As such, I have no more affection or respect for him than I do for Rush Limbaugh or David H Koch or Alice Walton.

Again, in 1992 I voted for a sixth party candidate. If I had done the same thing in 2000 in New Hampshire, I would still be apologizing. I think those 22,198 people should feel deeply ashamed for the horrible mistake they made.

[ZombieHorde]

91. Your math is a bit flawed.

All the people who voted Green were highly unlikely to vote Democratic over Socialist, or another liberal party. Some probably would, but the Democratic Party failed to inspire Green voters. This is why "Nader defenders" use the word "entitled." Your logic is based on this entitlement.

Since Gore did win the Popular vote, perhaps the Electoral College would be a better target for your unhappiness.

Again, in 1992 I voted for a sixth party candidate. If I had done the same thing in 2000 in New Hampshire, I would still be apologizing.

Your hypothetical Nader vote would have only mattered if you lived in Florida and you have voted Democratic if the Green Party had another selection, and the other liberal parties were also unappealing. Even if every single Nader vote outside of Florida went to Gore, he still would have lost.

I did not vote in 2000 because I had just moved to a new state. That was the only Presidential election I missed since I was legally allowed to vote. I didn't even know Nader was in the race until after the election.

[hfojvt]

100. uhm, no

you are apparently unaware of New Hampshire. Look it up.

Gore lost New Hampshire by 7,211 votes. Nader took 22,198. New Hampshire's four electoral votes would have given Gore a victory. You think those 22,198 would have voted Green if somebody else was running as a Green? Well, only 4,479 voted Green in 2004 and only 3,503 voted Green in 2008 (with another 2,001 write ins) only 1% voted Libertarian in 1988 vs. 3.9% for Nader. Considering that I voted Democratic in 1984, 1988, 2000, 2004 and 2008, I would say that my voting 6th party in 1992 was definitely an assist to George H.W. Bush. But New Hampshire voters seem to be not as reliable as they voted for Reagan, Reagan, Bush in 1980, 1984 and 1988.

The electoral college would be very hard to change. Nader's actions could be changed by just one person. One stupid, stubborn arrogant person, but still, just one person could have made a difference, and every person should try to make a POSITIVE difference. (see my signature line).

Nader made a big negative difference.

[ZombieHorde]

162. OK, add NH.

The electoral college would be very hard to change. Nader's actions could be changed by just one person.

We don't how those people would have voted if Nader didn't run. Many of them may not have voted at all. You're guessing.

[hfojvt]

170. sure, I am guessing

and you, on the other hand are absolutely certain of Nader's innocence. Only about one third of those New Hampshire voters need to have done the right thing instead of the wrong things. Those are pretty good odds. You are just guessing that some 15,000 would stay at home if they didn't have an arrogant asshole spoiler to vote for. The very same asswipe who only got 3,503 votes in 2008 and only 4,479 votes in 2004, but yeah I am sure that 15,000 people would have stayed home, or voted for another Goofy if Nader wasn't on the ballot in 2000.

I mean, come on man, why keep grasping for any slender reed to avoid admitting a very likely truth? You seem to me like a person who sees a 500 kilogram bomb land ten centimeters from somebody and blow up, who then says, "well, since we can't find the body and do an autopsy to be sure of a cause of death, we cannot be certain that the bomb killed them." What would it take to convince you that 22,198 is greater than 7,212?

[ZombieHorde]

173. This is not a matter of innocence or guilt.

This is a matter of people trying to get other people to vote for them.

Gore presented himself as a centrist (for the time, he would seem more liberal now), and a lot of people were pissed about Tipper Gore's involvement with Parents Music Resource Center. This is not a good way to attract hard-core liberals, or the youth vote.

If you want a group of people to vote for you, you generally need to appeal to them. The Green Party and the Socialist Party appeal to many liberals who feel marginalized by the centrist Democratic Party. The people who vote Green and Socialists are not Democrats. Similarly, the people who vote Libertarian Party and Constitution Party are not Republicans.

Your agenda is different than their agenda. Many of them are absolutely disgusted by the increases of power, the war on drugs, how slow we are leaving the Middle East, and who knows what else.

[noiretextatique]

172. i find it odd that some cling to speculation

rather than facing the truth about fraud and treason, i.e., the real reasons for gore's 'loss.'

[G_j]

96. yes, and should they be branded too?

or how come there are so many who put their focus on Nader rather than look at how African Americans were kept from voting, and how the very serious complaints from the Congressional Black Caucus were completely ignored? No, some would rather scorn other progressives than actual right wing criminal law breakers.

[white_wolf]

36. Apparently the Nader voters didn't think Gore earned their vote.

Once again, blame Gore for not being left enough to earn votes, don't blame Nader. If the Democratic Party keeps up this mindset that they are entitled to people's votes, they are going to lose. They are entitled to nothing, votes must be earned.

[hfojvt]

52. apparently Nader voters didn't care if Bush became President

that is the bottom line. In 1992, I did not vote for Clinton.

Thus, I am in the same boat as Nader voters.

But I knew, even as I did so, that I might be helping Bush Sr. to win re-election. I didn't care though, because I thought Bush and Clinton were both basically moderate Republicans.

I was wrong about that, probably. Clinton was better than I gave him credit for (although in some ways he was worse too) and Bush worse than I gave him credit for.

But I was right about the impact of my vote. I never deluded myself on that.

[emulatorloo]

118. Apparently Nader voters did not think about the consequences

[white_wolf]

122. For the 10th time Democrats are not entitled to any votes.

If they can't earn people's votes then they deserve to lose.

[emulatorloo]

168. Right, because Republicans are entitled to win.

Vote for whoever you want.

[Jim Lane]

145. At least they thought about the consequences in 2004.

The one bright spot from the Nader fiasco was that most of the people who made the mistake of voting for him in 2000 saw that his candidacy had, in fact, been one factor resulting in the inauguration of Bush. Nader ran again in 2004 but his vote declined precipitously. Something like three-quarters of his previous voters, having seen and (finally) thought about the consequences, abandoned him.

Well, better late than never, I suppose.

[emulatorloo]

169. Very true.

[woo me with science]

102. "The smart way to keep people passive and obedient..."

"The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum." Noam Chomsky

Shame on anyone who wants to limit the debate to the corporate party talking points.

[treestar]

123. I always thought the earning votes theme did not make sense

and your statement here sort of highlights that. Third party candidates earn votes. But what did the voter get? A losing candidate.

[hfojvt]

18. he probably thinks this thread is about him, eh?

He's so vain.

[Chorophyll]

19. Dear Ralph Nader: Thanks for the seatbelts.

Now don't let the door hit your ass on the way out. Colossal schmuck.

[Skidmore]

21. So which R Superpac will be funding his candidacy?

[Fix The Stupid]

24. So...

Why doesn't the left do the same?

Why not secretly prop up some far right wing candidate/party?

Make someone up. Make him so far to the right as to be a caricature...

Siphon off some of those votes that the GOP would recieve...

Why doesn't this make sense?

- just had a scary thought - maybe this right wing monster would win!

[Skidmore]

38. I wouldn't vote for Nader if he were the only candidate for the office. Period.

The right wing monster financed him last time. Why should it be any different this time?

[Fix The Stupid]

89. Don't disagree...

But...

If that tactic worked so well for the right, ie - prop up Nader to siphon off votes for the GOP...then why doesn't the left or the Democratic party create a right wing equivalent to steal the GOP votes?

It's a serious question.

Everyone blames Nader for Bush...by that logic, why not fight fire with fire?

Make a party up - get some knuckledragger as their face, make him a total caricature of the right and watch the crazy vote go to them instead of the GOP.

Makes sense to me

[ZombieHorde]

31. I think Gore should apologize for Bush.

If Gore would have stepped down, then Nader would have won.

Lieberman as VP? WTF?

[Spazito]

32. No doubt, one of the repubs' SuperPacs will be 'supporting' him....

in the desperate hope Nader can split the Dem vote enough for RMoney to win.

Fuck Nader and his repub buddies.

[nadinbrzezinski]

42. I guess he should if he were the one behind

All the shennanigans, including a USSC decision, a near republican riot and voter supression.

[white_wolf]

49. Nadin, you're doing it again. Pointing out facts.

You know how some posters here feel about those. They would much rather blame a single scapegoat than try and understand the fact that Gore didn't gain the White House was due to a number of reasons including, but not limited to: a weak campaign, voter suppression/fraud, and a Supreme Court that completely ignored the Political Question Doctrine.

[Nye Bevan]

50. Just imagine, if Nader had appeared with Gore on a stage a few days before election day 2000,

shook hands with him, acknowledged their differences of opinion, congratulated him on his campaign, and urged his supporters to vote for Gore in order to keep Bush out of office. No Bush victory; no Iraq war; no Guantanamo; quite possibly, no 9/11.

Had he done that, I would have had some real respect for the guy.

[Uncle Joe]

56. That would have put Gore over the top, apparently Nader thought enough of Gore in 2006

to get an autographed book.

Edit to add, by a margin too large for Bush to steal.

[DevonRex]

58. What a beautiful dream. It could have happened that way if Nader had chosen that route.

Unfortunately Nader didn't choose to do that. And he chose exactly how most Democrats would regard him in the future. Fuck Ralph Nader.

[onehandle]

62. Yep. And at the time, 9/11 seemed like an isolated event from Nader...

...purposely working to elect Bush.

But now we know a lot more.

There was an interruption in our national security between the Clinton Administration and the Bush Cabal.

The clueless Bushies like Condi Rice, 'missed' the signs that this was coming. That much is clear.

But just changing the players up and down the security chain, compounded the problem. Some key people, may have replaced other key people in less important positions. There would have been much less changeout with Gore elected, and much knowledge capitol would have been retained.

On some level, it makes sense to blame 9/11 on Ralph Nader.

[JackRiddler]

72. Just imagine, if the election had been stolen on Bush's behalf regardless, as had been intended...

and planned all along by the mob around Bush. You would have been deprived of a relatively powerless scapegoat on whom you could displace your anger. How would you have maintained your denial then?

[Nye Bevan]

77. I'm not sure I follow.

Nader deprived Gore of enough votes to enable Bush's mob to steal the election. I'm not sure how that's being in "denial".

[JackRiddler]

158. We have no idea what the vote totals would have been without Nader...

Last edited Sat Mar 3, 2012, 02:30 PM - Edit history (1)

And since we do know the Bush mob was engaged in election fraud and intended to steal Florida no matter what, we also cannot say that they would have been unable to steal it anyway, even if Gore's margin of victory in Florida had been a bit greater. (And again, there's no guarantee of where the Nader votes would have gone, nor any presumption that these "belonged" to Gore.)

All this shouldn't matter because of what you are denying. Nader was doing something legal and constitutional.

The denial part is that Gore won anyway: the national popular vote and the vote in Florida. But the Bush mob conducted election fraud followed by a judicial coup d'etat, effectively suspending the Constitution and practicing an illegal government in the years that followed.

To position Nader as the villain and talk about him all the time is a form of denying the actual crime, which was on a planetary scale of horror.

[noiretextatique]

175. [phone]

why focus on the fly on the elephant's ass instead of the elephant?

[JackRiddler]

59. Yeah, it's time he apologized for the Jeb Bush / Katharine Harris election fraud...

and the unprecedented and unconstitutional Supreme Court decision that stopped the recount that would have confirmed Gore's victory. Although he was not one of the perpetrators of the 2000 coup d'etat in the United States, it's time he apologized to make you feel better. Since those who actually committed the coup and went on to perpetrate war crimes and genocide in South Asia aren't apologizing, and have been rewarded for their crimes with continued freedom and material prosperity, and are always plotting their way back into power.

A criminal cabal stole the election and seized your government, ending the pretense to democracy. It surely hurts, and the denial must run deep. How much easier to beat up on a legitimate but not powerful third-party candidate, even though he had nothing to do with the criminal events.

But there's no excuse for this. Focus on the crime and the criminals, not the bystander who annoys you. Let go of your denial.

[G_j]

69. "those who actually committed the coup and went on to perpetrate war crimes

and genocide in South Asia aren't apologizing, and have been rewarded for their crimes with continued freedom and material prosperity, and are always plotting their way back into power." absolutely!

[Rex]

71. It is strange how some ignore the 800 pound gorilla

in the room and focus on the 5 ounce Tea Cup making all the noise.

[noiretextatique]

94. nader was the fly on the elephant's ass

sad that democrats against democracy keeping blaming the fly instead of the elephant.

[randome]

106. Well said!

[noiretextatique]

176. it is truth

whining about nader diminishes the reality of the crimes committed by harris, jeb bush, scotus. etal, to install shrub. nader did not break any law.

[fascisthunter]

131. THANK YOU! (nt)

[Returning Survivor]

66. Nader didn't bring us Bush>

The SCOTUS did. And Gore should have gone 67 instead of 3!

[pansypoo53219]

74. the gnews media wanted gore to lose. they used nader

and all the bullshit to make bush possible. they grabbed any excuse to push THEIR monster. just like they pimped THEIR shiny new toys the tea baggers. just as the eschew the occupy movement as it goes against MONEYED INTERESTS.

THE TEVEE GNEWS IS ANTI-DEMOCRATIC. turn it off.

[Uncle Joe]

97. + Infinity with a cherry on top.

[Paulie]

90. And the Jewish areas that voted for Pat Buchanan?

I can't remember but wasn't that more than enough votes? The butterfly ballot was a problem as well, and I recall the dems approved the design.

Florida was a mess. There were 4 people running in the general. Then add in the supremes and ugg...

Blaming Nader is really blaming the voters en mass. So might as well say so.

[GeorgeGist]

95. Yeah ...

it's do much easier to blame Nader than the criminals on SCOTUS.

[Le Taz Hot]

101. 100 responses,

3 recs. What does that tell you? You guys are like a dog with a bone. You've learned well from the Republicans: "Don't confuse me with the facts, I know what I know." I mean it's not like this shit ever gets old or anything.

[Myrina]

104. Nader's on the SCOTUS now?

Can't think of any other reason he'd have to apologize for the Bush presidency, since it was SCOTUS who did the anointing ...

[ikri]

107. Remind me

How many votes did Ross Perot strip away from Bush the Elder in 1992 that put Gore in a position to run for President 8 years later?

If all those Perot voters had voted for Bush (because any vote for a 3rd party would automatically have gone to the loser) he'd have won in 1992 quite handily, Clinton and Gore would have been a footnote in history.

Is it only OK to have other parties in an election when they take votes away from the Republicans?

[noiretextatique]

110. yes: some democrats are against democracy

when their candidate is challenged. never mind disenfranchisement and scotus' treason.

[CrispyQ]

111. I miss unrec. --nt

[aquart]

115. Who is funding this little attempt to split the left?

[Warren DeMontague]

120. Why should he apologize? The GOP bankrolled him in 2004, for fuck's sake.

Dude knows which side of the bread the butter's on. I bet Rush Limbaugh is cutting him a check right now, in between his tirades against "sluts" who use birth control.

GO(P) NADER!!$$$!!!!!

[nanabugg]

183. And they will be bankrolling Buddy Roehmer this time . nt

[rudycantfail]

121. Gore fucked the whole thing up. eom

[DonCoquixote]

129. If Nader wants to be honest

He can say he will not take ONE cent from the GOP.
Granted, post citizens united, that might be hard to track, but he can at least say he won't
He can't.
He will take GOP money,
he will take Lady Lynn Forester de Rothschild's money,
and save the GOP clown car.

And then, Lady Lynn Forester de Rothschild can nominate Hillary in 2016,
which will bury OWS,
bury the left,
but Nader will get paid nonetheless.

[fascisthunter]

130. lol... did the Supreme Court Select Bush or not?

wake up

[noiretextatique]

177. yes...a partisan scotus crowned shrub

and dems caved 'for the good of the country.'

[fascisthunter]

178. "dems caved 'for the good of the country"

and THAT is exactly why people are blaming Nader. Frauds...

[noiretextatique]

181. so true

dems were complicit in the theft by refusing to take on scotus.

[whatchamacallit]

134. Wow, this thread is filled with

democrats who don't really believe in democracy. I voted for Gore, but regardless of the potential for a messy outcome I defend everyone's right to run. That's our system. Deal with it.

[Uncle Joe]

141. Your claim is false, no one on this thread, said Nader didn't have a right to run.

If someone posted that Nader, "didn't have a right to run," please tell me which post that is because I don't see it.

If you truly believed in democracy, you would recognize this thread for what it is.

An exercise of all the peoples' First Amendment Rights of free speech, we're debating the pros, cons, merits and demerits of Nader running in 2000 and possibly now.

If you voted for Gore you would know this is the fruition of his legislative vision in opening the Internet to the people, this is democracy.

[whatchamacallit]

159. I'm responding to the Nader hate

which seems, primarily, based on him having the temerity to run against Gore.

[Uncle Joe]

161. I believe the vast majority of these posters don't hate Nader, they hate what he did.

That's not the same as saying he had no right to run against Gore or anyone else, it's believing his actions only served to enable Bush to power.

Nader; could just as easily have run in the Democratic Primary, had he run in the primaries, he would have been guaranteed a seat at the debates with Gore and Bradley, but he took the easy way out.

The corporate media never wanted Nader to win, they just wanted him strong enough to damage Gore's chances at defeating Bush.

Nader's short sighted and possibly self-serving actions only helped Bush which in turn damaged the causes or issues for which Nader claimed and with strong justification to support, the fight against corporate supremacy, the environment, civil rights etc. etc. were all set back decades if not more by Bush's ascension to power.

I'm convinced the primary cause for Bush coming to power was the corporate media's one sided, institution wide enablement of him to power while they simultaneously demonized and trashed Gore.

I'm also convinced the primary reason for their urgency in doing so is precisely because Gore was the preeminent poltical champion for opening up the Internet to the people. That's the bedrock foundation for their hatred of Gore, because the corporate owners and upper managment came to see the Internet as a growing threat to their top down, one way business model of telling the people what reality is.

Of course there were other reasons as well, election fraud in Florida and possibly elsewhere, the Supreme Court, Clinton's transferrable scandal and impeachment but there is no denying that Nader's third party run damaged Gore while helping Bush.

Having said all that if the coprorate media had not waged one sided, continuous propaganda war against Gore's credibility and integrity for the better part of two years while giving Bush a free pass before the selection, Gore would've won by a margin too large for Bush and his cronies to steal.

My conclusion is our First Amendment powers of free speech are stronger now than they have ever been because of the Internet and Gore paid the price for it, just as Prometheus did for stealing fire from Olympus. I don't believe it to be a cosmic coincidence that Gore went in to the news business with Current as a result.

[bluestate10]

138. The only person that has the memory of Ralph Nader is........

TADAHHHH, Milt Romney.

[_ed_]

149. It's ALL Nader's fault

that Al Gore lost his home state, didn't run on Clinton's stellar record, ran to the center, and didn't properly legally dispute the results. Nader did all of that. He is omniscient.

[libodem]

155. Uh, you know the drill

FUCK NADER!!!!

[AnOhioan]

164. Why should he apologize...it was not his fault...but go ahead and hate if it makes you feel better

[Bonobo]

166. Has Gore apologized for picking Joe Lieberman yet or

for abandoning the fight to get our votes counted?

[MNBrewer]

167. Nor should he

[mdmc]

182. DLC is to blame, not Nader