I'm starting to understand why people don't vote. Not just the apathetic types who don't know what party the president belongs to. Not voting is sometimes an expression of principled disgust for the status quo. I'm not sure if that conscious boycott sends any more of a message that voting for a smaller party candidate or writing in someone's name, but I no longer wave my hand in contempt at this category of non-voters. I still don't agree with it, but I can respect it a little more.
People's reaction to Ralph Nader's candidacy has made me come to this appreciation. And I mean not people's reaction to the substance of Nader's candidacy, but to the fact of his candidacy.
It's disheartening to read sources like Alternet and The Nation jumping on to the ABB bandwagon. I stopped reading The Nation a while ago for other reasons; I thought it was predictable, not especially challenging and lacking in intellectual rigor. Alternet purports to "[provide] readers with crucial facts and passionate opinions they can't find anywhere else" yet their 'Nader doesn't have the right to run' columns are found all over the place.
That these so-called 'alternative' publications would so eagerly mimick the self-serving rationalizations of the Democratic establishment is sad. Even if these folks had endorsed no one, rather than a smaller party candidate, I could've accepted it. But the regular Nader bashing columns in these publications hardly meshes with their self-glorifying iconoclastic image. I don't like using the phrase 'sell-out' but it fits here.
Certainly any progressive should be condemning the Donkey Party's machinations to keep Nader off the ballot in many states; machinations which may be Democratic, but certainly not democratic. Richard Nixon would be proud of what they're doing.
If you believe in a fair electoral process, you should condemn these Democratic actions which are anything but democratic. If you believe that winning an election is more important than the democratic health of this country, if you believe we need to sacrifice democracy in order to save it, then you should vote for Kerry. Or better yet, vote for Ashcroft.
Elections are no longer driven by issues anymore, even if I'm hardly the first person to point out this.
I'd be willing to bet that if you gave a majority Kerry supporters a blind test with Kerry's and Nader's positions on a few dozen issues (but not identified as such) and asked them which they agree with and which are most important to them, they'd correspond more closely to Nader's agenda than Kerry's.
The most vicious anti-Nader rants come from the least likely people... at least if the world were rational. I've challenged any ABB Kerry supporter to name four Nader positions that they strongly object to. None has answered the challenge.
The irony is that while the two causes championed by President Bush that most enrage liberals and progressives are the Patriot Act and the Iraq war, Kerry supported those two things while Nader opposed them. So, who's the real ABB candidate again?
These ABBers demand that instead of supporting the guy doing the bad stuff, I must waste my vote on his willing accomplice.
When I issued the above challenge, one respondent said something to the effect: "I went to Nader's website. I was surprised to find that I agreed with him on almost everything. And that makes me even more convinced not to vote for him."
My head spun when I read that comment. It's then I determined that people who don't vote because of a principled disgust for the status quo are doing far more to adhere to his principles and are far more deserving of my respect in that regard than anyone who holds the above mentality.
1 comment:
I think I came up with four Nader positions, but I won't quibble about the numbers.
Perhaps sometimes not voting is "an expression of principled disgust for the status quo," but I think much more often it is a tacit approval of it. Many voters will stay home in November but I expect they will be more staying home out of complete disinterest rather than a sense that they don't see a chance for "meaningful change" (or any other buzz phrase that would fit nicely here).
I don't think I see the whole party system as restrictive as you do. In Vermont we have three members of Congress and two of them are independents, of these one was formerly a Republican and the other is still endorsed by the VT Progressive Party. One of the founders of the Progressive Party is now running for governor as a Democrat. At least at the level that I watch there is a lot of movement, a lot of coalition building, a lot movement in the parties. The same can be true in the national parties, both Republican and Democratic, there just need to be enough people willing to make it happen.
Elections are not driven by issues because it is hard to determine what to give credit and blame for. Take the economy, the Republicans will rail that Clinton was not responsible for economic boom during his second term, that no president can have that kind of effect. On the other hand, they'll certainly tell you that the President's tax cuts "are working" and revitalizing the economy. Like everyone else they want it both ways and there are no good sources for voters to hear, "Okay, these are the instruments that the government has to impact the economy, here is how they work and what their limits are."
Going further: Considering that the names of different ideologies, e.g. "liberal" and "conservative" have such incredible resonance as labels in our political system, it is amazing how many people have absolutely NO idea what the roots of these two movements were, how they evolved in the 1800s in response to the American and French revolutions and what they fundamentally believe. Sure, many people can recite things they heard like one group value "tradition" while the other one likes "big government," but only at the most superficial level.
Back to Mr. Nader's positions. Reading his position papers you realize that he has one huge advantage, he knows that he is never going to govern ergo he can trot out a vast wish list of things that he would like to see done without ever having to think about how these things would be paid for, what effect they would have on the macroeconomic forces that he is assuming will generate employment and the profits he is going to tax, or the fact that he would have to work with legislative and judicial branches that are not exactly going to be welcoming to his agenda. I'd love for Kerry to stand up and say, "Health care for all! Child care for all! College education for all! Good paying jobs for all! And I've got the tab covered!" That would be great, but then someone would run the numbers and happen to mention that he is in fantasy land.
If Mr. Nader really wants to support American democracy then perhaps he can start by putting together a workable agenda, laying out actual polcies that he could get through the legislature and pay for, and start leveling with people about the realistic things that they could expect from his presidency. Can we blame voters for being turned off when candidates that may actually need to implement agendas need to compete against the blue sky ideals of someone with no interests other than his own self-aggrandizement? That's a tough order.
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