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 Recent commentary from National Journal: Social Studies: On Same-Sex Marriage, Bush Failed The Public And Himself (March 10, 2004) President Bush's support of a constitutional ban on gay marriage amounts to a failure of moral and political vision, and of empathy and imagination. By Jonathan Rauch. Legal Affairs: Should Foreign Law Be Used to Interpret Our Constitution? (March 10, 2004) Conservatives are not alone in worrying about the dangers to our democracy of importing laws and constitutional principles crafted by intellectual elites abroad. By Stuart Taylor Jr. Media: A Controversial Primer (March 10, 2004) There's a method to controversies—identifiable patterns, behaviors, and tendencies. By William Powers. Wealth of Nations: George Bush and the Labor Market: Like Father, Like Son? (March 3, 2004) If the flight of jobs overseas is not the cause of the current labor-market malaise, what is? And at what point will job growth start to match the economy's growth in output? By Clive Crook. Legal Affairs: 'Enemy Combatants': Inching Toward Due Process (March 3, 2004) The Bush administration's handling of alleged "enemy combatants" at Guantanamo Bay shows signs of paying more heed to the rule of law. By Stuart Taylor Jr. Political Pulse: Positively Negative? (March 3, 2004) John Edwards needs to prove two things to Democrats on Super Tuesday. First, that he is electable. And second, that John Kerry isn't. Otherwise, he faces a long, difficult day. By William Schneider. Media: Cold Feet (March 3, 2004) We may look back one day and wonder why media coverage of the gay-marriage issue never kicked in to the old, familiar fight-for-justice story line evident in the civil-rights struggles of the 1960s. By William Powers. More from National Journal. |
Political Pulse 
The Nader Calculation
Ralph Nader draws a different lesson from 2000 than most others do. He thinks the election gave him clout. by William Schneider .... Democrats have good reason to be freaked out that Ralph Nader is running for president. Look at what he did to Al Gore in 2000. The TV networks' exit poll in 2000 asked Nader voters what they would have done had Nader not been on the ballot. Thirty percent of his supporters said they would not have voted at all. The rest said they would have voted for Gore over George W. Bush, by a ratio of better than 2-to-1 (48 percent to 22 percent). Remember the agony of Florida? Nader got nearly 97,500 votes there. And Bush carried Florida by just 537. Democrats certainly haven't forgotten. "Every major liberal and progressive group who has supported the causes that [Nader] has worked on told him not to run," Democratic National Committee Chairman Terry McAuliffe said after Nader announced his bid. It makes sense to vote for Nader only if you honestly think it makes no difference whether Bush is re-elected or the Democrats win. Does Nader think it makes no difference? "It's a question between both parties flunking; one with a D-minus—the Republicans; one with a D-plus—the Democrats," Nader said on Meet the Press. Nader calls his campaign a "national liberation movement for the Democratic Party," aimed at keeping the Democrats from drifting too close to the center. The Nation, which shares that mission, published an editorial telling Nader, "The overwhelming mass of voters with progressive values ... have only one focus this year: to beat Bush. Any candidacy seen as distracting from that goal will be excoriated by the entire spectrum of potentially progressive voters. If you run, you will separate yourself, probably irrevocably, from any ongoing relationship with this energized mass of activists." Nader's response on Meet the Press? "We can't just sit back like The Nation magazine and betray its own traditions and the liberal intelligentsia, and once again settle for the least worst." Nader's real beef is with the two-party system. Of course, people have to vote for the lesser of two evils. That's how a two-party system works. Nader seems to think legions of unhappy conservatives are ready to vote for him. "We hope to show that, increasingly, corporations are trampling conservative values," he said at the National Press Club. "Conservatives and independents who are very upset with the Bush administration's policies are left with two options: vote for the Democrats, which is unlikely, or vote for an independent ticket." Even though conservatives do have complaints about Bush (his immigration proposal, for example, and the massive budget deficit), no evidence suggests they are ready to abandon the president in large numbers, and certainly not for Nader. In 2000, Nader was on the ballot in 43 states and the District of Columbia. Running as an independent in 2004 will make it harder for him to get on the ballot. He could still run as a minor-party candidate in states where those parties have a ballot line and accept him as their nominee. With the aid of minor parties, Nader could gain access to ballots in 50 states and D.C. by collecting approximately 620,000 signatures nationwide. He received five times that many votes in 2000. Nader could be in a position to help Democrats make their case against Bush. "I'd like to make a personal statement to Terry McAuliffe, John Kerry, John Edwards, and ex-Governor Dean," Nader said: "Relax. Rejoice that you have another front carrying the ancient but unfulfilled pretensions and aspirations of the Democratic Party." Moreover, Nader says the voters he will bring out could help Democrats running for Congress. "I would help deserving congressional candidates in key swing districts, because I want the Democrats to recover the House or the Senate, or both," he said at the Press Club. Most of Nader's supporters from 2000 will probably not vote for him a second time, for one simple reason: They know what happened last time. In 2000, a vote for Nader was a vote for Bush. They might not have realized it then. They know it now. What about the Deaniacs? Some fans of former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean are so unhappy that their guy was spurned by the Democrats that they are toying with the idea of supporting Nader. They might be even more likely to do so if Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts is the Democratic nominee. There is no love lost between Dean and Kerry, and Dean supporters in several states rushed to endorse Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina in a move to stop Kerry, whom they regard as the ultimate Washington insider. Dean's message to his supporters? Get over it. "I will support the nominee of our party," Dean said in his withdrawal statement on February 18. "I will do everything I can to beat George W. Bush. I urge you to do the same." On February 23, Dean elaborated in a statement aimed at supporters tempted to vote for Nader: "If George W. Bush is re-elected, the health, safety, consumer, environmental, and open-government provisions Ralph Nader has fought for will be undermined.... It will be government by, of, and for the corporations—exactly what Ralph Nader has struggled against." Why is Nader running? He draws a different lesson from 2000 than most others do. He seems to think the 2000 election gave him clout. After all, he determined the outcome. So this time, he feels that Democrats have to pay attention to what he says.
What do you think? Discuss this article in the Politics & Society conference of Post & Riposte. More from National Journal. More on politics and society in Atlantic Unbound and The Atlantic Monthly. William Schneider is the Cable News Network's senior political analyst. He is also a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C., and a contributing editor for the Los Angeles Times, National Journal, and The Atlantic Monthly. His column appears every week in National Journal, a weekly magazine covering politics and government published in Washington, D.C. For information on National Journal Group publications, see NationalJournal.com. Copyright © 2003 by The Atlantic Monthly Group. All rights reserved. | [an error occurred while processing this directive] | ||
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