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Grex > Agora35 > #131: Steinem on Nader? A perspective worth considering. | |
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| 25 new of 56 responses total. |
carson
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response 7 of 56:
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Nov 4 00:00 UTC 2000 |
(Bush hasn't spent dime one of his own money on his campaign. neither
has Gore. so, when I begin reading Marcus's ridiculously long rant and
reach something like "Bush is rich so he doesn't have to beg" when I
*know* Gore isn't suffering in his personal finances [remember, his dad's
dead, so he pribly has a large part of whatever wealth Papa Gore
accumulated from tobacco], I stop reading. did people make up stories
about the antiChrist too?)
(Steinem's criticisms of Nader, if she did indeed write them, show a
narrow, misguided view of the political process. for one, the federal
matching funds are almost a prerequisite for running for president
credibly. seeing as most first-time presidential candidates don't go on
to win the Oval Office, making a dry run *and* getting matching dollars
for the next time seems like a pretty good plan to me.)
(plus, what the heck did Nixon vs. Kennedy mean to history? did it mean
that if Nixon had won the first time, he wouldn't have reached
Watergate-level desperation? Kennedy wouldn't have been shot? LBJ and
Ford never would have been president? isn't answering a question with a
question fun?)
(it seems to me that the author believes "reproductive rights" [whatever
*that* means] are the issue, and implies Bush is on the wrong side of the
issue. there are many people who feel that way, but there are others who
see a bigger picture and fault the candidates from that broader view.
these ten points don't convince me that the one-trick "reproductive
rights" pony is any better than the one-trick "environmental" pony.)
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scg
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response 8 of 56:
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Nov 4 00:01 UTC 2000 |
I wonder if the Green Party could survive qualifying for Federal matching
funds, or if they'll be torn apart the way the Reform Party was.
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carson
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response 9 of 56:
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Nov 4 00:08 UTC 2000 |
(funny you should mention the Reform Party. Perot has endorsed Bush.)
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raven
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response 10 of 56:
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Nov 4 00:29 UTC 2000 |
And just to address the gonadal politics issue here is Barbara Ehrenreich
far more of a feminist activist than the milquetoast Steinem urging a
vote for Nader:
VOTE FOR NADER
by BARBARA EHRENREICH
It must be some playful new postmodernist form of politics: First you
spend years ranting about the plutocracy that
has supplanted American democracy and is rapidly devouring the
planet. You complain about the growing numbers
of Americans who can't afford healthcare or housing; you rant about
the inadequacy of wages and the arrogance of
the corporate overclass. Then, just as large numbers of people start
tuning in and even getting excited to the point of
supporting the one presidential candidate who's making the exact same
points you've been trying to get across all
this time--you whip around and shout, "Only kidding, folks. Get out
there and vote for Gore!"
Normally I'm more responsive when summoned to help save a drowning
man. But none of the lefties for Gore are
arguing that Gore has said or done anything recently to earn
progressive support. He's going down, is all, and going
down so quickly and inexplicably that no one can call him "wooden"
anymore--there's a question whether he's even
carbon-based. Here he is, faced with the frothiest Republican
presidential hopeful since Dan Quayle, and Gore can
ignite no sparks, cannot even rise above his own fundraising scandals
or apparently grasp wherein the scandal lies.
As recently as late June, for example, he praised an audience of
African-immigrant Americans for their contributions
to his campaign, promising that the money would be "helping to focus
the attention of our country on issues in
Nigeria or Ethiopia or Ghana or Cameroon or South Africa."
We are being summoned to save this inveterate bribe-seeker because "a
vote for Nader is a vote for Bush." That in
itself is a disturbingly Orwellian proposition, easily generalized to
"Don't challenge the system, you'll only make it
worse." But leaving that aside, let us acknowledge that Bush is
indeed scarier than Gore on several discernible
issues, abortion the most prominent among them. Hence the familiar
plea of the pro-Gore leftists: Keep W.'s pudgy
little fingers off the Supreme Court.
Ah, the Supreme Court! Never mind that pro-choice Justice O'Connor
was a Reagan appointee or that Clinton's
man Breyer is one of the most economically conservative Justices
around--the Supreme Court gets dragged out
every four years to squash any attempt to escape the Democratic
Party. So it has been and so it will always be until
we have a Court consisting entirely of pro-choice teenagers.
Abortion, which is the issue I am most frequently Gored with by the
political "realists" of the left, deserves a closer
look. Note first that the prominence of this issue in the Gore/Bush
race above all reflects the loving concordance of
the candidates on almost everything else--militarization,
incarceration and the necessary immiseration of working
people everywhere in the service of global capital. Note second that
what has vitiated abortion rights on the ground
is not so much the legal whittling away of Roe v. Wade (though quite
a bit of that has gone on too, at the state level)
as the relentless pressure from antichoice groups on abortion
providers. And aside from reining in clinic picketers,
there's not a whole hell of a lot the Supreme Court can do to fix
that.
It should be recalled, too, that we didn't get legal abortion in the
first place because nine men in black robes were
kind enough to allow us to have it. Women fought for it by every
means possible, illegal as well as legal. Surely the
anti-Naderites of the left can agree that Roe v. Wade wasn't the
author of women's liberation, just as Brown v.
Board of Education did not create the civil rights movement. Deep
social change is made by deep social
movements, not by edicts.
But the left-wing Gore-ites often seem oblivious to the dynamics of
real social change. They say we have to build an
alternative politics--only just not yet. Wait until we replace
"winner take all" elections with something more
democratic, they urge. Fine, only where is the energy to reform the
electoral process going to come from unless we
start challenging that process with attractive third-party candidates
now? Or they say wait until we have a real
party--who are these Greens, anyway? But parties don't just grow by
accretion. Sometimes they have to do
things--grand, noble and, from a "realistic" point of view, surely
foolish things--like stepping into the fray and duking
it out with the bullies and their designated surrogates.
What I fear most about a Gore victory--yes, I said victory--is its
almost certainly debilitating effect on progressives
and their organizations. During the Clinton years, many a feminist,
enviro and labor leader was so charmed by the
crumbs of "access" thrown their way and the occasional low-level
progressive appointment that they bit their
tongues whenever Clinton showed his true DLC colors, e.g., with
welfare reform. And every time I would sputter,
"Dump this creep!" someone would whisper soothingly, "But he's
pro-choice (and so much more pro-labor and
pro-tree than the other guy)." Is this what we're going to hear when
it comes time to protest the war in Colombia or
any other Gore-perpetrated horror? At the very least, the progressive
Gore-ites ought to explain how they intend to
avoid getting into another hostage situation should their man win.
But I can't get really mad at the Gore-ites of the left--there is
such a becoming and altogether seemly diffidence
about them. To my knowledge, none of them are sporting Gore buttons
or bumper stickers, and I don't expect any
of them to invite me to a Gore house party anytime soon. While they
may firmly believe that "a vote for Nader is a
vote for Bush," they seem also to understand that a vote for Gore is
a vote for the system as it stands--and
specifically for the DLC-dominated Democratic Party. Like it or not,
that's how the Gore votes will be counted,
and that's how they'll be spun.
Here's how generous I am: I'll tell them what they can do if they'd
like to save Gore. They should stop flacking for
him--stop all this carping about "spoiling" and "vote stealing"--and
explain to their man what he'd have to do to start
taking votes away from Nader. Like renouncing the substitution of
bribery for the democratic process. Like
pledging to spend the budget excess on such daily necessities as
universal health insurance and childcare. Like
embracing a worker-friendly approach to world trade.
I doubt Gore could ever become Nader-like enough to steal my vote
from the original, certainly not after his choice
of DLC leader Lieberman as Veep. But it sure would be nice to see him
try.
Barbara Ehrenreich's forthcoming book, Nickel and Dimed, on low-wage
work in America, will be out in
the spring of 2001.
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scg
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response 11 of 56:
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Nov 4 01:05 UTC 2000 |
I think this person is confused about statistics in her comment on the Supreme
Court. Certainly some justices appointed by Republicans have turned out to
be liberals. Certainly some Justices appointed by Democrats have turned out
to be conservative. It happens, but it happens in a small fraction of cases.
Assuming there are four Supreme Court apointments that the next President has
to do, Gore may well appoint three liberals and, accidentally, a conservative.
Bush may well appoint thee conservatives, and by accident, a liberal. But
what matters in Supreme Court decisions is not the leanings of one Justice,
but the leanings of the majority. I doubt either candidate would "screw up"
on a majority of their Supreme Court appointments.
I think she's also confused about the power of the Court. She's right that
Roe v. Wade didn't start the Pro Choice movement, and that Brown v. Board of
Education didn't start the Civil Rights movement. Both of those had been
going on for quite a while by that point. I don't know as much about the
history of abortion rights, but the NAACP and various other civil rights
organizations had been filing desegration lawsuits for years before getting
to Brown v. Board of Education. They had also been working very hard outside
the legal arena to build suppose for racial equality. All this was necessary
to get American society, and by extension the US Supreme Court, to the point
where racial equality was seen as important. Still, it wasn't until the NAACP
started winning its civil rights lawsuits that they could force a vast
reduction in legal segregation. The composition of the Court was vitally
important to the Civil Rights movement. I suspect it was vitally important
to the Pro Choice movement as well.
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jerryr
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response 12 of 56:
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Nov 4 14:38 UTC 2000 |
see: margaret sanger
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krj
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response 13 of 56:
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Nov 4 18:57 UTC 2000 |
To clarify or correct something Marcus wrote in resp:5 ::
Bush ran his campaign for the Republican nomination without Federal
funding, and thus he was not bound by spending limits in the primaries.
However, for the November election campaign, he has accepted the
Federal funds and the spending limits that go with them, as has Gore.
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jazz
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response 14 of 56:
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Nov 4 20:50 UTC 2000 |
Nader's run for office for many years now; this is a major change in
his platform, which used to be, "a vote for Nader is a vote of no confidence,"
and his first promised executive action being to resign from office. I've
voted for him on that platform before, and it turns out that I agree more with
his current platform, but now that he's changed platforms I won't be voting
for him.
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raven
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response 15 of 56:
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Nov 4 21:42 UTC 2000 |
My vote for Nader is because I am confident that I want to see much
less goverment pork spending on the military and I would like to see the
desctructive effects of global corporations reigned in. For a point
by point refutation of the Steinem article by another "feminist" see:
http://commondreams.org/views/110400-105.htm
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mdw
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response 16 of 56:
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Nov 5 07:00 UTC 2000 |
The figures I saw for Bush's campaign spending showed him spending
something like double what Gore had spent. I've no idea if that was
just for the nomination or what - presumably it will all be in the
history books soon enough, complete with footnotes. I'd be surprised if
Gore weren't rich as well; have we had *any* major party presidental
candidates in recent history who weren't rich? I suspect Gore's riches
were more honestly come by than Bush's -- it's hard to imagine anything
more sleazy that wouldn't actually be illegal.
It's certainly an interesting question what the green party would do if
they managed to qualify for matching funds. It does seem likely that
whatever happens, it will be different than the reform party. The green
party has been around for a while and has at least had a chance to
decide what it stands for, and build a reasonably resilient grass-roots
starvation type organization.
The reform party grew *very* quick, and was as much a cult based around
Perot as anything else. It was basically done for when Perot waffled
about running in '96. Most of Perot's backing were business minded
republican types, who were as quick to go back into the fold as they
were to leave, and who really aren't all that far from Clinton/Gore in
any case. What's left of the reform party is pretty splintered -
Buchanan probably has the best grasp of what's left, but he's a
fundementalist christian not a business minded type, so has alienated
most of the reform party's former support. The natural law party has
tried, with some success, to absorb some of the splinters of the reform
party, although it seems the natural law party may have more in common
with the greens than with the business minded types. It will be
interesting to see if the reform party carries forward as Buchanan's
shield, or disappears entirely. But the core constiuency of the reform
party, that's gone from them forever; the things they cared about have
been borrowed lock, stock & barrel by *both* major parties, so the only
problem that faces those people is deciding which haystack to eat first,
so to speak.
The greens clearly don't have that problem. They are almost
"anti-business" (although, to be really viable, they'll probably need to
find a way to make companies think global, environmental, and small, are
really good for business.) In europe, the greens have been a major
political force, and the europeans are probably way ahead of us in many
matters related to the environment, safety, labelling of genetically
engineered foods, and such. It is sometimes shameful to see how far
behind we are in some of these matters. In the US, some of the issues
that face the greens are: if they get federal matching funds, can they
make as effective use of real resources as they have with virtually
nothing? Can they do an effective job of challenging the corporate
monsters that nobody wants, but that we all seem inevitably driven
towards despite our best wishes? Can they do an effective job of
transitioning from a fringe minority to a mainstream phenomena? Perhaps
the last challenge is hardest: if one of the major parties were to adopt
the green's platform, lock stock & barrel, as their own, what will the
greens do?
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jerryr
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response 17 of 56:
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Nov 5 13:25 UTC 2000 |
i still wonder why the greens think they will get a better hearing from a
repbulican administration than they would from a democrat one.
i personally will go out and piss on a tree if the greens prevent my pal al
from being elected.
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happyboy
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response 18 of 56:
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Nov 5 16:29 UTC 2000 |
nobody will prevent al from being elected but himself.
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jerryr
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response 19 of 56:
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Nov 5 17:08 UTC 2000 |
he might have a hand in it, but some of his party's traditional base is going
to vote for mr. nader. in an election this close it might make the
difference. if you are saying that he might have kept those votes if his
positions were different, i would counter by saying that he might have lost
some if they were.
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bru
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response 20 of 56:
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Nov 5 17:12 UTC 2000 |
Turns out some Republicans are also going to vote for Nader in order to get
an increased footprint for the third party.
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drew
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response 21 of 56:
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Nov 5 17:20 UTC 2000 |
Why can't the strong third party be the Libertarian party?
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other
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response 22 of 56:
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Nov 5 18:36 UTC 2000 |
I'm disappointed to note only one response by a woman to this item, as I
was specifically seeking the reactions and perspectives of Grex's female
population to Steinem's article.
re:21 Because the Libertarians are ridiculous in their absolutist
perspective on the role of government. How many people in this country
want to have to pay tolls on every road they drive as opposed to once-a-
year taxes? How many people in this country even know enough about what
the government does to assure food safety to be able to make an informed
decision about whether they want to eliminate the FDA's funding? How
small a percentage of those people would ever consider voting
Libertarian?
There's a part of me that wants to vote Nader just for the "send a
message/matching funds" reasons, but every time that notion arises, there
is the other part of me which says, "how much will it cost us in lost
social progress to send that message?"
The worst part is the third voice which says, "with either Gore or Bush,
the costs are still going to be so high that even a non-starter like
Nader is worth voting for, just for the impact."
What I end up with is a burning desire for a real candidate who I can
honestly believe represents a forward-thinking, progressive and practical
agenda. Unfortunately, that unsatisfied desire leaves me with only the
ashes of cynicism about the whole process.
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mary
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response 23 of 56:
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Nov 5 21:43 UTC 2000 |
Steinem has lost her feminist edge, she has always been a little on the
whiny side but since her last book I really can't give her opinions much
time at all. Politicians today do court the "women's vote". But they
also have their antenna up for the issues men tend to follow more closely,
like gun control. So, I'd guess I'd refer to this type of focus as genital
politics and I'm not sure it's all that harmful or avoidable.
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senna
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response 24 of 56:
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Nov 6 05:56 UTC 2000 |
The Greens clearly aren't worrying about the next four years as much as they
are the future. If they rallied behind a democrat every four years because,
after consideration, they decided they had to settle for the lesser of the
evils "just this once," they'd never go anywhere. By necessity, they have
to look to the future. Frankly, there isn't a better election to start making
strides than this one.
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scg
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response 25 of 56:
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Nov 6 08:09 UTC 2000 |
I don't think your last sentence is true, Steve. If the goal is to start out
by getting the 5% of the vote to qualify for matching funds, doing so in an
election that wasn't nearly as close would presumably be considerably better.
But I really don't think the Presidential election is an effective place to
start a party's move from obscurity to power. Unless experienced candidates
are willing to defect to the party, it leaves the party running inexperienced
candidates for the country's highest office. It also requires a fairly
unknown party to build up support throughout the entire US at the same time,
which is a pretty formidable task.
An easier way for the Green Party to launch itself onto the National stage
would be to go after a few Congressional seats. Rather than rallying for a
marginally useful, if that, five percent of the vote across the country, they
could concentrate their efforts on a few very liberal Congressional districts,
and they might have a shot at actually winning. Once they got a few members
into Congress, given how close the balance of power is between the two parties
now, one of the major parties would probably need to form a coalition with
the Greens to get anything done. At that point, the Greens could wield
considerable power, as well as possibly getting their candidates the name
recognition and experience required to go after higher offices.
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mdw
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response 26 of 56:
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Nov 6 09:54 UTC 2000 |
Unfortunately for you, presidential elections are when the most people
come out to vote, and they are by far the most visible. It certainly
helped Jesse Ventura. There are green candidates for a variety of local
candidates, but nobody talks about them. I did see a flyer stapled to a
local telephone pole for the green party sheriff candidate.
Normally, in a presidential election, the presidential candidates also
take time to go campaign for various lesser people in their party.
Generally that happens when the race is not close and one candidate is
doing a whole lot better. In this election, of course, both Bush and
Gore are far too busy with other concerns.
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carson
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response 27 of 56:
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Nov 6 11:51 UTC 2000 |
(the added benefit of having someone from your party at the top of the
ticket means that you can vote a straight party ticket, which a large
number of voters do.)
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senna
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response 28 of 56:
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Nov 6 12:58 UTC 2000 |
I disagree with Steve. The presidential election is the best way to get your
name out in the open, because for the other three and a quarter years people
don't talk politics much at all. The Greens would be toiling with nameless
candidates in small areas that got no national attention, and would
furthermore run the risk of being labelled a regional party. Instead, they
are a national party that has a candidate with decent name recognition at the
front of it. That's the best chance I've seen to get them out. I know *I'm*
paying more attention.
A close election might actually be a better choice from them, on the off
chance that they *do* cost Gore the election. Imagine the publicity they'd
be getting.
I generally don't think that regional party building is a good way to work.
It tends to pick up the nastier parts of local culture. "Southern Democrats"
come to mind. This isn't in Canada, where the Bloc Quebecois can rally its
own troops and effectively logjam itself into second place in the national
government. Nor is this Canada, where regional separatism is a much larger
issue than it is here. We've had enough civil wars.
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scott
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response 29 of 56:
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Nov 6 17:39 UTC 2000 |
The Green Party *is* going for Congressional seats... an old friend of mine
is running in the 8th district (Lansing area).
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gelinas
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response 30 of 56:
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Nov 6 17:44 UTC 2000 |
I think you have to do it both ways: lots of local candidates, getting
elected and getting experience. Then get some ('cause you won't get all)
of them elected to state offices. That gets you enough exposure to stand
a chance in Congressional races. And you need at least one from each of
the 'nine nations'. Then you've got some to run for President.
The third-parties I remember jumping to prominence in Presidential elections
all disappeared just as quickly as they appeared: the Know-nothings,
the Bull Moose, the Reform (which seems to have lasted longer than the
other two).
The big problem is that you need a Presidential candidate who is actually
a party member; someone in it for the convenience (a la P. Buchanan and
the Reformers) isn't going to mobilise the base.
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mary
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response 31 of 56:
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Nov 6 18:34 UTC 2000 |
I'll take a shot at Ms. Steinem's points. This may get longish
so feel free to abort.
10. He's not running for President, he's running for
federal matching funds for the Green Party!
Can you really run for one without the other? Perot doesn't count. ;-)
9. He was able to take all those perfect progressive
positions of the past because he never had to build an
electoral coalition, earn a majority, vote, or otherwise
submit to democracy.
Yep, the way I'd put it is he hasn't had to compromise on some very
important issues because of a years of political gamesmanship. I don't
think he's at all afraid of the democratic process. I expect he would
bring a fresh perspective to some issues that have been getting mostly
lip-service at election time and not much else the rest of the time. I
think when Ms. Steinem states Nader might not "submit to democracy" what
she's really afraid of is that he comes in without the usual IOUs and all
bets are off. No prob here.
8. By condemning Gore for ever having taken a different
position - for example, for voting against access to legal
abortion when he was a Congressman from Tennessee - actually
dissuades others from changing their minds and joining us.
Yowser, that's a stretch. I don't think the average person who has a
reasoned change of heart will be less inclined embrace a new opinion
because Presidential candidate Gore did the same to follow political
aspirations and match a party platform. Which is what I think happened
here.
7. Nader is rightly obsessed with economic and corporate control,
yet he belittles a deeper form of control - control of reproduction,
and the most intimate parts of our lives. For example, he calls the
women's movement and the gay and lesbian movements "gonadal
politics," and ridicules the use of the word "patriarchy," as if it
were somehow less important than the World Trade Organization. As
Congressman Barney Frank wrote Nader in an open letter, "your
assertion that there are not important issue differences between
Gore and Bush is either flatly inaccurate or reflects your view
that...the issues are not important... since you have generally
ignored these issues in your career."
Last I looked Nader was very pro-choice and I don't get Steinem's comment
about his belittling deeper forms of control. In fact, I see Nader as
quite the crusader for the powerless and disenfranchised. "Feminism" has
eroded over the years to represent a special interest group made up of
mostly whiny women. My kind of feminist is the person who is looking out
for the civil rights of all persons and is reluctant to target any
specific sex as more worthy of attention. I suspect Nader would do a fine
job attaching importance to areas where civil rights are taking a hit.
And again, Steinem is supposedly commenting on Nader yet the emphasis is
on Gore and Bush.
6. The issues of corporate control can only be addressed
by voting for candidates who will pass campaign-funding
restrictions, and by conducting grass roots boycotts and consumer
campaigns against sweatshops - not by voting for one man who will
never become President.
So, who do you think takes the issue of campaign-funding more seriously,
Gore and Bush who are grabbing the money all the while saying they don't
like the system and will see the rules get changed next time around, or
maybe the guy who won't even take the big bucks now and who is willing
to demonstrate his commitment to change right now, starting with his
own campaign?
5. Toby Moffett, a longtime Nader Raider who also served in
Congress, wrote that Nader's "Tweedledum and Tweedledee assertion
that there is no important difference between the major Presidential
candidates would be laughable if it weren't so unsafe." We've been
bamboozled by the media's practice of being even-handedly negative.
There is a far greater gulf between Bush and Gore than between Nixon
and Kennedy - and what did that mean to history?
My response to this is personal. My radar on Gore is that he is a
chameleon and that he has and will say whatever he needs to to advance in
the Democratic party and get elected. Every time he gives his wife a big
wet kiss in front of banks of cameras my feelings get validated. I don't
know what kind of a real difference there is between Bush and Gore on the
issues. I don't think anyone really knows.
4. Nader asked Winona LaDuke, an important Native American leader,
to support and run with him, despite his likely contribution to the
victory of George W. Bush, a man who has stated that "state law is
supreme when it comes to Indians," a breathtakingly dangerous
position that ignores hundreds of treaties with tribal governments,
long-standing federal policy and federal law affirming tribal
sovereignty.
I don't know anything about Native American issues. But in this comment
Ms. Steinem is saying Nader is wrong to run on a platform which is very
supportive of minority rights because if he does Bush might win. Yuck.
Electoral terrorism. I'm so glad Nader isn't willing to buckle and pay
the ransom.
3. If I were to run for President in the same symbolic way, I would
hope my friends and colleagues would have the sense to vote against
me, too, saving me from waking up to discover that I had helped send
George W. Bush to the most powerful position in the world.
This response reminds me of the "I have met Mr. Kennedy, sir, and
you are no John Kennedy." I'm embarrassed for Ms. Steinem.
2. There are one, two, three, or even four lifetime Supreme Court
Justices who are likely to be appointed by the next President. Bush
has made clear by his record as Governor and appeals to the
ultra-right wing that his appointments would overturn Roe v. Wade and
reproductive freedom, dismantle remedies for racial discrimination,
oppose equal rights for gays and lesbians, oppose mandatory gun
registration, oppose federal protections of endangered species,
public lands, and water - and much more. Gore is the opposite on
every one of these issues. Gore has made clear that his appointments
would uphold our hard won progress in those areas, and he has
outlined advances in each one.
Yep, this is scary. But I also know Bush is looking for a second
term and this will, hopefully, temper his appointments. Meanwhile
I think the whole two party system will have been given a wake-up
call and we'll be presented with better candidates next election.
And I hope Nader is back again.
1. The art of behaving ethically is behaving as if everything we do
matters. If we want Gore and not Bush in the White House, we have
to vote for Gore and not Bush - out of self-respect. I'm not
telling you how to vote by sharing these reasons. The essence of
feminism is the power to decide for ourselves. It's also taking
responsibility for our actions. Let's face it, Bush in the White
House would have far more impact on the poor and vulnerable in this
country, and on the subjects of our foreign policy and aid programs
in other countries. Just as Clinton saved women's lives by
rescinding the Mexico City policy by executive order as his first
act as President - thus ending the ban against even discussing
abortion if one received U.S. aid - the next President will have
enormous power over the lives of millions abroad who cannot vote,
plus millions too disillusioned to vote here. Perhaps there's a
reason why Nader rallies seem so white, middle class, and
disproportionately male; in short, so supported by those who
wouldn't be hurt if Bush were in the White House. Think
self-respect. Think about the impact of our vote on the weakest
among us. Then we can't go wrong.
I couldn't agree more with her first sentence. And again, Ms. Steinem
spends not one word on disagreeing with Nader's stance on the issues but
rather rants on about Bush and Gore. Does she not know where Nader is on
these issues? I suggest she doesn't much care past the point at which she
has decided Nader is an unelectable underdog. Not quite my idea of
ethical voting, although I'm sure it works for her. I won't vote for an
inferior candidate when a better candidate is available. I won't cave in
to threats that voting for Nader is dangerous, not when I see both Bush
and Gore as risky. I am thinking about the poor and disenfranchised,
as I'm sure Gloria is. But I also wonder if she isn't thinking about
her past White House visits and how that all goes bust if Gore isn't
enthroned.
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