Nader writes: "The tough times in America continue. Tens of millions of Americans are feeling the squeeze and are suffering diminished livelihoods ... Against this background, what have the two parties done?"
Ralph Nader doing an interview during his 2008 Presidential campaign, 08/01/08. (photo: Scrape TV)
Open Letter to RNC, DNC
03 August 12
ear Chairpersons:
The tough times in America continue. Tens of millions of Americans are feeling the squeeze and are suffering diminished livelihoods. More than 15 million children go to bed hungry at night. Unemployment and underemployment affect more than twenty million adults. Calls for cutting into the core of programs for the needy, the vulnerable and the disadvantaged regularly emanate from Congress.
These calls are coming most insistently from the Republican leaders. Congressman John Boehner, Eric Cantor, Paul Ryan and Senator Mitch McConnell are demanding severe reductions in effective social programs and more tax cuts for the wealthy and the large corporations, many of which have been paying very little or no federal income tax, such as General Electric.
Against this background, what have the two parties done? This year they have each taken $18.2 million in taxpayer money for their national political conventions in Tampa, Florida and Charlotte, North Carolina later this summer. The money comes from taxpayers via the Treasury Department's "$3 Tax Check-off" found on tax return forms.
Taxpayers who check-off are told that the money generally goes "to the Presidential Election Campaign Fund." Taxpayers are not told the first priority is funding for the party nominating conventions, not the general election nominees and primary election candidates.
Taxpayers who opt for this partial public funding of elections may not like funding political extravaganzas for the two parties, festooned by banners, musical entertainment, food, drink and other amenities. They might not want their tax dollars associated with nearby lavish corporate hospitality parties loaded with lobbyists lusting for access, subsidies and other special privileges.
They might not want to have their tax dollars mixed with corporate contributions to the two conventions from the oil, drug, insurance, banking, nuclear, military weapons and agribusiness-food processing giant multinationals.
When your two parties in Congress established this slush fund for the conventions years ago, they tried lamely to justify the use of taxpayer contributions for the conventions by declaring that televised conventions were educational presentations; live democracy in action. That didn't pass the laugh test then or now. The nominations are all wrapped up. The conventions will be coronations of Barack Obama and Mitt Romney. The party platforms are done deals.
Party rituals, the mutual admiration exchanges and the scripted, pre-cleared speeches by selected speakers are the highlights of these uncontested, predetermined, rigged shows of inaction.
Pay for your own parties, your own liquor and your own entertainment.
Return the misled taxpayers' $36.4 million to the U.S. Treasury now. Or if you wish to receive some benefit from this modern version of "l'etat c'est moi," donate the money to the Tampa and Charlotte charities that are feeding the hungry poor and homeless. Their menu will certainly be different than yours, but they (with their strapped budgets) certainly will be pleased by the gesture.
I have sent copies of this communication to charitable associations that provide food and other necessities for the growing number of impoverished Americans in Charlotte and Tampa. The recipients were Second Harvest Food Bank, Loaves and Fishes, and Faith Soldiers in Charlotte, North Carolina; and Feeding America, Kaye Prox Food Bank, and Metropolitan Ministries in Tampa, Florida. Those compassionate providers and their volunteers, reached on the telephone, were gracious regarding the meaning of this message to you.
Other citizen, charitable and religious groups in these two metropolitan areas may be inclined to emphasize this request with their own manifestations later next month. You would be well-advised to wisely render their reactions unnecessary by taking this humane initiative.
Should you not respond to this plea, which I am sure would be supported by the vast majority of the American people of all political persuasions, your conventions could be labeled the "Marie Antoinette cabal of 2012." Surely, you remember what she suggested.
Sincerely yours,
Ralph Nader
Ralph Nader is a consumer advocate, lawyer and author. His most recent book - and first novel - is "Only the Super-Rich Can Save Us." His most recent work of non-fiction is "The Seventeen Traditions."
Reader Supported News is the Publication of Origin for this work. Permission to republish is freely granted with credit and a link back to Reader Supported News.
|
THE NEW STREAMLINED RSN LOGIN PROCESS: Register once, then login and you are ready to comment. All you need is a Username and a Password of your choosing and you are free to comment whenever you like! Welcome to the Reader Supported News community. |
 24 May 2013
|
 23 May 2013
|
 22 May 2013
|
 23 May 2013
|
 23 May 2013
|
 22 May 2013
|
 24 May 2013
|
 22 May 2013
|
 22 May 2013
|
Comments
We are concerned about a recent drift towards vitriol in the RSN Reader comments section. There is a fine line between moderation and censorship. No one likes a harsh or confrontational forum atmosphere. At the same time everyone wants to be able to express themselves freely. We'll start by encouraging good judgment. If that doesn't work we'll have to ramp up the moderation.
General guidelines: Avoid personal attacks on other forum members; Avoid remarks that are ethnically derogatory; Do not advocate violence, or any illegal activity.
Remember that making the world better begins with responsible action.
- The RSN Team
Good on ya', Ralph! Thanks for sticking it to them, and in the meantime, letting the American people, once again, learn the truth.
N.
If we ever even once got a mea culpa from you for your part in "electing" that hypocritical coward and world-class dunce George W. Bush, I would give some attention to your mewlings and pulings.
But typical of your kind, you stand above the fray, seemingly oblivious to what you have precipitated -- in this case: the AD 2001 coronation of Dubya with its attendant destruction of the US economy, rape of our natural resources, pillage of our treasury, evisceration of our Bill of Rights, and loss of our international reputation.
You want to blame someone for the election and rise of the shrub, go back to the evil, twisted, oil-loving roots from whence the shrub sprang and read a little history to discover the inaccuracy of your statements. Also, recall the cover of the Daily Mirror in 2004 with the headline that stated, "How can 59,054,087 people be so DUMB"? The same can be said of the DUMB-BELLS who elected him the first time around.
Wise up, he who gets elected to any of the highest offices in this country is hand-picked by the 0.01% and that's the way it is. Sad, huh?
Funny how other Countries War to get Freedom and we let ours slip away Can;t blame anyone one but ones self for that!!
Do you know why? I do. It's because it's soo easy to scapegoat 3rd party voters. It's because you propagandists CREATE the 50% that doesn't vote. It's exactly how your propaganda works (the lesser of 2 evils argument is propaganda. just google propaganda techniques if you doubt me)
You see the average citizen is confronted with the LIE that they have to vote for the dem or the rep or their vote won't count, won't matter, and will let the greater evil win. And that becomes our reality because we dont demand an alternative.
So what happens? well 50% comply with your propaganda and 50% just turn away and give up altogether because they'd rather be told "if you dont vote then dont complain" than be blamed for the greater evil winning.
So if you get to blame us for bush then I get to blame YOU for every rightwing policy shoved onto us by obama in the name of "compromise". And I'll blame YOU for every rightwing policy he inflicts on us in his 2nd term... and... so will the voters in 2016. YOU will be responsible for the next GOP president in 2016 because YOU only advocated for a rightwing democrat because he pretended to be a liberal during election season.
When I ask Americans if they vote at least half say, "I don't pay attention. I don't know what's going on." I don't think that most of them have an understanding that goes so far as to include the workings of the electoral college.
Never, never again will I vote for the lesser of two evils. The status quo can go * itself.
Thank you Mr. Nader. You're a true American hero.
However, I also agree with Mr. Nader's letter to the RNC and DNC. He does point out facts that aid the parties' agenda. He also has some excellent suggestions as to what to do with the money. They won't listen to him, of course.
The thumbs down score you've received Tureblue is a knee jerk reaction. We complain about how stupid conservatives are but when liberals react without thinking it results in the same stupidy.
The facts just don't support blaming Nader for 2000. With the voter suppression, blatant electoral fraud, the media blindly repeating any negative statement about Gore regardless of how blatantly inaccurate, and topped off by the corrupt SCOTUS decision, I'm very surprised that you'd buy into the B.S. that Ralph Nader – simply by exercising his right as a citizen to run for office – caused Bush to win.
Bush didn't win the election, despite all the cheating and propaganda. Blaming Ralph Nader is just easier than tackling a much bigger problem – the total corruption of the two parties currently deemed to be the only ones that can win.
Do you suppose I might have gotten fewer thumbs down it I had cut the cows throat and chased it around the abattoir until it bled out?
That anyone would blame him for that speaks volumes about your lack of them.
Some country. Some politics. Cowardice is rewarded. Courage is disdained.
It's been said that when we vote for the lesser of two evils, we soon forget that we are voting FOR EVIL.
As for Nader, if he had let go of his ego and supported Gore, the Florida debacle might not have happened because the choice of Gore would have been too much to dinker with.
Okay, you don't like the fact that Ralph stood up for himself and something different. You don't like that he didn't tow the party line; never mind that the party deserted us, not the other way around.
But Ralph Nader is a brave man who has stood up against the insanity this country has so actively embraced. And you should see the strides the Green Party is making! I think they are going to be a force in 2012, then you will be thanking Nader for having the spine that both the Republicans and the Democrats failed, and failed miserably, to develop to stand up to being bought off by the 17 greedy old white men behind the green velvet curtain.
I hear that the Republicans consider Ross Perot the spoiler for their guy. But, if you try to compare the two, Perot and Nader, well that's just ugly to the eyes. Ugh!
I never check off that little box. I had a feeling that it didn't go to the right people or places. Now I know I was correctamondo, thanks to Ralph Nader.
Diogenes of Sinope, used his lifestyle and behavior to criticize social values and institutions in a corrupt society.
Mr. Nader, with social media today, facebook, tweets, ect. you may very well raise a "hue and cry" that corruption can not ignore?
Thank you for speaking for us.
I do not want to see that man or hear his hubristic voice ever again.
...and I am -and always have been- a progressive. If RSN is going to regress to the Ralph Nader mode then there is nothing here for me to learn...lean forward and learn from past mistakes on the left. Don't relive it by giving yesterday's man, Nader, print space.
Also, I must encourage you to study the election of 2000. If you do take the time to do so, you will realize that Nader was a candidate, but not a crowned head. George W. Bush was that with the crown. Gore was never meant to win any more than Nader or anyone else. Once you research you will see that the so-called election was totally corrupt and totally choreographed in favor of Bush.
Totally illegal and had nothing to do with Nader.
Gore, Nader are intellectual bores to many because they do not understand Science and so they did not vote for them as they did not feel either could id with them.
Perhaps true of both, very true of Bush.
But everyone has the right to run for any Office. That we allowed others to put Bush in was wrong...but what about the second time around No Nader or Gore around for that...
Nader did some very good things, I disagreed with the Corvair. I got to tell him so. He is very interested in trying to get America fixed. He can be very Meish. But over all he is a good egg, just could not get enough behind him.
I do not remember him slandering or being slandered. They were too above the Poor and Average Persons grasp.
What everyone has to become very clear about is that the only a few ways a third party is ever going to be succesful. The first is to start by being successful at the local level and building national strength from the ground up. A second is a way that would help bypass the need to build locally, and that is to take all private money out of elections - every candidate have the same access and ability to get his or her message out. I don't see that happening anytime soon. And everyone has to realize that even if a spectacularly charismatic third party candidate managed to win the White House, he or she would be severely limited in what they could do faced with a Congress still controlled in some combination by the two current parties.
While this token protest of taxpayers money being sent in self-congratula tory celebration is, perhaps, apt, it doesn't address the real issue: taxpayer contributions that could be used to try and start the process of honest, publically financed elections being used for the self-gratificat ion of the elected elite.
However, giving every candidate the same access and bility to get his/her message will go for naught as long as CITIZENS UNITED is around.
Much easier to be here sniveling .... No one to blame but ourselves. the Party counts on it.
Not a one has formed a Committee, started local organizing because they spend too much time on PC
An appropriate and intelligent response to the article is a thank you to Mr. Nader for the heads-up regarding a bit of wasteful and monumental stupidity, via a share of the article on FB for instance. Almost everything else in the comments is pure mental masturbation accomplishing exactly NOTHING.
I felt also he did ram the Corvair which cost him Politically even for all the good points he made, got passed.
He is very good at figures, he does have a very quick mind and rhetoric. I met him as he was working on the side of Environmentalis ts, Coming to GrassRoot Meetings across the USA....where have you all been? He is actually not unapproachable. But once he gets into a subject, you better have time, notepad, and try to learn.
http://contract.rebuildthedream.com/?rc=rtd_home
We cannot afford to diminish a unified sentiment that the status quo is unsustainable by overreaching with a pie in the sky platform that peals away critical support with every additional plank beyond the bare essentials we require to achieve fundamental changes in our political and economic systems to reestablish "government of the people, by the people, for the people".
Having stated this, I find it necessary to separate issues. In my estimation, Ralph Nader's half century of contributions to American life outweigh his presidential election foibles. Going forward, his analysis never fails when it comes to elucidation and common sense, which, as Mark Twain reminded a century ago, is not very common. For a lifetime, Mr. Nader has remained true to his father's lesson: Returning from school to his father's grocery store, the senior Nader never asked, "Ralph, what did you learn at school?" Instead the contentious grocer asked, "Ralph, how did they make you think?" So, to this day, Ralph Nader continues to make us think. And in the instance at hand, he is once again spot on.
Having stated this, I find it necessary to separate issues. In my estimation, Ralph Nader's half century of contributions to American life outweigh his presidential election foibles. Going forward, his analysis never fails when it comes to elucidation and common sense, which, as Mark Twain reminded a century ago, is not very common. For a lifetime, Mr. Nader has remained true to his father's lesson. Returning from school to his father's grocery store, the youthful Nader was never asked, "Ralph, what did you learn at school today?" Instead, the contentious grocer asked, "Ralph, how did they make you think today?" So, to this day, Ralph Nader continues to invite us to think with his direct, factually steeped essays that always end with a direct-action pathway. And, in the instance at hand, he is spot on.
A great suggestion: End corporate money for elections and finance campaigns and elections from the public funds. Set strict guidelines and time limits so we might hear honest debate on the issues and not the dirty advertising campaigns we are all tired of.
Time for the RNC and DNC to step up and think outside the box!
If they can't do it, let's try for a new party! Yes, a third party! Mr. Nader knows about that.
Instead, they did everything they could to vilify him, exclude him from the "debates" and convince their gullible "lesser evil" constituents that Nader was some kind of closet Republican.
The biggest obstacle to having genuinely OPEN and FREE elections with REAL (i.e., multi-party) alternatives to the "two" political parties that have brought this country to its knees and delivered OUR governance to multi-national corporations, is the "two" parties themselves.
They control the media and the electoral machinery that exclude ANY candidate not 'vetted' by the Establishment. Like the 'Cosa Nostra' crime families, the Dems and Reps present a united front against sharing their turf with ANY "outsiders".
Judging by all the crap we hear about Ralph Nader 'costing' the elections, they have succeeded magnificently. Smarten up, all you Nader bashers. Think OUTside the box these "two" parties have put us in. Stop kvetching and............
DEMAND FREE, OPEN AND INCLUSIVE ELECTIONS...or kiss our so-called democracy good-by!
The Democrats have let a healthy majority slip with little accomplished and no retribution for the causers of the depression -long predicted by more credible sources and still hanging on by it's long, sharp fingernails. And made it all so much worse by naive or typically foolish soft-pedaling attempts at conciliation with the irreconcilable.
The Rethgulican medievalists have "Just said NO" to everything, reason or none and continue to block anything even mildly progressive or populist even before it is proposed.
And if I might add a rider, the judiciary have come out and openly tilted vote-buying in favor of the purchasers.
It's really that simple.
Because Bush won, he was able to change a liberal majority on the Supreme Court to a conservative majority--the majority that voted to uphold Citizens United.
If for no other reason, I will never forgive Nader for running in swing states even though he had been warned that his presence on the ballot in those states could likely throw the election to Bush.
He can say all he wants about residing on the left side of the political spectrum, but after 2000, I'll never believe him. Actions speak much louder than words.
Perhaps you should blame the Workers World Party. In Florida, more people voted for the Trotskyist candidate from WW than the margin between Gore and Bush when the vote was stopped by Rethug hired goons. If only the extreme leftists hadn't fielded a candidate, why, all the people that voted for them, or at least the majority, would no doubt have voted for "Mr. Occidental Petroleum" Al Gore.
Or, if all the ballots had been counted, Gore would have won. That must have been Nader's fault as well. Or hey, if Gore had carried Tennessee, he would have won. That was his home state, and Nader wasn't even on the ballot there. But just by his existence, he cost Gore the election in Tennessee.
Perhaps you should blame the Workers World Party. In Florida, more people voted for the Trotskyist candidate from WW than the margin between Gore and Bush when the vote was stopped by Rethug hired goons. If only the extreme leftists hadn't fielded a candidate, why, all the people that voted for them, or at least the majority, would no doubt have voted for "Mr. Occidental Petroleum" Al Gore.
Or, if all the ballots had been counted, Gore would have won. That must have been Nader's fault as well. Or hey, if Gore had carried Tennessee, he would have won. That was his home state, and Nader wasn't even on the ballot there. But just by his existence, he cost Gore the election in Tennessee.
And of course, Scalia, saying that because Bush and the RethugNaziCons expected to win, they would be "irreparably damaged" if the vote count continued, since it was trending against the fascists. So it was sopped, just in time.
And the [White] Supremacists carried out their act of treason, as Vincent Bugliosi persuasively argued, and -- did you say the Supremes were "liberal" at that time, before Bush took office? Why am I even bothering to educate you?
By 1982, 18 years earlier, there was a solid right-wing bloc that held four seats; ten years later, and there were only two real liberals left on the Court -- neither of whom, incidentally had been appointed by a Democratic president.
Perhaps before vilifying the most solidly pro-people candidate ever fielded by a non-Marxist party, you should read up on the real history of our times.
The fascistization of the political sphere and the deliberate destruction of the Republic as well as any trace of real democracy in the United States was not accomplished by the pipsqueak Schrubbe nor his puppetmaster Cheney.
It was the product of a century-long class war carried out by the rich against everyone else, and it gained its greatest momentum with the election of Ronald Reagan, followed by four "tough-minded" militarist and pro-elite traitors in a row.
¡De acuerdo compañero!
You don't have to quote 'exit polls' or any kind of poll to 'prove' your conclusions, for they are your conclusions, and no fact or figure is going to change your mind in any significant way. The fact that your conclusions are based on false facts and false numbers does not enter into your thought process, and why should it, you've drawn a line in the sand.
To quote your own words:
"If for no other reason, I will never forgive Nader for running in swing states even though he had been warned that his presence on the ballot in those states could likely throw the election to Bush."
Why do you include the warning phrase..."could likely" in your statement; 'could' & 'likely' are such conditional terms?
As has been pointed out by many in this discussion, there were many a 'could' & 'likely' that would have been deciding factors in this historic election, not the least of which is this simple fact:
If just 1% more of the eligible voters, who didn't vote, had taken seriously, the right, privilege and responsibility of voting, there would have been about a million more votes cast nation-wide. Combine that with the FACT that Gore got 500,000 more 'popular' votes than Bush, and you have a more 'likely' outcome that 'could' have happened.
I urge you to reconsider that line in the sand and forgive Mr. Nader. Try to never say never...it makes for a better life.
I spent my voting life from 1974-2000, working for the Greens. Working hard, with passion and energy, in a swing state. Election Day 2000 I had called a hundred people telling them unequivocally that "A vote for Nader is a vote for NADER, NOT Bush." And the percentage of the win in my state was so close -- those electoral votes would have made Florida irrelevant, and yes, I blamed myself for some part of that vote. I spent the next eight years working for the Dems in expiation, only giving up when I saw the schism between Obama and Clinton becoming so raucous and hateful that we didn't even see the pre-Tea-Party infiltrators signing up as Dems for the caucus, and they shredded the platform we'd sweated over for months. Now I donate to down-party seats, trying like hell to get ANYONE but a Republican elected in my own county.
But hey, if we want to assign some blame around here, what about Lieberman? Everyone forgets that he conceded the race even before SCOTUS. Even before the recount was stopped, old Joe went on national radio and declared that he & Gore had lost. THAT was what ended the whole thing, and when he later stabbed the party in the back, I was not in the least surprised.
write in voting but those words write in online voting must "RUB SOMEBODY THE WRONG WAY" because those words seem to BE DISAPPEARED all the time! Like maybe even this comment will be DISAPPEARED?
Several decades ago, Margaret Thatcher claimed: "There is no alternative". She was referring to capitalism. Today, this negative attitude still persists.
I would like to offer an alternative to capitalism for the American people to consider. Please click on the following link. It will take you to an essay titled: "Home of the Brave?" which was published by the Athenaeum Library of Philosophy:
http://evans-experientialism.freewebspace.com/steinsvold.htm
John Steinsvold
Perhaps in time the so-called dark ages will be thought of as including our own.
--Georg C. Lichtenberg
RSS feed for comments to this post