Lydia Nickerson's comment is very well put. "Letting the perfect be the enemy of the good" as they say.

The notion of things getting worse before getting better is foolish and dangerous. Think of the lasting effect of GW's Supreme Court nominations. Think of the cutbacks in social spending and the peril it imposes on the most vulnerable in our society. The mind boggles.

After holding my tongue after reading all these posts -- and this makes it distinctly difficult to type, let me tell you -- my discipline gives way and I murmur that while it's entirely likely someone spoke of it before him, one Vladimir Illich Lenin is generally credited with advocating the philosophy of "heightening the contradictions."

I remarked to Teresa some months ago that I don't actually think there's a single political idea that I am more completely against.

Okay, slavery, cannibalism, species suicide. I'm against those too. But the things we trash when we "heighten the contradictions" are often the fruit of a thousand generations of hardscrabble moral progress, fifty steps forward and forty-nine steps back. It took a lot of people a lot of work for there to be the good there is in the world.

I actually have a name for this position. It's called "conservatism." Unfortunately, it was stolen a long time ago.

Just for the record, I too am _vehemently_ opposed to the "things have to get worse to get better" argument. I do not espouse it, have never espoused it, and hope fervently that someone I love will drown me if they ever hear me espousing it. When things get worse, more people die and more people suffer.

Although I voted for Nader, he said many things that I profoundly disagree with. This is one. "There is no difference between Gore and Bush" is another.

And a thank-you to Patrick for his gracious apology for "spluttering"; not necessary, but welcome.

Clearly I'm pissing up a rope in this forum, and I will make good on my promise to vacate the premises just as soon as I respond to the host.

For starters, I'm pretty sure we met years ago at Big Mac in Kansas City. I was sliding into gafiation but you were an up and coming fanzine star, and quite clever as I recall.

You still strike me as being pretty smart. Smart enough to ignore my points and cut to the damning lines where I cross a line (or, at least it would appear so when my remarks are taken out of context).

I really have only one point to make here: the Democrats have failed abysmally to take care of those at the bottom of the economic ladder. Nothing else really counts in the long run. The economic statistics showing the massive transfer of wealth to the already wealthy did not slow down during the Clinton years, and it's time to face those facts.

Blame Nader, blame me, blame your dog. I don't care. But if you don't work to get a progressive Democrat nominated, you only have yourselves to blame for what's coming.

It's easy to see Gore as having been the answer to all the problems Bush has created, but "heightening the contradictions" is an insulting conjecture regarding Nader's "supporters." The fact is simply calling us supporters is a stretch. Nader was the means to an end: a slap in the face to the Democratic Party for abandoning the good fight and all the little people who don't have PACs.

You see Iraq and the economy and assume all would be well under President Gore. I don't. Had Gore prevailed (after fighting back as he damn well should have throughout that campaign cycle), the Republicans in Congress would have eaten him for lunch. Sure there'd be differences, but the most important of them would be the fact that instead of Bush's crumbling poll numbers and an awakening America, we'd still be in "blame Clinton-Gore" mode.

The Republicans OWN this country, and right now they're destroying the franchise and opening the door for a fire sale on new leadership. Absent the Democrats fighting back, the next best strategy is to let the Republicans piss in the bed they've made. Now that the Clinton sideshow is over, it's a lot harder for the Republicans to duck responsibility for this unholy mess they've made.

I'm a dues paying Democrat who quit the club when they voted to start letting Republicans become members, and if you can't hack that, at least show me the courtesy I'm due for having put in thirty years of hard work for a long list of Democratic candidates. The fight over Nader isn't about Nader anymore than the fight over partial birth abortion is about the sanctity of life. It's all about control, and who's in charge. Either let everyone back into the clubhouse, or stop pretending that anyone who disagrees with you is a traitor.

It was NEVER about Nader or the Greens, and until you understand that, you'll never see the real problems we're facing.

So, Mark, you're bugging out so you don't have to read the replies? Why am I not surprised that you're happy to do the attitudinizing, but won't deal with the consequences?

Mark Giselsen said: "Blame Nader, blame me, blame your dog. I don't care. But if you don't work to get a progressive Democrat nominated, you only have yourselves to blame for what's coming."

Well, instead, I chose to work to get a Democrat nominated whom I felt had a chance to actually win the 2000 election. And you know what? He won. He wasn't allowed to take office, but he won, despite the pissers and moaners on the far left saying that he wasn't a progressive and the people on the far right complaining that he was a Stalinist.

Everything else is irrelevent compared to this fact: The candidate who won the election was not allowed to take office.

I don't know what to do about that. And neither do you.

Yes, exactly. I sent Lydy a mash note after reading her 2 posts.

MKK

Yes, exactly. I sent Lydy a mash note after reading her 2 posts.

MKK

Yes, the Nadarite idea that things have to get worse before they get better seems to me to be a close analog of the old Trotskyite idea of fucking things up to "heighten the contradictions."

Not a good idea at all, if only because when things start spirally out of control, they're as likely to land someplace we hate as someplace we hope for.

"I really have only one point to make here: the Democrats have failed abysmally to take care of those at the bottom of the economic ladder. Nothing else really counts in the long run."

Well, taking care of the poor, the helpless, and the sick is certainly a moral imperative.

Whether it's the only moral imperative ("nothing else really counts in the long run") is another question.

Personally, I would also include keeping the peace, preserving the planet, and fostering justice.

It's not a new observation to note that people who focus too hard on a single issue, no matter how worthy the issue, tend to become rather ruthless in its pursuit. Unfortunately, the rest of us have to live in the remains of the china shop after they're done with it.

To split a hair, I myself do believe that sometimes it is necessary for things to get worse before they get better. (Similarly, it is sometimes necessary for things to get better before they get worse.)

However, deliberately making things as bad as you can make them is short-sighted. Yes, the pendulum has to swing this way for a while before it swings the other way. However, pulling the pendulum as far as possible in the wrong direction won't speed up the process of changing direction; it will only make it more violent and impossible to control when it happens.

And at some time in the future that pendulum is going to change direction again, and the more you pulled it off center this go-round, the harder it's going to come back and slam you in the butt.

The idea behind it all seems to be that if only you can pull the pendulum off center far enough, it'll swing to the other side with enough force and violence that it will stay there for all time. This is a delusion. Actions create reactions. Grinding our boots into Germany's face after WWI did not exactly ensure that Germany would never again trouble us. The changes in society in the 1960s onward also fueled the rise of the fundamentalist Christian Right as a reaction.

We have to take the long view. Yes, in the short run things sometimes have to get worse first. But in the long run the way to improve them is to minimize the violence of the swings of the pendulum, not increase it. Deliberately bringing about more misery and suffering in the conviction that you're making things better in the long run is a delusion, and a particularly cruel one, though sometimes well intended. The world doesn't really work that way.

David Brin is fond of quoting a study that suggests that people in a self-righteous mood are literally enjoying a high . . . an endorphin kick.

I've never seen this study, and I should really ask DB to get me a reference. But it makes sense. Folks in a state of wrathful indignation appear to me to be in a state of altered conciousness.

We're used to self-righteousness from the right, but I see "nothing else counts" and "things have to come to a head" rhetoric, one realizes that folks on the far left too are fond of this (theoretical?) neurochemical warm fuzzy.

Teresa, I was planning to lurk, but if you insist, I'll stay in the fray and defend my comments.

Patrick, economic justice and access to healthcare aren't single issues: they're at the heart of the traditional Democratic Party, and all other things flow out from these core values. Even race and choice are but manifestations of these two uberissues.

The party has been coopted. Sure, radicals always say that, but despite some very strong Scandinavian socialist tendencies, I'm getting more conservative, not more liberal in my old age.

You reference a china shop. I'll see you the broken crockery and raise you one Krystalnacht. The Democrats have been standing on the sideline and letting the Republicans tell outright lies for well over a decade now. Republican lies now pass for truth in our brave new world with six media conglomerates. Please tell me how Gore would have stopped the lies when he couldn't even control his own press? (And, as a Daily Howler reader, I do feel for Gore on that front -- he got screwed by the media, but when he refused to fight back he made it clear that he wasn't the right person for these divisive, highly polarized times.)

Over half of all Americans think Saddam Hussein was responsible, at least in part, for 9-11. Please reconcile for me how that can be possible if the Democratic Party is really out there fighting for the truth. Tell me which high profile Democrats have come out and called our Liar in Chief a liar.

I am personally torn by current events. As I said, IF we invade Iraq I will regret my Nader vote to my dying day. But short of that war crime occurring -- and it can only happen because of the Democrats failure to oppose this insanely stupid move -- everything else is relative.

Would things be better if Gore was POTUS? You tell me. Tell me when he would have grown a pair and put a stop to casual lying by the GOP and the stooge press. Tell me how Gore would have finessed progressive legislation past the coalition of rabid Republicans and southern fried pseudo-Democrats. Tell me how Gore-Lieberman would have never bowed to the Zionist lobby or pushed even harder sanctions or even war on Iraq (I cringe at the thought of war but what is more evil: wrongful war, or all the children Clinton killed with his continuation of the pinpoint bombing of Iraq's infrastructure?).

I look forward to reading about the utopia Gore would have given us, and how everything would now be different.

Scott, I would say that sometimes things _do_ get worse before they get better, rather than that they _have to_ (I'm splitting your proverbial hair still further; it's beginning to look like a feather duster at this end).

Things have to start getting better before they can get better. People have to start doing things that will make them get better. Sometimes, when it's really dark and chaotic, and despair is all around, it's very hard to see any course of action that will make things better, so you settle for not making things worse, for not lying down and dying, for finding room to breathe. That too is a start.

The long view lets you know what you're working for, but the short view is what gives you things to _do_. It's important to keep your eyes on both. It's important that the things you do be things that _can_ be done, and that can _make a start_ at making things better. It's vital not to let the expectation that things surely will get worse keep you from doing what you can to make them better, or at least stop that descent into darkness.

There's a difference between making things worse as opposed to letting nature (or in this case the GOP) take its course. No one on the left is encouraging Bush to do these things, and I don't think anyone could have anticipated the massive hubris of this adminstration.

If hard left Democrats were egging Bush on, I'd say you have a point. But I don't think that's happening, in fact, just the opposite. Because Democrats don't fight back in any meaningful ways (OK, bonus points for Estrada), Bush/Rove have been empowered to push the envelope.

Stephan, all of last night's endorphins were courtesy of THC, but today is all me (no endorphins, just crankiness). Just out of curiosity, how many more years should I have slaved away as a rank and file labor Democrat before you would give me permission to be self-righteous? I thought thirty years was a pretty good apprenticeship, but apparently you have a more Gang of Four style definition of party loyalty.

Oddly enough, Stefan--and I'm not denying the crappy attitude and vicious remarks and high hats on both sides of this fucked-up fence--but let me tell you: far and away the most self-righteousness and endorphin-charged ass-kickery of trumped-up straw men is coming from those who spew on Naderites than from the "far left." --But I'm a "Naderite," I suppose, and one is always more likely to note the shit drizzled on one's own head than the shit pouring out of one's mouth.

And anyway, I've already said elsewhere and recently that I've had enough, but: I myself have never said "Things have to get worse before they get better." (This is also a motivation behind old-skool Baader-Meinhof terrorism. Keep that as a debating point, if you like.) That certainly wasn't my motivation for voting for Nader. Nor that of anyone else I know who did. The reasons were many and varied--anyone remember the FEC matching funds, for one particular instance? Depending on which polls you read, there was a shot at the Greens nailing 5% of the vote almost up to Election Day 2000. Maybe the general "you" thinks that was a stupid reason, but it was a reason; it was touch and go here in Oregon, but Gore looked like he would carry the state; I did the calculus, made up my mind, and voted. I don't regret a thing.

Certainly, I think it's a better reason than voting against one's supposed party affiliation because you're too stupid to look past grossly biased media coverage and you think you're getting a tax cut from math that a sixth grader would laugh off the chalkboard. Yet a whole passel of Democrats did just that in 2000; far more than voted for Nader. --Which might be why they get wooed and we get spittle, majority rules and winner take all, but hey. Game theory was never my strong suit.

Julia's right, though. Actions have consequences. And there are no ends, only means. I don't know yet how I will vote in 2004, or for whom. But I won't choke on my 2000 vote (or my 1996 vote, or my 1992 vote), and I certainly won't apologize for it.

So.

...after considerable reflection, I've decided that the views of Mark Gisleson represent exactly those of a person I would blame. I can certainly respect those who may choose to vote for Nader because he represents their views; using Nader as a vehicle to punish or force a change to the platform of another candidate is a different matter.

Most folks who pay attention to the sport of politics understand that it's about power and control, and I suspect that most of those same "most folks" also know that - to many Nader voters - it wasn't about Nader. What Mr. Gisleson and allied thinkers haven't seemed to figure out - and the Republican Party has - is that only the team with the ball gets to score. The Republican Party does a much better job of subsuming its varied interests to the goal of winning than do the Democrats, as the Nader candidacy as a means rather than an end shows.

I don't have Mr. Gisleson's credentials as a party activitist, but I have been a big fan and student of politics for 30 years, too (well, more than thirty years, but why go into that, eh?). The called-for need to renounce the centrist ("Republican Lite") views of the DLC and return to the golden era of progressive Democratic politics as a means of gaining control and reaching those at "the bottom of the economic ladder" absolutely mystifies me. Aside from the fact that Clinton only had a Democratic Congress (and not a very helpful one at that) for two of his eight years, there remains the not very successful history of progressive Democrats even making it to the White House during my adult history. Think Nixon, Reagan, and George H.W. Bush. A Nader-voting blogger wrote a few weeks ago that she shouldn't be blamed for Bush because Gore ran the worst campaign in the history of the country. Oh, really?! Think Humphrey, McGovern, and Dukakis (sorry, it was so bad I can't even spell his name anymore).

The effort to create of a centrist core in the Democratic party came about because the progressive candidates were getting their heads handed to them (with Carter being the post-Watergate anomaly when no living Republican could have been elected). If there are those who can't abide by the Democratic party not sticking closely to their progressive viewpoint, by all means keep it up; it's certainly your right to run cutouts to represent your ends. Just make sure that you understand that none of your ends will be met if you split the progressive and moderate vote and the other side holds to a single candidate...and understand that there will be those who understand how the game is played who will blame you, despite your protestations...

The argument that voting Green would help move the Democrats back to their core is specious at best.

There is no evidence to support this notion of changing a party from without, and intuitively it would seem to only sap the energy and drive of the Democratic party. Granted, the Dems' strategy to move right to absorb some the GOP's space is a colossal failure and contributed greatly to the exodus of progressives. True this hurt the Dems and may reconsider their strategy, but the end result is the Bush adminstration, which by all measures, is a hell of a lot to ask of your fellow citizens.

The lessons from the '00 and '02 elections are manifold. One thing The Dems have to do is invigorate their base, and can do this in part by courting Greens to work within the Democratic Party on traditional Dem planks. Another thing they have to do is illustrate the profound differences between themselves and the GOP and in a manner that is consistent, unwavering and strong. The Dems will not do well if they don't win a few shouting matches.

I personally am going to go all out volunteer crazy come next election cycle (for the Democratic Party) and from what I gather here, I won't be alone. I sincerely hope that those who voted Green in '00 reconsider come the next election.

cheers,
Scott

I should clarify that I'm not David Scott Marley, but Scott Betts in the previous "Scott" comment.

I should clarify that I'm not David Scott Marley, but Scott Betts in the previous "Scott" comment.

For the record, I have no problem with the "vote trading" movement, or folks who conciously voted for Nader in "sure thing" states. My parents and sister did the latter. I might have done the vote-trading thing, but even living in CA I didn't want to take chances.

"I look forward to reading about the utopia Gore would have given us, and how everything would now be different."

Who said anything about Utopia?

There's a list of *little* outrages -- snowmobiles let back into national parks, the increases in routine secrecy, closed meetings where a gleeful Enron suggested administration energy policy, ASHCROFT for cripes sake -- that would _not have happened_ had Gore been president.

Gore wouldn't have changed his mind about Global Warming after getting into office. He still might have been unable to get Kyoto ratified, but the very fact that there'd be someone in the Whitehouse who didn't think it was a theory cooked up by grant-hungry atmospheric scientists would be a really good thing. He might not have been able to get CAFE standards raised, but he sure as hell wouldn't try to squash every attempt.

I could go on. But to paraphrase a line from Stewart Brand: "We're not into Utopian thinking here, perferring a more fiasco-by-fiasco approach to perfection."

Since when does moving the party to the center mean abandoning your base, or refusing to fight Republican lies?

As I've said, Bush winning was not my #1 scenario when I voted for Nader, but I wasn't naive and knew that to be the worst case scenario. I also cast my vote in a state Gore had safely in the electoral bank, so my personal vote had nothing to do with Bush's election. I won't fault any Floridians for voting for Nader, but had I lived in Florida I probably would have voted for Gore. I'm angry, but I'm not reckless.

I worked for Ted Kennedy in Iowa in 1980 because it was obvious to me that Carter was going to get slaughtered by Reagan. When Kennedy lost I voted for Carter, not Anderson. I have always played to win.

Gore was not a winner. Ferchrissakes he won the popular vote and still lost. In my book that spells L*O*S*E*R. He would have become a failed one-term president at best and he would have left the Democrats in an even deeper hole than they're in now.

Is it cynical to think that Bush wrecking the economy and foreign policy is good for the nation in the long term? Sure it is. But when your team refuses to fight back, you're left with a different set of options.

Today's Estrado vote aside, please explain to me what the Democrats have done in the past two years that makes you proud to be a Democrat. People know what Republicans are, but anymore I don't think anyone has a clue what the Democrats stand for. The only people talking about a Democratic agenda are the Republicans, and they're just creating straw men to knock down. What is Kerry's vision for America? I'd really like to know.

I used to be a union guy.

Think about how unions evolved. It was the fight of the working people against the moneyed interests. They learned that there IS a way to fight against the overwhelming power of money and that way is to band together, form a coalition, stand as one, etc.

These are lessons that were learned they VERY HARD way! They were learned over time. They were learned in very tough battles that won decent wages, the 40 hour week, vacations, pensions, health care, worker safety and other worker protections that brought us a middle class and made America what it is today!

The word 'union' means everyone standing together because they are stronger standing together than if they split into small factions. 'Solidarity' is another union expression.

'Scab' is another union expression. A scab is someone who breaks ranks. A few people breaking ranks can cause EVERYONE to lose!

The Democratic Party has always been a coalition of factions banding together to fight for average people. The Naderites broke the coalition, and look what happened!!! We ALL need to learn from this!

You know, Mark, I find many of your posts quite interesting, despite the fact that I totally disagree with you on many, many points, but there was a point when you lost credibility:

"Tell me how Gore-Lieberman would have never
bowed to the Zionist lobby or pushed even harder
sanctions or even war on Iraq"

The "Zionist lobby" hasn't really existed since, well, about 1948. It was a movement to *create* the state of Israel, and a successful one at that. And it's bloody bad enough to be getting this anti-Semitic "the Jews control the world and f*** everything up anyways" rhetoric from the so-called Christian Right, do we really need it from the oh-so-concerned-about-human-suffering left?

As a radical Fabian ("wadda we want?") who is blessed with the option of voting in a system of proportional representation (although often horrified at the result), I think it instructive to reflect upon the actual numbers (as posted, I believe, by Erik Olsen) and wonder what the world would be like if one half of one tenth of one percent of Nader voters had had some elementary game theory in their educations.

--One tenth of one percent of Nader voters who lived in Florida and could predict a corrupt Supreme Court would trash its legitimacy with one breathtakingly stupid ruling. But we're kinda piercing a Veil of Ignorance on that one, aren't we.

Mark,

I'm not proud of current Democratic leadership, particularly in the last oh, 20 years. However, I truly enjoy having "Baghdad" Jim McDermott represent me in Congress. He may engage in some grandstanding sure, but at this point I appreciate anyone with a D behind their name doing some agitating.

To me, however, which Democrat does what is almost besides the point. I am nearly diametrically opposed to just about every single GOP plank. I do not agree with their "vision" of America and see that it's imperative to thwart implementation of the GOP's policy wishlist.

On the subject what the Dems should be doing to re-build, I would like to see them get down on traditional real policy issues, and sell people on it by *fighting* the mean spirited right wing jabberers. Nothing gets me so stoked as to see some proper leftie fury let loose on someone who just dittoheads GOP talking points.

What a coherent thread. There are actually Naderites here towards which I don't have a gut-wrenching visceral reaction which makes me want smash my computer screen. My monitor is most grateful.

That said, I find the tone of utter disrespect towards Gore somewhat interesting. Considering that Naderites tend to claim an anti-establishment ethos, I would think that Naderites wouldn't swallow the conventional media-spun load of horseshit that says that Gore is a sell-out liar to corporate interests, and that he has no balls and that he can't run a campaign well (since when did that become your standard for judging whether somewhat is fit for governing, Naderites?). I would think you would seek more independent outlets for your news, and recognize that Gore played a critical role in resolving the conflict in the Balkans (he was the most hawkish member of the administration, to his great credit), had a great record on the environment, and generally led an honorable life with little deception but little charisma.

I would think that for you guys, charisma wouldn't be a criteria for office. As in, you wouldn't say things like Gore's such a loser, like the Democrats, and I won't vote for L-O-S-E-R-S who can't hold their own states (what the fuck does that make Nader, btw?). I guess if we had a third, fourth, fifth, or eighth party, none of this would be an issue.

I'm proud, damn proud, of being a Democrat, with all the accomplishments of the past century and the great accomplishments we're going to get to in the next. We are winners and we are right. Despite setbacks over the past 25 years, we live in a largely liberal society, and we can and will take back the momentum in 2004.

Anyway, I hope that Naderites come home to the Democratic Party. If not, well, I wish you luck working on your perpetual motion machines.

I just took blueberry muffins out of the oven and there's fresh coffee. If everyone's gonna be up all night again hashing this thing out so we can win next time, you're all welcome to come over.

Jeez, this guy has more farewell tours than Frank Sinatra. What the heck. As they used to say on the Well: Lawn chair!

"Would things be better if Gore was POTUS? You tell me. [...] I look forward to reading about the utopia Gore would have given us."

Yes, these discussions have been just chock-full of people claiming that Al Gore would have brought us a utopian society.

"Gore was not a winner. Ferchrissakes he won the popular vote and still lost. In my book that spells L*O*S*E*R....[P]lease explain to me what the Democrats have done in the past two years that makes you proud to be a Democrat."

You talk about politics like it's high school football. Here in the grown-up world, with which you are evidently unacquainted, we make many of our choices based not on what makes our chests fill with School Pride, but rather on which alternative must be avoided at all costs.

Of course one wants better choices. And one gets those by avoiding actions which bring an end to all choice. Most people figure this out sometime in childhood.

Kip Manley says "I myself have never said 'Things have to get worse before they get better.'" Probably not. (I quite like Kip Manley and his fine weblog.) But Nader certainly has, at various times and in various ways.

Depending on his audience, Nader has been pretty blunt about his intention, which is to destroy the Democratic Party.

Which is why I took umbrage to Mary Kay Kare's statement to being nice to potential allies that we might need.

The Green Party, in the US, is not an ally. They proudly weakened the Democrats in 2000, and they have stated that will, of course, do so again. If there is an election in 2004, the Democratic Party needs to count only losing some small percentage to the Greens, and needs to decide what action to take based on that.

Erik,

I think the Democratic Party will not have to worry about the Greens if they can motivate their core voters to turn up in November. I hope that they'll make use of Bush's mistakes and not try to pull any punches, because they're going to need to throw down to get their voters excited again. Gore and company were far too genteel. Given Gore's treatment by the media, I was surprised that he seemed so bloodless and passive about it, which only served to dishearten a lot of people.

The Greens are finished. Exit polls in 2000 suggested that the Clinton scandals were the reason most Green voters abandoned the Democratic Party. It was not a vote against the Democratic Party, per se.

Indeed, one can only marvel at the kind of people who can excoriate the Democrats for their supposed lack of fighting spirit, while at the same time explaining why it's right to work to defeat Democrats. So as to, you understand, build a better and truer "progressive movement."

Again, this is the logic of abuse: I'm hurting you, but it's for your own good. This does not exactly reduce my chronic suspicion that Naderism, far from being anchored in humane values, is actually at root a kind of bullying and power-worship.

There's nothing wrong with being opposed to the Democratic Party. But doing so while blithering about how Democrats shouldn't be beastly to Naderites simply beggars belief. Evidently, Democrats are contemptible L*O*S*E*Rs who don't fight back, but if Democrats act ticked off at people who work for the defeat of Democrats, then they're big meanies.

It certainly is a wonderful thing.

Patrick, you need to translate that WELL idiom in full: Pull up a lawn chair, pop a cold one, and sit back to watch the show.

Stefan, I've been assuming for years, just based on my own observations, that self-righteous indignation is a high. The shorthand term Patrick and I use for it is "cheap glow". A lot of people obviously find it attractive. I figure it's one of the reasons they listen to Limbaugh. I also figure it's why some political websites -- mostly right-wing, some left -- have taken to having an "instant outrage" feature for the rats who can't wait to press the lever and get their pellet. I've also noticed that the outrage-generating texts have been making less and less sense, as both parties to the transaction move toward the complicit admission that one participant just wants his shot of anger, and is willing to cede his judgement to the other in return for it.

If you follow Dante's schema, those who indulge their taste for a buzz of anger will wind up in the fifth circle, the marshes of Styx, with the wrathful and sullen; while those who supply them will be in the eighth circle with the false counselors and the sowers of discord.

Vachon, thanks for the muffins. The virtual sort are all I can eat these days.

Oh, and Mark? I didn't insist that you stay. I said you were a wuss for announcing your departure the way you did.

>Oh, and Mark? I didn't insist that you stay. I said you
>were a wuss for announcing your departure the way
>you did.

Ha.

There are many reasons I like my friend.

Erik: Take issue with Nader all you like; I am completely unfond of him myself. But the people who voted for him, for whatever reason, can be our allies if we don't run them off.

So are you pissed at my idea here or me in general?

MKK

Whether or not folks who felt it best to vote Green in 2000 still feel that the Democratic Party has lost its way, I hope that they vote for Democratic candidates in 2004. The Executive is clearly in the hands of a group with an agenda for closed government, increased police power, and making war in the world; this group may not even truly represent the Republican Party, and they certainly don't represent you.

While you may feel that the Democratic Party doesn't represent you well either, and even that some Democrats are heaping undeserve opprobrium on you, getting the current gang out of power needs to be a priority if there is to be anything left to be Green about. If you feel that things have to get worse before they get better: they've already gotten worse, and they will get worse still by 2004. Cast your vote, and give your time, to working on the "getting better" part of the process in 2004.

Let's see if we Nader voters and you angry Democrats can agree on something.
Bush is an unmitigated disaster.
There. Are we agreed?
OK. What happened happened. We have another election coming up.
One of the likely Democratic nominees is Joe Lieberman, a man who wholeheartedly supports Bush's war-to-be.
Are you going to vote for him if he's nominated?
I threw out this question before and got no takers.
I will say that Lieberman had something to do with my ultimately rejecting Gore in favor of Nader, something I thought long and hard about--though, again, I live in NY and had the luxury of knowing Gore would win my state anyway.
And you know, most of Gore supporters I tried to talk to about it reacted in much the angry tone I'm hearing here.
All right, what now?

"Bush is an unmitigated disaster. There. Are we agreed?"

Heck, I'm an anarchist who thinks libertarians are too fond of government -- making me less welcome in this company than an ant at a picnic. But "Bush is an unmitigated disaster?" That's easy. One takes one's common ground where one can find it.

I've been reading this whole "Nader Voter" set of discussions with deep fascination. In the market anarchist caverns where I hang out, there's frequent discussion of whether our electoral distaste for Republicans is electing Democrats, who are viewed as even worse. The view that their disastrousness is roughly equivalent is an unpopular minority in our unpopular minority. I never realized before now that at least part of the Nader faction was animated by the same view, or perhaps a perverse mirror image of it.

Not being an American, the niceties of your election system may be confusing me but:

From where I'm sitting, it looks like the time in the system for this argument is when you are picking your candidate. That's when you hash this out and decide on a centrist, a progressive, a chimp or whatever.

Once that is settled, it makes no tactical sense to split the vote to protest at the candidate chosen. That fight is over until the next selection process, and the job is to help your guy beat their guy.

No?

The whole "hold your nose and vote for the least bad of the two" reminds me of the most recent French presidential election...

Robert, I'm still an outsider with respect to US party politics, but at least in the instance you've brought up my thinking is along the lines Niall mentions.

What can individuals do towards keeping Lieberman from becoming a candidate on the Democratic ticket?

In the last presidential election, I voted for Gore while my fiance voted for Nader. I was extremely upset with him when Bush won, I couldn't see his views on how his vote had counted at all. After the last campaign here in Massachusetts, I could see his view- don't vote against the person you want to lose, vote for who you think is the most qualified candidate. I voted Green in the last election for governor. I knew that Romney would probably count my vote as *for* him and against O'Brien if he won. I also gave a protest vote against Senator Kerry. He had no competition, so I showed my anger at his support of the war by writing in a protest nominee. I didn't think Kerry was a worthy candidate. I didn't think Romney or O'Brien were worthy candidates. I thought Jill Stein was the best candidate for governor. I thought Kerry needed to see what his constituents thought of his actions. I am so torn about the next elections. I refuse to vote for Bush. I don't like any of the Democratic candidates thus far. If a third party candidate were to pop up, I don't know if I would vote for that candidate, or just try to keep Bush out in any way possible. I want to vote for the best, but I may vote against the worst.

Just my $.02. :)

Kerrie

What can individuals do towards keeping Lieberman from becoming a candidate on the Democratic ticket?Send money to the campaign of a viable alternative. My own guess is that that's probably Edwards.

"Oh, and Mark? I didn't insist that you stay. I said you were a wuss for announcing your departure the way you did."

Yeah, you sure got me -- fooled me completely. I really thought you wanted me to stay. And I've certainly gotten the fisking I deserved (and, in true Instapundit fashion, it was a VERY selective fisking).

For most of the folks here, this will clearly always be about Nader, and will never be about the Democratic Party. Good news for the party, I'd hate to see them have to change or take a stance or try to mobilize their base or anything.

Thank god the Democratic Party is comprised of more reasonable people than the posters here. Democratic gatherings can get fairly boisterous but there are lines, and in my thirty years of rank and file party work NO ONE ever called me a scab before (probably because no one in their right mind would ever tell a union man that to their face, especially not in a place where alcohol is being served).

I added Electrolite to my bookmarks because I was impressed by the intellectual nature of the comment threads I sampled. Boy did I misread that one. I've never seen such a lynch mob mentality -- Nader did it, get him, get him! Hardly any posts responding to questions about the Democratic Party. Joe Stalin should have had such faithful adherents.

I have postered, leafleted, stuffed envelopes, marched, written letters to the editor, appeared in tv commercials, spoken at meetings, worked plant gates, run phone banks, turned out the vote, and cleaned up afterwards. But somewhere along the line my party changed. It took me years to figure it out. Then I read some old notebooks from twenty years ago and realized that my political views were consistent with where they had always been. It wasn't me that had changed, it was the party. And, as a result, in a state that Gore safely won, I voted for Nader.

Posters here seem to view that as treason, or faulty reasoning at a minimum. I thought of it as an intervention, a wake up call for a party drunk on corporate donations and severely compromised by pro-business legislation. And I still think the party is broken. Who in the Democratic Party speaks truth to power? Nah, I forgot. You folks don't answer questions like that, you just assign blame. And -- just guessing here -- I'll bet you haven't stuffed many envelopes either.

Those of us old enough to remeber Vietnam remeber destroying villages in order to save them. Who would have thought that the Nadarite left would apply this technique to our own country?

Mary Kay: But the people who voted for him, for whatever reason, can be our allies if we don't run them off.

But a large number of people who voted for him will not be our allies, period. That's my point. Matter of fact...

The are times when the Democrats need to look at those who are repeatedly stabbing them in the back and say "Go To Hell." I'm all for inclusive, I'm even all for being respectful. But when those you are trying to be inclusive of keep directly attacking you, it's time to quit being nice to them, look them in the eye, and tell them just how full of it they are.

And, that what the Green Party of the US is. They've decided (Go look at thier web page) that the Democratic Party is as much an enemy to them as the GOP.

That's fine. They have every right to do so. But I'm not cutting them the least bit of slack. I don't care if they are Green or GOP or just another member of the press telling another lie about Gore. I do agree with Mark there -- there are times when the Democratic Party need to fight.

And one of them is when the Greens attempt to snipe off Democratic candidates -- esp. when those candidates are incredibly closely aligned with thier goals. Paul Wellstone was far more Green, by word and deed, than Ralph Nader. They chose to try and unseat him anyway.

As to those who voted for Nader as a protest. That's fine. You need to decide which is more important to you -- attempting to make the Democratic Party "more progressive", or getting Bush out of office. If the latter, I'm willing to work with you. If the former, I am not.

There are real problems with the Dems. This is not the time to be addressing them -- and the answer is not "Destroy it and let the enemy keep the city" -- which is what voting for the Greens is an explicit declaration of.

So are you pissed at my idea here or me in general?

The idea, of course.

Then again, when you see things like this you can certainly understand why the Greens would be angry at the Dems. I certainly am.

However, will it be any better if you unseat those Democrats, and allow the GOP to capture those seats? Were these Dems making a (unwise, dangerous) comprimise, or were they just GOP in disguise?

That's a really important point. We're 9 senators away from having *no* progressive voice, at all, in the Federal Government. None. They pass what they want, sign what they want, rule what they want constitutional. There is a small voice still in DC, stopping the worst.

Do you really want to take that away right now?

Actually, Mark, I don't view anything you've done or said as treason, since I tend to reserve that word for people who betray the country and/or its Constitution (Oliver North, Dubya). You've had a right to say everything, and vote for whomever you wanted to.

I for one don't even blame you for Bush's election. Your vote was in a firmly-Gore state, and under those circumstances a protest vote is a reasonable thing to do (so see, not even faulty reaoning).

On the other hand, you've also said you're still glad Gore lost, and that if (if?) we invade Iraq, you'll regret your Nader vote until your dying day. The first statement makes you a de facto Bush supporter, which means you're the enemy, politically speaking (doesn't mean I'd throw wine in your face at a party though). The second makes no sense: why regret a meaningless symbolic act (since your state was firmly in Gore's grip) because of a contingency it did not and could not affect? That's a place where your reasoning is faulty.

It's also faulty if you disagree that being glad Gore won is equivalent to being a Bush supporter. There were no other possibilities; a Gore loss was exactly equivalent to a Bush win.

To directly answer a question: no, you're correct. No one in the Democratic Party speaks truth to power. I'm not real fond of the Republican-lite version of the DP that we're seeing these days.

But guess what? I'm not tremendously enchanted with my job, either. I'd much rather be a rock star. But I don't quit my job and go try to be a rock star (or even a science fiction writer) because my job is the best I can do right now. It's fairly well optimized for living in the real world. I'm hopelessly mired in the real world, I realize. (I had an opportunity to leave it permanently, but I slept late that day. No regrets.)

So I'll keep going to work at this huge faceless corporation, and voting for the leftmost candidate who has a chance, and working, in my slow way, to get a better job/life/world. If your choice is different, ache ache. But you're not an ally unless you take the real world action that leads toward the same goals I have.

It's really that simple.

Damn. "Being glad Gore lost," of course I meant.

"And, that what the Green Party of the US is. They've decided (Go look at thier web page) that the Democratic Party is as much an enemy to them as the GOP."

And if Democrats support Bush's war, and the choice next election is 2 pro-war candidates, why is that not so? (not saying that will happen, but it's at least a distinct possibility).

Mark,

Just to quickly dispense with a question that might occur to you: yes, we've met. I interviewed for a job with you back in 1994. It was an interesting interview. We mutually agreed I wasn't a good fit for the job. None of this is relevant, actually, but it can be infuriating to wonder if this is someone you know.

As for the thread, it sure looks like you're not living in the same world or reading the same words as I am. I'm not much of a volunteer, when it comes to politics. I don't even believe that governments are real, for heavens sake. But because of the 2000 election, because of how angry I am with the Greens, and how terrified I am of Bush, I've been trying to do a little party volunteering.

Over the course of the last 10 years, I've been changing my mind about party loyalty. I used to think that being an independent was a great virtue, and letting the party tell me what to do or who to vote for was irresponsible. I'm coming to understand that, warts and all, the Democratic Party is the closest thing I have to a political home in the US today. It's a very dysfunctional home, and the roof leaks, but if we do not hang together, we shall surely all hang separately. There is power in solidarity, even if one has to embrace knaves and fools sometimes.

For most of the folks here, this will clearly always be about Nader, and will never be about the Democratic Party. Good news for the party, I'd hate to see them have to change or take a stance or try to mobilize their base or anything.

This is so completely opposite of what I, or Erik Olson, or most of the other commentators have said that it leaves me reeling. What on earth? I've noticed a number of people, myself included, arguing that what we do _next_ is mobilize the base, get involved in the party, and work. One of the things that we need to work on is making sure the Green Party can't ever stab us in the back, again.

You've said several times that Minnesota was safely Gore's, which is why you could vote for Nader. We did go for Gore, but I never felt it was safe. I think you took more of a risk than you admit.

An answer to Michael's statement that there hasn't been a Zionist lobby since 1948: I was going to say this is technically true, but I don't think it's even that. There are people in this country who take the position that do not accept the current borders of Israel -- not because the borders are too large (or exist at all) but because the borders are too small. (I was recently reminded of the reported Arab maps that call Israel's location "Occupied Palestine", or don't even distinguish it at all from Arab territory, at a nearby Jewish school; the outline on their atrium wall was clearly Israel plus the West Bank.) The Zionist movement said that Jews should have part of the Middle East; the current form argues that Israel is entitled to more than it got in 1948.

It may be stretching to call them "a lobby", but there are clearly pressure groups (with suitably lying names: "Committee for Accuracy on Middle East Reporting in America", "Facts and Logic About the Middle East") whose primary action is to attack anyone who suggests there are rights and wrongs on both sides of the Middle East conflict. Their particular target locally has been WBUR, which takes all the NPR talk feeds, originates some of its own, and relays a couple of hours of BBC news progamming (which really riles CAMERA -- the BBC asks everybody hardball questions and has reported the death and devastation on both sides.) The result has been a considerable loss of funding for what I consider the best broadcast news in greater Boston (at least).

Then of course there's A(merican)I(srael)PAC; they aren't as savage as CAMERA, but they have a clear position in favor of the unrealistic demands of Sharon et al. (e.g., absolute peace before negotiations begin -- cf Dubya on dealing with North Korea). Is a PAC not a lobby?

And a thought for people who believe they're in "safe" states: 8 years after being the only state to go for McGovern, Massachusetts went to Reagan in 1980. I don't remember whether Anderson got his largest percentage here, but I do recall it being in double digits.

This discussion hasn't much covered the fact that barely half the eligible voters turn out even for a presidential election. Nader and Buchanan voters can point to the uptick in participation in 2000, claiming they brought the disgusted to the polls instead of taking votes away from the majors, but that's debatable -- and they certainly didn't excite more than a tiny fraction of the non-participants. Certainly the Democrats have been doing more to make voting easier for everyone than the Republicans have (cf "motor voter"), but more than zero is easy.
(Or even less-than-zero, cf not just the mangling of the rolls in Florida but Republican mailings in Southern California about the penalties for vote fraud.) It's easy to say "fight back against lies", but surveys suggest that people quit voting because of the high noise/nastiness level of campaigns. Do the Nader supporters on this list really believe that the Democrats can win by moving left without a charismatic candidate who can also hold the center? Absent this, what to do? (And where? -- how productive is it either to work at home in the "safe" states where a lot of this list seems to live or to travel to campaign in more closely divided states that may be suspicious of outsiders?) (Let's not talk about electoral college reform; there are too many overpowered pseudo-frontier states for that horse to run.)

Lydia- you said, "One of the things that we need to work on is making sure the Green Party can't ever stab us in the back, again."

I don't think the Green Party- or any third party- is a back-stabbing issue. If I remember correctly, there were 2 presidents who were third party candidates- Roosevelt (Progressive) and Abraham Lincoln (Republican- yes, it was originally a minor party).

Two things that the Green party has been promoting, which I don't think are any sort of evidence of back-stabbing, are Clean Elections and Instant Runoff Voting. If all candidates were given an equal chance at being heard, if all voters knew who the candidates were and their positions, and if we were allowed to enumerate our preferences, perhaps we could be better represented?

Just a few thoughts. :)

Kerrie

For more info:

http://www.instantrunoff.com/

http://www.free-market.net/directorybytopic/campaignfinance/

Here is one registered Democrat who will raise his hand and say that, if he is not convinced to change his current understanding of the candidates, he would not vote for Joe Lieberman next year. (I hope this is not because Lieberman is Jewish. I did vote for him for VP, when I did not know so much about him, but I did know he was Jewish. I hope I'm voting against him because his positions and his attitude repel me.)

To answer Niall's and Bob Webber's question, I intend to express this opinion by supporting other candidates now, and voting for one when the time comes. I haven't yet decided among them. I expect the choice is really rather out of my hands, as I live in neither Iowa nor New Hampshire, nor am I gifted with the ability to make large donations.

But if Lieberman is nominated anyway, will I line up behind him, as a loyal Democrat?

Unless my opinions change, no. I'm not a loyal Democrat. I support them because almost all the candidates I consider both good and electable are Democrats. If a candidate is not good, I have no obligation to support him.

I think it was Lydia who said that the lesser of two evils is still lesser. Yes, and the lesser of two evils is also still evil. In some cases, the lesser takes precedence; in other cases, it's the evil. We must each decide for ourselves which is which - so I cannot summon up a righteous fury against those who chose Nader over Gore, even though I made the opposite decision.

The practical balance between the parties is also a factor, as Xopher pointed out.

As for Mark, he's still living in a different timeline than I am: he's reading a thread full of anti-Nader vengeance; I'm seeing only one or two people saying that besides PNH, who repented of it.

Concerning the comments about a Zionist lobby, I suggest to Chip and Michael that they read Michael Kinsley's article in Slate a couple days ago (I can't link to it because Slate appears to be hosed at the moment), and ask them if they consider what he describes there to be a Zionist lobby.

To answer Chip's factual query about Anderson in 1980: In Massachusetts, Reagan had 41.9% of the vote; Carter had 41.7%; Anderson had 15.2%. (Figures from the World Almanac via Excel.) This was, I believe, Anderson's highest percentage. Clearly, it would have taken only a few Anderson voters to have turned the state to Carter. However, this was not the case nationwide: Reagan won too many states by outright majorities, and all the Anderson voters in the country would not have been sufficient to turn enough states to Carter.

OMNES: I came to Electrolite this morning ready to to rant and rave and scream about how we're headed to hell in a handbasket and all y'all were doing was trying to upset the handbasket. Imagine my astonishment at reading mostly reasonable, or at least calm, posts added since I gave up and went to bed last night. Maybe it's me; maybe it's that there's finally some sun in the grey Seattle sky; maybe Mercury is no longer retrograde. Whatever. I'm feeling grateful I don't have to apologize to Patrick for ever attempting to convince him Comments were a good idea.

ERIK: Thanks, I appreciate it. Come see Seattle soon.

MKK

Kerrie wrote,

"If I remember correctly, there were 2 presidents who were third party candidates- Roosevelt (Progressive) and Abraham Lincoln (Republican- yes, it was originally a minor party)."

Alas, no. T. Roosevelt was elected as VP in 1900 and President in 1904 as candidate of the Republican Party. He lost when he ran as a 3rd-party candidate in 1912, though he did outpoll the Republican (the only time since the party's founding that they've been pushed into 3rd place.)

Nor was Lincoln a 3rd-party candidate in 1860. The Republicans had already moved by 1856 into the vacuum left by the demise of the Whigs as the other major party. Most Northern Whigs had joined the Republicans (and some former Democrats, too, like 1856 presidential nominee John Fremont and 1860 VP nominee Hannibal Hamlin); it was other Whigs, like ex-president Fillmore, who jumped to the Know-Nothings and the Constitutional Unionists who found themselves reduced to 3rd-party status.

Simon-

Thank you most kindly for the correction- I guess I can't trust everything I read these days. If only the internet made things more reliable instead of less. ;)

Sugarplum dreams,

Kerrie

Simon, two questions:

1) So if Lieberman is nominated, and runs as the Democratic candidate against Bush, we should be no worse off were we to stick with the presently-office-holding evil with whom we are graced?

2)"(I hope this is not because Lieberman is Jewish. I did vote for him for VP, when I did not know so much about him, but I did know he was Jewish. I hope I'm voting against him because his positions and his attitude repel me.)"

But you don't know for sure?

Mark, you and I share the desire of having the Democrats move left. But not only is the method you've chosen very harmful in the short run, it's also not likely to accomplish your goal in the long run.

The cold, hard political reality is this: For every vote the Democrats lose from the middle, they have to pick up two votes on the left just to break even.

This is reality: If the Democrats move far enough to the left to pick up Nader's 2.8% of the vote, and they lose even just 1.5% from the middle, that is a net loss for the party.

Now, if the Democrats moved far enough to the left to pick up Nader's 2.8%, would they lose 1.5% from the middle?

No. They would lose much, much more than that. At least 5%, but maybe even as much as 10%.

If the Dems ran on the Green party's dream platform, Bush would win with 53-55% of the vote, minimum. If the Democratic candidate carried 10 states, it would be a miracle.

And by running third-party spoiler candidates, what you're actually doing is insuring that the Dems will move to the right.

Looking at the last election results - Bush 48%, Gore 48%, Nader 3% - the Dems have two choices.

1) They can move to the left and try to get Nader's 3%

OR

2) They can move to the right and try to peel some of that 48% off Bush.

Now, given that the Greens have shown that they're an extremely fickle and willful bunch who were willing to turn on Paul Wellstone on the basis of a single vote he cast, which option do you think will sound more attractive to the Dems? Especially considering that they know that trying to get Nader's 3% will cost them more votes from the middle than they can afford to lose?

The Dems simply cannot run liberal candidates in national elections and win. We tried it in 1984 and 1988 and got slaughtered both times. How many more electoral drubbings will it take before you get the message? A majority of voters simply will not support a leftist platform. I don't know how to put it any more simply than that.

The problem with the far left is they have no idea how to be a minority party. It sucks being on the fringe because all you ever get to do is pull. But they forget that if they stop pulling, things move even further to the right.

Something that occurred to me last night:

I wouldn't mind seeing Nader as Attourney General.

At this point I wouldn't mind seeing Mortimer Snerd as Attorney General.

William Henderson wants the Democrats to move to the right.

Haven't they already done that? Aren't most of the Democratic candidates craven apologists for Bush's appalling war and economic policies? How far to the right do you want them to go? Didn't Harry Truman say, "If you give voters a choice between a Republican and a Republican, they'll pick the Republican every time."

At the same time, you're right in saying that trying to go after people who picked Nader over Gore is probably hopeless.

So instead of trying to become either Greens or Republicans, maybe the Democrats should try being Democrats for a change. It's worth a try, don't you think?

Jack Womack asks me two questions:

1) We'd probably be worse off under Bush than under Lieberman. I can't be sure. But based on what I know of Lieberman today, I think we'd be bad off enough that I'd refuse to take the responsibility of helping put him into office.

This is one of those cases where I judge the lesser of two evils to be more evil than lesser. I wouldn't vote for Bush unless the only other candidate were, I dunno, David Duke. I don't think I'd vote for Lieberman. I'd look for a 3rd party candidate.

That's what I did in 1980. I'd never vote for Reagan. I gave up on Carter. So I voted for Anderson, and I'm still proud of it. (I went to hear him speak just last year.)

2) One likes to think one is not prejudiced. But after seeing numerous prominent people disclaim holding various sorts of prejudice, while showing obvious signs of it which no outside observer can miss, the wise person will be cautious in claiming complete freedom (sorry, complete French) from any unconscious ignoble motives.

(Re my second paragraph above: Have I been reading Avedon Carol? Yes.)

I never said I WANT the Dems to move right. I simply said that that's the only real option the Green party spoiler campaign has left them.

Look at it this way. If Nader's 3% joins Gore's 48%, the Dems are at 51% and they don't need to move right. They might even be able to move a tiny little bit to the left.

But with Nader's 3% backing a third-party candidate, the Dems are stuck at 48%, which loses to the Republicans 48% because of the Republican advantage in the electoral college.

So if the Dems want to pick up more votes, they have two choices: move left, or move right. Moving right is more effective because they're taking votes away from the Republican candidate at the same time they're picking them up for their candidate.

So, a seperate Green electoral strategy will not push the Dems to the left, as many Greens seem to believe it will. It will, in fact, push the Dems to the right - because that is the most natural and logical response to the situation.

If the Greens want to move the Dems to the left, the way to do it is for them to join the party and change it from within. That is, after all, how the conservatives were able to move the Republicans so far to the right.

I still can't believe that so many Greens can't see this. It seems like the most obvious thing in the world.

William, you're playing a zero-sum game. Voters aren't so many blocks that you can push around and add up in confidence that they'll stay where you put them.

I think most of the Greens around here will tell you that they tried the change-from-within thing. Whether you agree with them or not, there are reasons one might give that up. And the Greens really do have a strategy, it's just that, being individualists, they don't always follow it.

That's because you're treating it as a zero-sum game, Mr. Henderson, ignoring a large and untrammelled pool of votes: those who just haven't been voting, for one reason or another--though it would not be utterly off the wall to posit that it's largely because they feel (in one way or another) that the current system has failed them.

Nor do you take into account the prevailing media bias--real and quite demonstrable--which helps maintain such surrealistically frustrating circumstances as (warning! Utterly unsubstantiated 3-year-old memory cited as fact ahead!) polls from the 2000 elections which showed 60% of Americans favoring Gore's positions over Bush's, but 60% of Americans leaning towards voting for Gore over Bush.

Nor do you take into account the profoundly cynical nature of the advice you offer. I am aware that politics is the art of compromise, and one must win before one can do something; nonetheless, one must also stand for something. Moving rightward to chase votes just to hold power merely to keep things from sliding even further rightward is ugly and unsatisfying and starts to smell real bad after a point. That's hardly a fair summation of every Democrat's intent and strategy, no. But it's a fair summation of the overall national thrust, so far. And working from within to change an organization that's actively destroying the things you want to protect can be difficult, for some.

Look. I don't know what the answers are. We are indeed in a crisis situation; there's nobody on the planet who could have predicted how bad things would get back in 2000. (Gallantly bitter proclamations of contradiction heightening aside.) --At the same time, the logic of a crisis is seductive: there will always be some reason we can't do what needs to be done; always. The Democratic party on a national level does not inspire me. It does not work towards my goals (which may be unworkable and utopian and foolish and ill-thought-out, but that's an argument for another day; I have my goals, and I look for the best means I have and can determine to bring them about, in my own bumbling way). I do not know who I will vote for in 2004, but chances are better than even that whomever the Democrats nominate will have a lock on Oregon's electoral votes over Bush. Therefore, there's a better than even chance I will be voting for someone else. (What's up with the New Party? I know here in Oregon they're sorta fellow-travellers with the Pacific Greens, and they're doing a fusion play in those states that allow fusion voting, but are they doing anything else much anywhere? Anyone?)

Of course, there's an eternity between now and then. I reserve the right to be pleasantly surprised, being that there's many a slip 'twixt cup and lip.

That, at any rate, is what seems obvious to me.

Gack. Should have been "60% of Americans leaning towards voting for Bush over Gore."

But y'all probably figured that out. You're smart that way. (Insert black bitter joke about Gush and Bore, and the differences between.)

Oh, I understand that the political climate can and does change. But as the political climate stands in America today, a candidate that is too far to the left simply cannot win a national election. We saw that in 1984 and again in 1988. The only way to beat Bush is to form a center-left coalition.

And for people who want to focus on long-term change, I would ask, how long do we wait? There are people out there who don't need help in 25 or 50 years - they need help now. The minimum wage is too low. The last time the EITC was expanded was when Clinton first took office. And on and on. And it's because the right has had its way for far too long.

How long do we wait? Do we wait until there are 7 justices to the right of Scalia and Thomas and under the age of 50 on the Supreme Court? Do we wait until 80% of the federal bench is made up of Federalist Society members with lifetime appointments? Do we wait until the Constitution isn't even worth the paper it's printed on anymore?

How bad do things have to get before the Greens will acknowledge reality?

k, trying to chase a majority out among non-voters is a fool's errand. Historically, there are people who vote, and people who don't vote, and every study I've seen says the non-voters' political leanings are pretty much divided exactly the same way as the people who do vote.

There is no legion of progressive non-voters out there ready to ride to the rescue. We have to play the hand we're dealt. The American electorate, by and large, leans conservative. They don't lean anywhere near as far to the right as the current administration, mind you, but they do lean right nonetheless. You and I may not like that fact, but ignoring it won't do us any good.

Clinton was able to win twice because the right was divided and because he was able to build a center-left coalition. We should be looking to his campaigns for a model, not spurning them and saying everything will be fine if we just move to the left. If that means we have to write off Nader's 3%, so be it. Going after the 10% of moderate voters who sided with Bush last time will probably be a lot easier and more productive anyway.

Someone HAS to stop the right in this country. If the left won't do it, it's up to the middle. Just don't be surprised if, when it's all said and done, the left has excluded itself from any and all political debate in this country.

Why is it only the Greens to have to "acknowledge reality"? Why can't some of the purportedly sane people who voted for Bush (they can't all be as crazy as he, surely?), perhaps ones who were fooled by his campaign rhetoric, be the ones who have to acknowledge reality? Then the Democrats wouldn't have to turn themselves into Republicans to get them.

Kip. Simon. I have been following this argument since 1968, when nine-year-old me was passionately for Eugene McCarthy. (My father and I went to see him arrive at Sky Harbor Airport, then we went to a big fundraising dinner at which he spoke. It was my introduction to electoral politics. I've had the bug ever since.)

So that's, um, thirty-five years. Humphrey, McGovern, Carter, Mondale, Dukakis, Clinton, and the calamity of 2000.

And what I have to say about this argument is: William Henderson is right. He doesn't want the Democratic Party to move to the right, and yes, it sucks that it's Greens who have to "acknowledge reality" and not brain-dead Bush supporters. Guess what. Reality is reality, and he's right and it's too bad and this is the fucking lay of the land. And the moment we start working with it instead of whining about how unfair it is will be the moment we start getting somewhere, rather than watching all hope go down the toilet.

Henderson:

The only way to beat Bush is to form a center-left coalition.

There is no legion of progressive non-voters out there ready to ride to the rescue. We have to play the hand we're dealt.

This doesn't mean we have to dance to the DLC's tune. Be creative. There are more possibilities in these hard truths than Al From has divined. For crying out loud.

But it is the truth, and the longer you ignore it, the worse the damage is going to be. How much are you willing to spend? How many other people's lives?

> Mark Gisleson posted on March 14, 2003 10:27 AM:
>
> > "Oh, and Mark? I didn't insist that you stay. I said you were a
> > wuss for announcing your departure the way you did."
>
> Yeah, you sure got me -- fooled me completely. I really thought
> you wanted me to stay.

You're welcome to stay. But if you do, it's by your own choice, not at my command.

Yes, I do think it's wussy to get your last licks in, announce that you're now going to leave, and then stick around anyway to see what everyone says. How did I know you were sticking around? I didn't. I knew it was a good bet. People who go to all the trouble of making and writing out an argument, and make a big deal about how they're leaving, usually can't stand not knowing how their routines are playing with the audience. Not always, of course. But if I'd been wrong, my remarks would have been wasted on the empty air. You made yourself their proper recipient by coming back to hear them.

> And I've certainly gotten the fisking I
> deserved (and, in true Instapundit fashion, it was a VERY
> selective fisking).

Selective? Please. You're not unusual enough to warrant it. What actually happened: People disagreed with your statements, not on ideological grounds, but because they found less merit in them than you did. Some of them made statements in return which you found uncongenial. I don't see your grounds for complaint. If you bolt both wings onto the same side of your airplane, it isn't selective persecution that makes you crash.

Please take this as information, not unkindness, but you don't come off as morally superior when you sit back and say pettishly that you don't like this and don't like that about the Democratic Party, tsk tsk tsk, simply not good enough. Politics aren't a lifestyle accessory where you get to turn up your nose at when they fail to exactly match your tastes. Elections are about getting candidates elected. The ones who wind up in office have a lot more power than the ones who don't. Politics are realtime. Bad officials make bad policies, and real people suffer as a result of them. If you've helped engineer an electoral outcome that puts bad people in office, you've done a bad thing.

> Thank god the Democratic Party is comprised of more reasonable
> people than the posters here. Democratic gatherings can get fairly
> boisterous but there are lines, and in my thirty years of rank and
> file party work NO ONE ever called me a scab before (probably
> because no one in their right mind would ever tell a union man
> that to their face, especially not in a place where alcohol is
> being served).

No one's called you a scab. I have no idea where that comes in.

> I added Electrolite to my bookmarks because I was impressed by the
> intellectual nature of the comment threads I sampled. Boy did I
> misread that one. I've never seen such a lynch mob mentality --

Heavens, such drama. You need to get out more. Has no one ever disagreed with you before?

> Nader did it, get him, get him! Hardly any posts responding to
> questions about the Democratic Party. Joe Stalin should have had
> such faithful adherents.

Now you're being rude. Inaccurate, too.

> I have postered, leafleted, stuffed envelopes, marched, written
> letters to the editor, appeared in tv commercials, spoken at
> meetings, worked plant gates, run phone banks, turned out the
> vote, and cleaned up afterwards. But somewhere along the line my
> party changed. It took me years to figure it out. Then I read some
> old notebooks from twenty years ago and realized that my political
> views were consistent with where they had always been. It wasn't
> me that had changed, it was the party. And, as a result, in a
> state that Gore safely won, I voted for Nader.
>
> Posters here seem to view that as treason,

Nope. Nobody's said anything of the kind.

> or faulty reasoning at a minimum.

That, yes.

> I thought of it as an intervention, a wake up call for
> a party drunk on corporate donations and severely compromised by
> pro-business legislation.

Bush is a mighty opponent of corporate donations and pro-business legislation, you betcha.

> And I still think the party is broken.
> Who in the Democratic Party speaks truth to power?

Speaking truth to power is the especial purview of saints and prophets, though I believe everyone has the responsibility to do it once in a while. However, it is not a substitute for effective action when effective action is an available option.

> Nah, I forgot. You folks don't answer questions
> like that, you just assign blame.

I'm starting to think that addressing the participants here as "you folks" is a marker for a certain kind of rudeness.

I'm also starting to think you're not just here for the hunting.

> And -- just guessing here -- I'll bet you haven't stuffed many
> envelopes either.

Don't bet it if you can't lose it. Want to lay a side bet on which one of us can field-strip and clean a spirit duplicator or mimeograph the fastest?

I've been staying out of this set of arguments because I don't have much (nice) to say: I'm a Gore voter in a Nader neighborhood in THE Bush state, and I'm pissed off at everybody: Gore, Nader, self-righteous voters of all stripes and especially Bush (not to mention Natalie Maines for taking it back).

Almost nobody talks about the Bush voters in this thread. I know the Bush voters. They're my mother, my in-laws, my friends and (former) coworkers. The last time I was in Dallas, which is more GW Bush country than Houston by a long shot, I attended a dinner party thrown by my husband's parents for a dozen of their well-connected Highland Park friends. They are not just people who vote Bush, they're people who financed his $DEITY-cursed campaign.

When you get them alone (except for the fiery liberal couple who kept me and my husband from falling off the starboard end of the table), they're nervous about the economy, and some of them are worried about the war. But I'll tell you what: they're not going to vote for Gore. They're not going to vote for anyone with a D behind his or her name. Even my own mother, who's a sight more liberal than my in-laws, may well vote for Bush again. And she knows better; we ALL knew better in Texas beforehand.

Right now we in Texas are reaping the bitter harvest of the tax cuts Bush rode into the White House. We're throwing poor kids off CHIP because we don't have a red cent to our name. We used to be Mississippi with good roads, and we many not even have the roads much longer.

Would I vote for a Lieberman or a Nader (both of whom I despise from the depths of my heart, regardless of my feelings about their voters) to keep Bush from wrecking the rest of the country the way he and his cronies have wrecked the National Laboratory for Bad Government? If you made me vote today, yes. I may feel differently in 2004, but from where I sit today, getting Bush out of office is more important than arguing about who is sensible, who is pie in the sky, or who has the better plan for 50 years down the road.

Whoever upthread was talking about working together like in the union: Amen, brother.

Chip - with respect to "safe states", it's important to note that whether or not a state is 'safe' is not constant, and varies from election to election as a result of local politics and the comparative strength of local parties. The Republican party in California in 2000 was moribund; it experienced an incredible, calamitous, collapse during the 1990s. But that doesn't necessarily mean that California will still be a "safe" state in 2006; circumstances may change.

William - it seems to me that arguing that the Democrats must move towards the right because the political climate of the day demands it is, in the medium-term, self-defeating. It neglects the role that the party has in helping to shape the political climate, and creates a situation where the political climate is being shaped by conservatives, and shifts ever further to the right, while the Democrats follow along. The lack of a vibrant voice for principled liberalism helps the process by which the political climate shifts rightward.

To be sure, that voice does not need to be a candidate for high office; it might be more effective if it were, essentially, a left-wing equivalent to the Cato Institute. But the point remains: for liberals in the public eye to move, en masse, towards the current 'center' when that center is to the right of them simply encourages the process by which the center continues to shift ot the right.

This whole idea that the bad taste left with the American people by the current administration will banish the GOP from leadership for aeons to come reminds me of...What, exactly? Oh, yes. It all comes back to me now. It reminds me of how the disgrace of the Nixon administration led to an endless sunny utopia of presidencies under Carter and Mondale and their successors. (Surely the extent of the Republicans' scandals could not have let them recoup in a mere four years to give us three terms of Reagan and Bush!)

As many qualms as I had about Gore-Lieberman (and they were plentiful, I assure you), I have to admit that the even greater qualms I had about this Bush doofus still gave me no idea just how bad things were going to be.

Now Bush, spurned by the U.N., has apparently abandoned all pretense of being interested in disarming Iraq. Rather than accede to the world's lack of interest in U.S. wars of world conquest, he's pretty much admitted all he was interested in all along was taking down Hussein, and installing what he apparently hopes will be the first of a string of democracies installed at gunpoint throughout the Middle East.

The Saudis, among others, should be a lot less apprehensive once they appreciate what Bush seems to believe "democracy" is: An unelected monarch able to wield unbridled power.