I voted for Nader

[drumwolf]

....in 1996 and 2000. :P

Not this time. I just came back from City Hall in SF where I turned in my absentee ballot -- marked off for John Kerry and John Edwards. Woo-hoo! Good lord.... that means this is the first time I'm voting for a Democrat in the presidential election in twelve years.

And earlier this morning I was phone banking at the SF Dem office, where Rep. Nancy Pelosi, Calif. state Treasurer Phil Angelides, Mark Leno, and SF District Attorney Kamala Harris all came in person. Wow.

:bounce: :bounce: :bounce:

[Sannum]

1. Oh my god...

You gave me a fright there, lol.

Thanks for phonebanking. I hate it but it has to be done:)

[DuaneBidoux]

2. Too bad you don't live in Florida (well, not too bad for you...

...but too bad for us).

[HuskerDem]

3. Awesome! spent my day phone banking in Cincinn, OH

Going to protest Blinky tomorrow and his dark lord too.

Sweetness.

[Daisey Mae]

4. Wow you had me going.... Happy you are with Kerry/Edwards

We are going to win with good people like you waking up and seeing the danger that this country is in......KERRY BY A LANDSLIDE........

[Name removed]

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[Name removed]

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[demgrrrll]

9. Weembo I like your style. eom.

.

[idiosyncratic]

11. When will freepers learn to spell lose? n/t

[dhinojosa]

13. An experiment that can cost us our country.

I am say 'nay' to a loss, waiting 8 years will cause more of a mess for Americans that it would even be very difficult to overcome. Our elderly will be out of social security/medicare (iow dead). Our veterans will continue being shortchanged and cause many of them to be homeless. Crime will rise because of lack of work. We will be left in a weakened state because our military would leave their posts, and we will not get new recruits because no one trusts the president. The stock market will cave under pressure of a budget deficit, national debt, trade deficit, baby-boomer retirement strain, and tax cuts. Our credibility will be so shot it may be next to impossible to restore with other nations, do you know how that can affect trade?

The republican may cease to exist after 4 years but it may take our country down with it. Now is not the time for an experiment like this....

I still love you though. B-)

[kokomo]

7. Wish you could convince the many Naderites on other forums to follow suit.

Just came from AlterNet.org and the Naderites there bash Kerry on every thread! They brag about voting their conscience but how can they feel so pure when they may get Bush's blood on their hands?

http://forums.alternet.org/bin/motet?enter+-uja69a+Election_2004

[PATRICK]

12. It was not long ago

That the mere five letters would have relit the eternal flame war.

Maybe now we can move on to legitimate issues of reform that many beside Nader are rightfully concerned about- depending on Tuesday's results.

[gjb]

16. Nader is a vanity candidate at this point. Hitler rose to power because...

...social democrats refused to form a coallition to stop him when they had the chance. All according to the highest principles of course.

[drumwolf]

26. Fuck 'em.

I'm convinced that without Nader, most of the Naderites either wouldn't vote at all or would vote for other marginal third parties like Natural Law or Peace & Freedom. From what I can tell, most former Naderites who could be persuaded to vote for Kerry are doing so. I mean, for fuck's sake, Chomsky, Zinn, and even Nader's former running-mate Winona LaDuke have all thrown their support behind Kerry.

During the 2000 election campaign, San Francisco was blanketed with Nader/Green campaign material, signs, posters and bumper stickers. This time I see hardly any Nader OR Green 2004 signs but I do see Kerry/Edwards signs all over the place.

[Polly Glot]

8. What made you vote Democratic this time drumwolf?

My hubby is driving me nuts. The good news: He HATES the shrub and swears up and down he would NEVER vote for him. The bad news: He isn't much fonder of Kerry and insists he won't for him either. I have tried every day to get him to "see the light" but he insists they are both just corporate puppets and we're screwed whoever wins. At this point he's trying to decide which of the third party candidates to vote for.

So I'm curious what made you see the light? Please do share so I can convince him! We live in a battleground state so this is crucial!!

I am praying every day for myself or Kerry to say the right thing to convince him to vote K/E. The reich-wing media's fondness for snippets of often-irrelevant soundbites doesn't help so DU is my last resort!!

[Norquist Nemesis]

19. Isn't marriage a beautiful thing!

Welcome to DU!!! :hi:

I wouldn't trade my hubby for anything though there's times he infuriates me almost more than I can bear...yet, to my surprise, he always pulls. He's my grounding force in all things and after 24 years of marriage I realize there are more things we are actually on the same page than not.

Make your hubby his favorite meal and back off (but only just a little). Set up the candles on Monday, get some aromatic lotions if necessary...anyway, I digress. You will find he's much more in your realm than you're giving him credit for.

In the end, he'll most likely vote for John Kerry on Tuesday...with your influence (and providing you don't make it a fight of it). Regardless of how he voes, you'll still be with him on November 3rd. And 4th, and 25th. And hopefully, on January 20, 2065.

So...charm him from the kitchen, entice him in the bedroom, and drive him to Kerry/Edwards at the polls. LOL!!! In the end, you won't ever know how he actually voted...but you can have an influence.

The fact is, he cares about what you think and how you feel about things. And that is the most powerful thing with the love two people feel about each other. :)

[Polly Glot]

22. Thank you liburl!!

I like how you think!! You must be very happily married. :)

I know *I* care about what he thinks too... and I agree with him that corporations have been taking over our country, but overcoming them is something that can wait until November 3rd. I was originally ABB big-time, but over the months it's become clear to me that Kerry has a big heart and insightful outlook and that's exactly what I want for POTUS. This is the hardest thing to explain to my hubby as it's more a gut feeling I have about Kerry than any kind of empirical knowledge. With any luck and lots of prayers, Mr Glot will go ahead and vote for Kerry, and then and only then work to get more third party strength in the political system.

[drumwolf]

21. my reasons for voting Nader then vs. Kerry now

First of all, I've always lived in overwhelmingly blue states (New York during the 1996 election, but moved to California in 1999), so I've always had the luxury of voting third-party without worrying too much about throwing the election to the GOP.

Having said all that, I voted for Nader in 1996 because it was pretty much a foregone conclusion that Clinton would defeat Dole handily, and then in 2000 I voted for Nader again because I really did believe that there would be little difference between Gore and Bush. After all, the Clinton/Gore administration was pretty much centrist, and Bush campaigned with an image of being a moderate consensus-builder. I certainly had no clue that Bush would be as much of a wingnut as he's turned out to be.

Another thing: I was voting more for the Green Party than for Ralph Nader, and I was hoping that if they collected enough popular votes, the Greens would get matching funds and turn into a powerhouse that could push the country leftward.

This time around, purely from a practical perspective, I probably could get away with voting Green Party again without hurting Kerry. But I decided long before the Democratic primary that I would vote for the person who had the best chance of defeating Bush, purely out of principle and to make a statement with my vote even if it didn't affect the outcome. In other words, my vote for Kerry is essentially a protest vote against Bush.

The argument I would make to your husband is that Kerry may be an establishment lackey (which I do believe he is to an extent), but he's not a PSYCHOTIC, DELUSIONAL, MENTALLY ILL, RELIGIOUS EXTREMIST, CHRISTIAN-TALIBAN establishment lackey. Kerry may keep the status quo, but that sure beats Bush taking us off a cliff.

But if he is absolutely adamant about voting third-party, he should vote for the Greens instead of Nader. Nader is just a lone non-affiliated candidate with delusions of grandeur, whereas the Greens are an established party trying to be a force in politics.

[Polly Glot]

23. Thank you so much for your perspective on this matter.

The argument I would make to your husband is that Kerry may be an establishment lackey (which I do believe he is to an extent), but he's not a PSYCHOTIC, DELUSIONAL, MENTALLY ILL, RELIGIOUS EXTREMIST, CHRISTIAN-TALIBAN establishment lackey. Kerry may keep the status quo, but that sure beats Bush taking us off a cliff.

I am going to repeat this like a mantra over the next couple of days! Here here.

I like what the Greens stand for too. In fact, I took some on-line political quiz a while back (sorry, I don't have the URL anymore) and the Greens are much more aligned with my political outlook than the Dems. Nevertheless I have so much faith that Kerry will bring this country back on the right track. Then and only then, once we are SAFE, can we take our ideals a step further and lick our corporation stranglehold on America.


Thanks again for sharing, drumwolf...

[IChing]

10. Thought for a moment we had kevin costner

I finacially supported nader ($35) in 2000 but voted Gore.

[mermaid]

14. Jesus Christ...Don't DO That To Me!!!

I came here ready to scream and yell and kick your ass for voting Nader this time out...thank GOD you didn't!!

Look, I understand all about idealism, and so on...but when expressing your idealism causes the very schmuck who stands the best chance of screwing up the things you profess to care about to get elected....
Holy shit, I thought I was gonna have a Christing heart attack!!

[gardenista]

15. Bravo! You did the right thing! nt

[DaveSZ]

18. John Kerry voted with Ted Kennedy 96% of the time

He's voted for the enviornment 92% of the time and helped found the first Earth Day.

He's more green than Al Gore and Bill Clinton put together.

You made a good choice.

[Erika]

17. My Green Friend Is Also Voting For Kerry

after voting for Nader in 2000. He's seen what Bush has done to environmental policies and no way would he waste his vote on Nader.

[sr_pacifica]

20. you, tease, you

the only reason I looked at your post---to see what IDIOT dared to announce he/she voted for Nay-Dear. :-)

[TrueAmerican]

24. Damn it

I was hoping to whoop on so Nader voter.

Congrats for seeing the light.

[NastyDiaper]

25. If you have swing Green friends with doubts:

Send them to votepair.org NOW. Votepair will clear their conscience and help guarantee the right vote when the curtain is drawn. After batting around a few emails to make sure that I was not being 'had', I'm convinced that I was hooked up with a real MA Green vote. I'm a FL Green who knew by 11/2000 that Nader pledged not to campaign as a spoiler and lied so I voted Gore. But the damage had been done. Here is what a votepair.org letter looks like:


Subject: VotePair Partner Details
Dear NastyDiaper,

Congratulations! VotePair has found you a strategic voting partner for the 2004 U.S. presidential election.

Your partner, SmartDude, is a Kerry supporter from Massachusetts. Your VotePair partner's email address is [e-mail].

We encourage you to communicate directly with your VotePair partner. Doing so gives you an opportunity to get to know them politically. If you would like to share your experiences of participating in VotePair, please feel free to email us at [e-mail]. And please check back at http://votepair.org/ to see how strategic voting is making a difference in this election!

If you have a problem with your partner or would like to be re-paired or removed from the VotePair system, please contact [e-mail].

The VotePair Team


The reason they need to act now is that you will want to bat a few emails back and forth to verify. For obvious (to democrats anyway) legal reasons, all votepair can really do is setup progressive pen-pals who have a strategic voting agenda.

[geekgrrl]

27. Me too! I voted for Nader in 2000 and NOT this time

Even a die-hard radical friend of mine is fed up with Nader. She is doing the votpair so she is voting for Kerry here in Wisconsin and her votepair partner is voting for Cobb somewhere else.

Me, I am proud to vote for Kerry.

[Dob Bole]

28. You probably just killed some people...

with heart attacks/strokes...anything that involves blood pressure.