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On the Edge of the “Dems”
The
US government’s spin on the facts in Iraq, at home and on the War
on Terror, has not subsided. |
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Only
three weeks ago, the US population back home felt itself moving
beyond Iraq. The “prison abuse” scandal at Abu Ghraib prison and
what it revealed of American torture policy led a slew of Democratic
Party loyalists and columnists to begin feting the sure signs of
victory for John Kerry in this fall’s elections.
Still,
Americans will realize that their government’s spin on the facts
in Iraq, at home and on the War on Terror, has not subsided at all.
By June 30, America will still be in Iraq, and John Kerry may be
forced into finally taking a stance on the war.
Senator
Kerry’s lack of a clear position on the Iraq war has certainly not
been through a lack of pressure; his two most astute rivals, the
independent candidate Ralph Nader and the Democratic hopeful,
Congressman Dennis Kucinich, seized upon a clear foreign policy
outline from the moment the parochial election campaign whistle
blew. Both contenders have explicitly called for a withdrawal of
American troops from Iraq and a restoration of the country’s
sovereignty. To back up their respective positions, both have
provided the public with an outline of a “road map” to
withdrawal.1
Ralph
Nader
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Ralph Nader: at war with the oligarchy
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Faced
with the Democratic Party’s false promises on progressive
policies, Ralph Nader’s decision to run is set against major odds.
Blistering criticism from America’s liberals and center-left has
been added this time around to the obstacles his campaign faces.
Nonetheless, Nader cannot merely be dismissed as indulging in a case
of narcissistic folly in this most decisive of election years.
His
significant finish with 6.4 percent of the popular vote (though not
one electoral college) in 2000 made him a viable contender, which is
exactly what led to the portrayal given of Nader’s decision by the
US mass media. Put simply, it was an exercise in character
assassination. As part of their purported news coverage, all major
outlets in the US announced that Nader was blamed by that nebulous
“many” for the defeat of Al Gore in the 2000 elections.
Needless
to say, it is no fairer to blame Nader than to omit citing the
indirect voting scheme and collegial system—let alone the highly
controversial outcome of the 2000 vote. Depending on who’s doing
the counting, Al Gore got anywhere between 340,000 and 540,000 votes
more than Bush in direct voting, i.e. the “popular vote,” while
the Florida State Supreme Court was overruled by its Federal
superior when allowing a full vote recount to take place2. When it is
painful to point to legalized electoral fraud as the source of
Gore’s defeat, trampling on an underdog will do just fine. Nader
has fought consistently against being pegged in that role.
The
former Green Party candidate’s own statistics point to a number of
traditional Republican voters as having voted for him in 2000, and
prepared to do so this year as well. This is not merely beside the
point. Voices from the “old” Republicans, such as Kevin Philips,
the author of Wealth and Democracy, see their party as having been
taken over by the neoconservatives on the one hand, and the
Christian Right on the other, both converging to fulfill the wishes
of the country’s very rich. For Philips, the country’s political
system has become a plutocracy: a government by the rich for the
rich. While there has been no clear endorsement of Nader by
disenchanted Republicans, they are seeking solutions elsewhere than
in the Democrats’ camp.
Why
should there be any reason to doubt Nader’s claim? His criticism
of the two-party exclusionary system—or “duopoly”—that has
ossified American politics is confirmed by Dennis Kucinich. As a
former mayor of Cleveland, Ohio, and Democratic Congressman from the
same state, Kucinich is perhaps the most persistent social activist
within the current ranks of Democratic presidential candidates. He
was among the very few representatives to vote against the invasion
of Iraq as well as the Patriot Act. These two men are exhibits of
the current organizational difficulties experienced by what the late
Edward Said termed the “other America.”
By
all accounts, one of the major obstacles is the Commission on
Presidential Debates. While it is logical to have only one candidate
per party participate in the televised presidential debates, it is
highly unbalanced to exclude third and fourth party candidates. This
is what happened to Nader in 2000, at the behest of both Bush and
Gore. Nader is working hard to “break the grip of [that] cynical
canard against the right of the American people to hear more voices
and choices.”3 In its stead, he has publicized the Citizen’s
Debate Commission, a nonprofit institution controlled by neither
candidates nor parties.
His
Battles Are Legion
Nader
and Kucinich insist on providing answers and policy proposals before
the election. |
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Ralph
Nader was born in 1934 to parents of Lebanese origin. After studies
in law at the US’s finest Ivy League universities, he became
brilliantly involved in a typically American offshoot of democratic
politics: consumer advocacy, i.e. standing up for the rights of
consumers. These include the right to protection and safety when
using industrial products, such as cars.4 Indeed, one way most North
Americans unknowingly celebrate Ralph Nader is by buckling up their
seat belts when driving. Such laws, including amendments on air
bags, manufacturer’s recall, crash tests and other safety
features, can be traced back to the 1966 Traffic and Motor Vehicle
Safety Act, fostered by Nader.
Nader’s
battles against corporations are legion. His legislative record is
powerful. Back in 1972, author Robert Buckhorn could already draw up
a sizeable list: “since 1966, Nader has been responsible . . . for
the passage of . . . the Natural Gas Pipeline Safety Act (1968),
Wholesale Meat Act (1967), Radiation Control Act (1968), Wholesale
Poultry Products Act (1967), Coal Mine Health and Safety Act (1969),
and the Occupational Health and Safety Act (1970).” 5
Since
then, Nader’s criticism of the fraudulent business practices of
many of the US’s most respected corporations has leaked into the
mainstream. While media-corporations in the US tried to ignore his
campaign in 2000, Lewis H. Lapham, editor of Harper’s, countered
the trend, personally running an interview with Nader and putting
his picture on the September edition above the headline “A Citizen
in Full.”
In
an eight-page ad-proof essay, Lapham’s striking prose gave Nader
all the room he needed to explain his platform and point fingers:
“The oligarchy never wants anyone to know what, or how much,
ordinary citizens can accomplish if they learn to use the power of
their own laws. Convince the kids that all the wars are over, that
history is at an end, that nothing important remains to be
discovered, done, or said, and maybe they won’t ask why a
corporate CEO receives a salary four hundred times greater than the
lowest paid worker in his own company.” 6
Several
candidates and national figures in the United States have spoken out
against the extreme concentration of wealth for which corporate
boards are responsible. Even Business Week and Fortune raise the
issue from time to time. Only Nader, though, has put this mutation
in the terms of an oligarchic takeover of American democracy.
The
fame and success of his battles notwithstanding, Nader has not been
exempted from a fair share of enemies from all corners of the
political spectrum. A number of leftist intellectuals have claimed
that he amassed a fortune from stock investments in the very
companies he fought as a consumer advocate.7 Other critics claim that
he was too silent in the delicate post-9/11 months, when even
mainstream Americans started calling for a bloodthirsty culling of
the organizations and countries they perceived to have sponsored
terrorists.
What
Nader was doing at the time was grassroots organizing and lobbying,
as well as writing on the corporate takeover of American business.
Since announcing his candidacy, he has spoken out against the
American government’s torture policy at all of its post-9/11 POW
camps. He has attacked the Bush government’s “war” on the Bill
of Rights and civil liberties and “on the egregious stereotyping
and violations of due process to people of minority status, recent
immigrants or long-time immigrants, bearing the brunt of the
violations of our civil liberties, especially Muslim-Americans and
Arab-Americans.”8
Last
April at Chicago’s Columbia College, he even called for President
George W. Bush’s impeachment. He argued that "when you plunge
our country into war on a platform of fabrications and deceptions,
and you bring back thousands of American soldiers who are sick,
injured or dead, and that war is unconstitutionally authorized to
begin with, Mr. Bush's behavior qualifies for the high crimes and
misdemeanor impeachment clause of the Constitution."9
What
has become clear is that Nader has not entered the electoral fray as
an outsider merely intent on destabilizing the Democratic Party, as
Al Gore and other Democrat bigwigs would have it. Moreover, he has
approached the Kerry campaign in a bid to discuss broader issues
than Iraq, and has sought to compel Senator Kerry to give a formal
outline of his approach to withdrawing Coalition troops from that
Middle Eastern country.10
Dennis
Kucinich
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Dennis Kucinich: voice of a tolerant, morally rigorous US?
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In
that regard, Dennis Kucinich can also be congratulated. Kucinich,
58, began his career in municipal politics in Cleveland, Ohio, where
he served as mayor in 1977-1979. He has been a congressman since
1997, representing the Democratic Party for Ohio State.
America
for Kucinich is a land of multiple horizons and cultural diversity.
In his choice to run from within the Democratic Party,11 he has
perhaps maintained an air of legitimacy about his desire to see Bush
driven from office that Nader has only been partially successful in
acquiring. On the other hand, as the poorest of the original nine
candidates, he has also had to bow to the Democratic Party pantheon.
The latter had tempted delegates briefly with an anti-war ballot by
letting emotions be stirred up with Howard Dean earlier in the year.
Then, it succinctly snuffed the flames out by orchestrating
Kerry’s success in the primaries.
In
his work in Congress, Kucinich has achieved a progressive record. He
is co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, and was
instrumental in saving a provision of the Clear Air Act. He has also
drawn support from a hodgepodge group of American Muslim
associations which keeps a website devoted to the candidate.12 Further
on the domestic front, his social policy platform includes universal
healthcare.
Significantly,
Kucinich has picked up on one of the most disturbing issues of the
upcoming elections: the question of electronic voting. Following the
confusion of the paper ballot in many Florida ridings in 2000, and
with the success of an entirely electronic vote in Brazil in 2002,
many in America’s political establishment have called for
electronic voting as a safe and foolproof alternative. On April 23,
Kucinich issued a call "to suspend immediately the
implementation of any voting systems that do not provide a 100
percent reliable paper-trail back-up to corroborate results."13
The back-up theoretically prevents software manipulation or other
technical vulnerabilities from arising through potential conflicts
of interest and partisan support amongst system owners and
conceivers.
This
means that Kucinich has been keen on exploiting issues the
mainstream Dems want to steer clear of, namely the sense of
conspiracy and oligarchic tyranny that permeates the political air
in the US these days. Hence, John Kerry is the only candidate for a
camp that may have little else to offer than an “anyone but
Bush” platform. Little if anything suggests that his approach to
the War on Terror will differ significantly. The wildcard is whether
Kerry’s domestic policy will also be a sequel to Bush’s magic
acts for the richest.
John
Kerry’s camp has little to offer other than an “anyone but
Bush” platform. |
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In
that light, was it a symptom of editorial confusion that led the New
York Times to declare in an article in early May that Kucinich was
still a contender, or was it an attempt to undermine the strategies
of the Kerry campaign? There can be little doubt that Kucinich is
the grass roots politician who has most tried to break the deadlock
of the big federal machine from within the system.
It is well-known that Kerry’s speeches since the Fallujah and
al-Najaf uprisings have double-talked their way to keeping troops in
Iraq under his mandate, should he be elected in November. Meanwhile,
the tone of the Times article zeroed in on Kucinich’s anti-war
stance. A cocktail of quotes was compiled, from people ranging from
war vets to teachers, including one from “Don Norton, 71, a
retired corrections official wearing a ‘No War’ button. ‘If it
wasn’t for Kucinich, there wouldn’t be anyone speaking for
[those of us who are against the war].’” 14
Kucinich’s
gambit may be even more detrimental for party advocates who believe
that the best way to beat Bush is by reproducing him. Amidst all the
paranoia of recent decades, Kucinich may be the highest profile
candidate to express the grass roots voice of a tolerant and morally
rigorous United States that many of us recognize through its arts,
its jazz, its independent journalism and its universities.
Now
What?
So
when the question is “Now what?” Americans will not find the
answers within the two parties that have brought them to the current
state of decomposition. On the edge lie Nader and Kucinich: two
politicians who insist on providing detailed answers and policy
proposals before the election, instead of big digit promises meant
to take us to the moon.
Both
Nader and Kucinich may not make much difference to the world right
now. But the recklessness of US behavior is what concerns us. The
world must also help America remain tied to its obligations and its
productive potential. That means providing it with options. And
options, at least, are what Nader and Kucinich seem to be providing.
*
Norman Madarasz
is a Canadian philosopher residing in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. With a
Ph.D. from the University of Paris, he teaches and writes on
international relations, political economy and philosophy. He is
also a regular contributor to Counterpunch and has published think
pieces and philosophical research extensively. You can reach him at nmphdiol2@yahoo.ca
[1] For Nader’s, please see Lionel Barber, “Campaign Theme: Nader’s Wild Card,”
Financial Times,May 20,
2004.
[2] The four biggest vote getters were Democratic candidate Al Gore with 50.16 million votes, Republican candidate George W. Bush with 49.82 million votes, Green Party candidate Ralph Nader with 2.78 million votes, and Reform Party candidate Pat Buchanan with 0.45 million
votes.
[3] From a news conference with Ralph Nader at the National Press Club in Washington, DC, February 23, 2004 as transcribed by Federal News Service Inc.
[4] After an initial publication in
The Nation in 1959, Nader gained notoriety in the automobile industry for his book,
Any Speed: The Designed-in Dangers of the American Automobile, Grossman, 1965.
[5] Robert Buckhorn,
Nader: The People’s Lawyer, 1972. Cited by a CounterPunch Wire: “Nader’s Legislative Record in the 1990s: More than Kerry and Bush combined,”
CounterPunch, March 3, 2004.
[6] Lewis H. Lapham, “A Citizen in Full: Ralph Nader Campaigns for President with a Course in Civics,”
Harper’s, September 2004, p. 38.
[7] One of his staunchest critics has been Bruce Jackson, SUNY Distinguished Professor and Samuel P. Capen Professor of American Culture at the University of Buffalo. Two articles set the tone: “George and Ralph: Separated at Birth” and “Open Letter to Naderites,” in
CounterPunch, February 23 and 28/29, 2004, respectively.
[8] Cf. footnote 1.
[9] Maura Kelly, “Nader Calls for Bush to be Impeached,”
Associated Press, April 6, 2004.
[10] Please see footnote 1.
[11] William Saletan and Avi Zenilman’s profile of Kucinich in
Slate magazine listed Kucinich’s net worth as between $2,000 and $45,000, June 10, 2003.
[12]
www.muhajabah.com
[13] Press release, “Kucinich Calls for Suspension of Electronic Voting.” April 23, 2004.
[14] Rick Lyman, “Down but Not Out, Kucinich Keeps On Fighting,”
New York Times, May 17, 2004.
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