Steinem on Nader? A perspective worth considering.

Nov 3 01:16 UTC 2000

            TOP TEN REASONS WHY
             I'M NOT VOTING FOR NADER
             (ANY ONE OF WHICH WOULD BE ENOUGH)
             by Gloria Steinem
             President, Voters For Choice

  10. He's not running for President, he's running for federal matching 
funds for the Green Party! 

  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. 

  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.

  7. Nader is rightly obsessed with economic andcorporate 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."

  6. The issues of corporate control can only be addressed by voting for
candidates who will pass campaign-funding restrictions, and by conducting
grassroots boycotts and consumer campaigns against sweatshops - not by
voting for one man who will never become President. 

  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? 

  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. 

  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. 

  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-rightwing
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. 

  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. 



[Attributed to Gloria Steinem, unsigned, forwarded by email, and posted
without permission.]

response 2 of 56:

Nov 3 08:16 UTC 2000

Yep Nader said that and as un p.c. as it sounds I agree with it to
a large extent.  I think sometimes the new, new left gets so wrapped
up in defending whatever "opressed" group they belong to that they
fail to see the global picture of domination of the world by global
capital flows regulated by groups like the WTO/IMF/NAFTA.  If
we can't see the broader context that we are all a part of, it
really does little good, if the "pro-choice," or "anti hate crimes,"
forces win if our environment is being degraded and all of our
wages are being driven down by global trade.

Ofcourse I'm a white male (poor living under the poverty line) so
I must be  some sort of patriarch according to the Steinem logic.
These sorts of arguments being tossed around by (upper middle class)
"feminists" far from disauding me from voting for Nader are just
pissing me off at the single issue democrats.  Are woman supporters of
Nader part of the patriarchial conspiracy as well?  

response 4 of 56:

Nov 3 14:41 UTC 2000

I don't have any problem with running for matching funds.  Sort of like
running for a local seat before running for a national seat (OK, I'm not
forgetting that this is Nader's first run for office and he's shooting for
the top), parties have to start *somewhere*.

Point #1 in the list made no sense to me; "If we want Gore instead of Bush
in the White House"... don't vote for Nader.  Well *duh*, if you like Gore
vote for Gore.  

response 6 of 56:

Nov 3 21:59 UTC 2000

Does anyone dispute that the abortion, gay, etc. issues *are* gonadal
politics?

response 8 of 56:

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.

response 10 of 56:

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. 

response 12 of 56:

Nov 4 14:38 UTC 2000

see: margaret sanger

response 14 of 56:

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.

response 16 of 56:

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?

response 18 of 56:

Nov 5 16:29 UTC 2000

nobody will prevent al from being elected but himself.

response 20 of 56:

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.

response 22 of 56:

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.

response 24 of 56:

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.