Tuesday, March 18, 2003

A few more complaints and predictions on March Madness Hyperbole. 2:35:25 PM    Let's hear it. []

Nader, Nader, Nader   I have been thinking about Ralph Nader lately, especially after reading Charles Taylor's piece in Salon last week.    It is my opinion, cynical as it may be, that idealism in voting has no place at a national level.    And I'll digress for a minute here and explain that I make a huge distinction between national politics and local politics--that is, votes for local/state officials and President/Congress.  The distinction is based on the reality that national level politics are so infused with money, entrenched power, the major political parties, and corporate interests that it is presently beyond the power of the Greens or anyone else to have a positive impact.  However, it is definitely possible for an impact to be made on a local/state level, where the money and parties and corporations are less involved and consequently there is more room for positive change.  Further, I believe that change at the national level cannot be top down--it must be bottom up--and consequently it is not only possible to create change at a local level, but it is NECESSARY to start at the local level.    In my view, votes at the national level, because of the nature of the system, should be made on the basis of their potential impact (particularly, perhaps exclusively) in the case of brutally close elections, which everyone was aware was the case in 2000.  Voting idealistically--"voting your conscience", as Brent put it--is, on its face, perfectly admirable.  But, to me, votes mean something beyond making a statement or pleasing yourself.  A vote on the national level (and, to a much smaller degree, on the local level) is a tally in the column of a person who will make life and death decisions--or it's a tally in the column of someone who won't but who takes tallies from someone else.  Voting, to me, is a Machiavellian exercise.    I have read that every Nader voter should be proud.  And I'm not trying to take that away--I'm hoping to minimize hostility here.  My question is, proud of what?  Proud that they took a stand and didn't vote for a candidate you didn't like much?  That seems very reasonable at first blush.  Absolutely.   But....   Is voting an end in itself?  Does the outcome of elections--determined by votes--mean nothing?  If the outcome of the election is the point, then the concrete impact of a vote must supersede the amorphous notion of pride in the vote you cast.  After all, it is the outcome that matters once election day is done.  When I cast my vote, I consider how my admittedly small contribution of a vote will affect the outcome of an election, and what that means for policy.  This is particularly/exclusively true, again, at the national level, because I think idealism will be lost in the money, but the sheer number of votes will matter.   As to how this relates to the Nader campaign, of course, this presupposes that Nader's candidacy had an impact on the outcome of the 2000 election.  And let me say that I fully agree that Bush voters and the Gore campaign are the ones who did this.  But the fact remains that a huge number of people who would otherwise have voted for Gore decided to vote for Nader. Not every Nader voter was a Gore supporter, but you'll never convince me that of the (if I remember correctly) over 100,000 Floridians who voted for Nader, 540 of those wouldn't have voted for Gore in a Nader-less election. The election was staggeringly close, and everyone KNEW it was going to be staggeringly close.  If this hadn't been clear, all of the vote-swapping schemes wouldn't have existed.     Finally, two points regarding the "It has to get worse to get better" notion.  Nader voters simply cannot have it both ways--they absolutely cannot claim credit for making it worse/then better while simultaneously claiming that Nader's presence did not swing the election result.  EITHER Nader's campaign was partly (and yes, I know that it's only partly) responsible for Bush's presidency, or they had no practical impact whatsoever.    Second, I must say that it's awfullyeasy for most Nader voters to talk cavalierly about making it worse.   Most of us aren't particularly affected by Bush's presidency.  I know I'm not.  It's easy to use your very nice computer to write that "things have to get worse" and then send those words out using your high-speed connection.  But if you're one of the estimated 4,700 mothers and 77,000 kids who will die because of Bush's gag rule on family planning, then it's not so easy to dismiss "making it worse".  Or if you're one of the millions of people who will get caught up in the criminal justice system for the next 15-20 years after Bush gets to make life-long Judiciary appointments.  Or if you're a victim of Ashcroft's attacks on civil rights and privacy. Or if you use medicinal marijuana.  Or if you're an Iraqi citizen, right?    I do not agree with Taylor's seeming conclusion that Nader voters are to blame for the Bush administration or the state of the country right now.  I don't believe that, and I do hope that no one takes offense to what I'm saying.  My larger point is that votes have consequences.  And, in the case of national elections, pragmatics should overwhelm idealism until such a time as idealism has a chance to matter in anything other than a negative way. 1:52:01 PM    Let's hear it. []