I was disappointed at first to hear he was thinking about it. What does he have that is better than Kucinich? Totally nothing, he is as appealing a candidate as Ed Rosenthal. Yeah a great guy, NOT a president. Why run?

I guess we will find out. I would be happier to be hearing he is endorsing Obama and was going to be heading up a product/food safety watch dog group, an issue we moms REALLY care about. And in exchange Obama is against all nuclear and other deadly pollution. We can hope, maybe it is theatrics to build the team.

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If Obama wins the primary,
I'm voting for Nader

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We need some kind of concerted action against a Nader candidacy.

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Nader is a spoiler. He would not make a good President. The only thing he can do is spoil the vote for Obama or Clinton. He caqn do no good for America. As an activist, he is a poor example of a human being. Just what we need... A man with rotten teeth to represent America to the world. A vote for Nader is support for the Republican war machine.

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I supported Edwards-now that he's out, I'm supporting Obama. I don't care much for Hillary. But if she should win the nomination, I will vote for her !!! The Democrats have been in a circular firing squad for years.
Just think what we could accomplish if we worked together and presented a united front.

This time, the Repubs are fractured and in disarray over McCain. This is our best chance we have to pull together, stop our bickering and put a Dem ( any Dem ) in the White House. We can start to undo the horrendous damage of the last 7 years, make us proud to be Americans again and show the world we've regained our senses.

If you simply cannot support the Democratic nominee ( whoever it may be ), please don't vote for Nader. Just vote the other races on the ticket and leave the presidential one blank. That's as eloquent a protest as voting for Nader ( or McCain ) and does no damage.

Third ( and fourth! ) parties may indeed be a viable option soon and I would welcome them. But go through the primary process like everyone else. Don't just decide to jump in at the last minute. Work your way up-get elected to the House or Senate first and "do your homework".

The fact that Nader's considering a run now reveals his desire to be a spoiler and just "stir the pot". If had been serious about it, he would have started when everybody else did. And ditto for Bloomberg.

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I swear if he F$$KS this up again...I will stop there.

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He loves getting his name in the paper and having some control, power, he is no different from any other very ordinary politician in that way. He has gotten to full of himself and needs a party every four years to remind himself how wonderful he is, spoiler is right, pathetic too.

Nadar is a one issue candidate, he is old old news. He has little if anything to offer on the war, our national defense, international relations, or our economy. He is lame and STUPID if he does this, few will appreciate it, most will laugh or ignore him, quite a few will certainly shame him as the spoiler he is.

He WILL get his face on the news though!

WTF!!! If you can't lend a hand get the hell out of our way!!!

STOP MESSING WITH OUR DEMOCRACY TO FUCKING SUIT YOURSELVES!

But you know, WHATEVER! BARACK WILL BEAT MCPAIN WITHOUT YOU! BRING NADAR ON! HE IS BLOODY DEPRESSING AND BORING, NO ONE WILL CARE AND FEWER WILL GIVE HIM THEIR VOTE!

YES WE WILL, YES WE WILL, YES WE WILL SAY NO TO 100 MORE YEARS!

VOTE OBAMA '08 FOR CHANGE WE CAN BELIEVE IN!

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I don't think it will happen this time.

Gore was not charismatic, did not generate the excitement that Obama does. So you'll have less voters seeking a third party alternative like Nader.

Plus many voters already believe that Nader is a spoiler. For Nader to even consider a third party run now reaffirms that belief. More likely Nader will suffer a backlash from people as a result.

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Jesus, Ralph. Are you happy that your crap, no possible way to win candicy put the son of a b--- IN the white house? The votes you garnered in Florida determined his victory. GOD, please stick your advocacy from outside. Remember this: only about 2% of republicans agree with any of your positions. On the other hand Democrats support you to a high degree. EXCEPT WHEN YOU SABOTAGE THE ELECTION. You would drain votes from US. Democrats! Rise to the call of sacrifice. STAY OUT OF THE RACE!! PLEASE.

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They should adopt some of his policy positions like single payer health care, reducing the military budget, etc.

Illegal attempts to keep him off ballots, and slander of an activist who has devoted nearly 40 years of his life to progressive politics don't help their cause.

What Dems seem to forget is that there are many progressives who aren't Democrats and never have been. If they want their votes they need to start adopting a more progressive platform.

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"So I think there’s never enough forces of justice, Amy. There’s never enough forces of justice to combat the concentration of power in the hands of the few used against the many in our country, representing giant corporations who basically have turned Washington into corporate-occupied territory."

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Progressives who vote for Nader are not thinking clearly and are throwing away their votes.
I'm sorry for those who didn't seen the handwriting on the wall in 2000, but now it's 8 years later!
Nader's a spoiler. I have no idea what he imagines he will do for the country.
But we don't have to go along. I understand that not everyone reading and writing here is a Democrat. But so what? It's hard to believe that many are McCain/Rove/Bush/Cheney etc etc Republicans. We need our Constitution back!

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I just voted for Obama (early) in the Ohio primary. If he gets the nomination, I will most likely support him in the general election as well. However, if Hillary gets nominated, I will be voting for Nader or writing in Ron Paul or supporting whoever else. We don't need another unrepentant Democratic hawk who is committed to corporate interests being the party's standard-bearer pushing it further to the right.

Having Hillary as the nominee would just be a bad strategical move for the Democrats. She has alienated the left and the right hates her. Howard Dean was correct in '04 when he said that the Dems are not going to beat the GOP by running a candidate that is too similar to George Bush. I think the same can be said for this race too. Hillary was beholden to the Bush agenda when it served her short term needs. She'd like to erase her history of voting along with the GOP, but what's done is done and she'll have to deal with the fact that there are voters who won't overlook her opportunism.

Having Nader in the race is ultimately good for the progressive community because he provides incentive for whoever the nominee is to not forget about the left. If he, or someone else, does not serve as left-wing competition, the Dem nominee will be tempted to drift to the right in the general election to gain votes from McCain.

This is supposed to be a multiparty democracy, so the more candidates the better.

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I swore, when the Democrats failed the country so disastrously in 2002 and 2004, that I would vote only for progressives, effectively for no Democrat other than Kucinich, so if Nader runs on a platform of troop withdrawal and genuine single-payer universal health insurance like Kucinich proposed, he'll have my vote. George Bush's rogue-nation presidency is not Nader's fault, it's the fault of people who wanted a progressive candidate but voted Democrat instead last time.

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While I do NOT want McCain as the POTUS nor do I have any love for Nader, I do want to point out a fallacy that is driven by emotional thinking.

In a McCain v. Obama race with Nader as a minor 3rd party candidate, a vote for Nader is NOT a vote for McCain. All it is is a vote that went to neither of the two primary candidates and it is arithmetically equivalent to a blank vote or staying home. A few people have said "don't vote Nader, just leave it blank if you must" but there is no difference between those two choices because leaving it blank or voting for Nader does not change the tallies for McCain and Obama. The only thing that changes their tallies is voting directly for one of them.

Why should someone vote for Nader rather than leaving it blank since there is no arithmetic difference on the final tally? Well, it does officially send a measurable signal that they are saying "none of the above."

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Hey Cynthia McKinney is running for the Green Party isn't she? http://www.allthingscynthiamckinney.com/

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...but NOT one bit of evidence so far that his STANCE on ISSUES is the worst or NOT the most progressive. Sounds like mostly like Faux News. here.

If you do NOT want my vote to go third party, you will have to deal with facts...or don't Democraps do that anymore? You sound like the Repukes of this day and age.

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Nader is running. If Dems are interested in why people support Ralph, they can take a quick look at his issues list.

If Dems want to attract those of us who hold think these are important issues, they need to start talking about these in a substantial way.

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...I do not want to leave it.

While I am not quite at the point of this quote: ‘I had a place to go when the Democratic Party left me,’ I am looking for this alternative for the first time in my life.

This was among the choicer words spoken in Fort Worth Feb. 10 by former Democratic Congresswoman and current Green Party presidential candidate Cynthia McKinney.

McKinney noted that, as a Congresswoman, some of the legislation she proposed, along with what she saw as a insubstantial yet substantial issue, a rejected attempt by party consultants to style her up, led her both to be marginalized within the Democratic caucus and to realize she had common issues with Greens.

Among that legislation she proposed was an attempt to ban depleted uranium from use in tank and artillery shells, banning tax breaks for companies moving businesses/factories overseas, and voting reform legislation that would have included instant runoff voting. Not surprisingly, all but three of the above three items were passed by Congress, the last in part because, of course, it threatens the two-party monopoly.

Top issues she mentioned included ending the war in Iraq, ending privatizing of prisons (Amen to that), learning from the success of “people power” in Latin America, and more attention to 9/11 “truthers” (a pet subject of hers, and NO amen to that on my part, especially as it was the second conspiracy theory item I heard at the event).

Other choice quotes:

Referring to the financial side of the two-party monopoly, she said, “We are all the same people. We get our money from the same people.”

On the work involved with doing the right thing, she said. “It’s easy for Nancy Pelosi, to ascend to the highest place (a woman has reached) .. and then say, ‘Impeachment is off the table.’”

Ironically, Teddy Roosevelt started the Progressive party after losing the first time. People are looking for an alternative to the dittohead parties we have today, and so am I. The time may have come. I am not Green yet, but a third party is a definite option this year unless my disappointing, pathetic actually, party shapes up.

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Ralph Nader is a has been, that will be lucky to get a few thousand votes nation wide. I say
ignore the guy. He is a loser who ruined his
once great legacy by giving us George Bush.
I wouldn't give 5 minutes of worry over a Nader
candidacy.

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In 2000, after the Nader candidacy indirectly led to Fuhrer Bush's "election" by taking much needed votes from Gore in Florida, Nader, speaking to a group of supporters, actually relished in his political significance. He was actually proud he had helped elect Bush. America be damned, I guess!
Well, now Nader seems to again want to split the proverbial baby.
I really don't care how much I agree or don't agree with Nader, with Kucinich, with Paul, etc. Third party candidacies could likely get McCain elected this time around. Even Hillary, let alone Obama, would be FAR better a president than McCain (who has been moving to the far Right lately).
I may have voted for Nader in 2000, but I certainly won't make THAT mistake again!

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There's a reason why the congress has the worst approval rating in years. There's a reason why the president has the worst approval rating in years. It's because both Republicans AND Democrats are whores to corporations and they don't give a rats ass about the people.
Someone needs to come in and fuck things up, and Obama will not be that man my friends. He's not for empowering the people like Nader is. Go Nader! He has my support.

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In his unwavering progressivism, Nader embodies the values of this website more than Clinton or Obama. Beyond that, Nader has accomplished more in this country than Clinton, Obama and McCain put together, without question. The man is a living legend, in my eyes.

Why are liberals attacking this man for challenging the two party system as it is currently constituted? I know a significant number of people on this website agree with Nader's criticisms of that system, that the parties are corporate-infused, that the Democrats are spineless and don't honor liberal values.

This article and the articles like it that will surely follow are all motivated by a realpolitik outlook that I find revolting when it comes from liberals. If you believe in Obama or Clinton, vote for them. If you see it as a "lesser of two evils" situation then vote for Nader or another independent. It's as simple as that. If Nader takes votes from Obama or Clinton, maybe the Democrats need to more carefully consider the ideas of the liberal wing of their party.

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Haaahaaaa! Nader is running.. How dare he!!? What, you think this is a democracy??

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Dear hysterical Democrats,

Why are you so arrogant as to assume that all americans left of center are on your side?

Why do you think that just because y'all have a candidate or two who makes nice speeches about change and is not a War Pig Republican that all of a sudden everyone on the left owes your candidate allegience?

Why do you continue to live under this collective fantasy that most of us who voted for Nader would have voted for your little corporate whore puppet candidates even if you held guns to our heads?

y'all scream and moan about Nader and his supporters as if we actually have something in common with y'all.

NewsFlash: We don't. Y'all are collaborationist supporters of an Imperial War Party that is part and parcel of the corporate oligarchy that is ruining this country and indeed, the entire planet. And since y'all are a bunch of do-nothings during non-elections years you can...

take your whining and piss off. Y'all have no right to lecture us on how to vote and who gets to run for president.

Most of y'all were sitting on the couch doing NOTHING while Bill Clinton and the big money Dems implemented a Republican economic and foreign policy agenda in the 1990's.

If you ask me your vitriolic hatred for Mr. Nader and his supporters has more to do over all y'alls guilt at being election year activists (and that in name and internet blather only) and doing nothing while the Dems fiddled during the sack of America and the planet by Corporate War-Mongering Huns.

Sorry, but for those of us who were trying to make change (and not just with nice speeches, either) during the Corporate reign of terror of the 90's, we get to vote for who we want to. We don't need a bunch of spineless liberals (who stood by and let the Dems promote NAFTA, the WTO, the Salvage Rider, the decade long intermittent bombing of Iraq, the savage exploitation of Appalachia and poor people everywhere, and countess other crimes against humanity and the planet) tell us who to vote for or make us feel guilty for not falling in line with the great liberal hallucination of change through Corporate controlled Politics.

Stop acting like we are some wayward leftists who need to sheparded or guilt tripped back into the fold. Your folds sucks and gets nothing done and I won't play along no matter how much you whine, complain, cajole or even make threats.

The radicals owe you nothing. We will pay you nothing (in votes or support or whatever) and we will vote our consciences when and where we please.

All this whining and hand-ringing is pathetic anyway. If y'all really support the Dems, shut the fuck up and get out from in front of your computer and go register people to vote and take whatever measures you feel are necessary to prevent the massive voter fraud that happened in 2000 and 2004 from happening again. That fraud accounted for more of a vote count difference between Corporate Whore Number One and his "opposition" than all the far left votes put together.

have a nice day and please stop whining - it is unbecoming of Citizens of free will and it makes all y'all look like a buch of complaining whining spineless do nothing conservative talk radio listeners.

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Isn't it oddly ironic that the moment it looks like Barack Obama my be the winner suddenly the Nader-bot is
activated.

These globalist elite really know how to manipulate the herd you really gotta give them credit for that!

Would Naderbot be activated if it was a safe Bilary versus Insane (i mean McCain)? No I doubt that seriously.

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Some say it's incorrect to blame Nader for Bush's victory in 2000. I think they're right. The people who are responsible are the Nader voters, not Nader.

I also voted for Nader in 2000. I did it in a state that was solidly for Gore. I rationalized that I deserve a pass because my vote was a noble vote, a protest vote, and because the state was safely in Gore's column there was no risk in it.

But I've come to realize I deserve no pass on it. I'm just as culpable as the 90-some-thousand Nader voters in Florida, and every Nader voter nationwide, because all that did was put Nader on a hyper-inflated ego trip since, motivating his run in 2004 and now 2008.

So here we sit, with a warmongering, double-talking torture-victim-cum-authorizer now the nominee of the Republicans. As a ninety-plus percent supporter of Bush policies, he will guarantee uninterrupted continuity to every reckless policy these criminals have implemented. He's a guy who glibly sang "bomb Iran" to the tune of some gleeful Beach Boys song, who is unabashedly for a hundred year occupation and more war, and this ill-tempered septuagenarian may well end up with the nuclear codes in his possession despite our most concerted efforts.

Thanks to a compliant media who have reconstructed the Humpty Dumpty that was his reputation, independents love him again -- and those are the very votes needed to defeat him.

So, in the face of this threat, Nader runs yet again, and for sure, some independent progressives, pure of heart, slow of wit, and belligerently self-righteous, will waste their votes on him, lecture us all on "democracy" in the process, and... well, we'll just have to wait and see what happens, won't we?

What we know now is that here at this juncture, with a full-on crisis on so many fronts, any of which have the potential to cause untold damage to the very foundations of our nation, Nader chooses to siphon votes away from McCain's opponent...and it's all because we stroked Nader's ego.

Knowing the consequences, you, Mr. Nader, are a traitor to the very causes you claim to adovcate. For that you are responsible.

We, your former supporters, regret ever doing so and hopefully most of us will never make that mistake again. For the grievous mistake of ever supporting you in the first place, we are all responsible.

So, not this time, Ralph. Not this time, not next time, not any time.

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Do you all remember how back in 2000 there was a plan to "trade votes": liberal voters in swing states would vote for Gore in exchange for liberal voters in states safely red or blue voting for Nader?
This seemed like a good idea to me at the time. But...
Ralph Nader nixed that idea, telling his supporters not to engage in the vote-trading scheme.
Hence, Gore lost Florida to Bush by only about 500 votes, while Nader got almost 100000 votes in Florida.
Bottom line: Nader's bad political decision to discourage vote-trading may VERY likely be responsible for the last 7 years of the Hell we live in where Bush/Cheney is the devil who torments us liberals.
I cannot ever forgive Ralph Nader for that.
And then, right after the 2000 election anyway, Nader was actually proud he helped elect Bush.

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In the presidential race, vote with your mind, not your heart. Any democrat is better than another GOP slimeball. Ok, some of them aren't that far off, but at least they will get SOME progressive items passed.

If you really want to "make a statement" or some other drivel, why aren't you working harder to get Greens and other parties at the local and state level? Even the Congress? Why throw in a spoiler like Nader? He has no chance of winning without more political backing. He's an egomaniacal intern trying to become CEO.

If you're a progressive and you vote Nader, or you stay home, you are living in utopian idealism. I commend you for your spirit, but shame you for doing nothing. Better we get incremental improvements with the Dems than live in a fantasy world where someone like Nader, who will never win with the current system. You aren't going to change the system by throwing it away on a Nader vote. You need to start lower on the pole and work your way up for 3rd party viability.

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Nader announced this morning that he will run for president again. Allow me to play devil's advocate.

I WILL support and vote for the Democratic candidate this fall, whomever it might be. But it might be my last time, if they don't begin to show a LOT more spine. I'm fed up with the Reid/Pelosi cave-in strategy. Their behavior has raised the bar that Democrats MUST live up to over the next four years to retain my support. At a minimum, the next Dem administration (should they win) will HAVE to conduct serious investigations into possible crimes committed by the this one. Without that, I'll be out the door. And I'm skeptical it will happen.

So, in four years, I may find myself in the position Nader supporters do now, catching flak from Democrats for choosing a Green candidate. This year's Nader voters, who are all very aware of the calculus of the last several elections, may nonetheless be just one cycle ahead of me in disgust with how spineless the Democrats have been. Gore and Kerry each ran flawed campaigns, and didn't fight hard enough for their rightful votes. There is no shortage of reasons to be suspicious that behind the facade presented to the public, Dems are actually on board with the Repugs in many heinous ways.

Repeated polls over an extended period of time (including on this morning's "Meet the Press") have consistently shown that Obama would defeat McCain head-to-head, but Clinton would lose to McCain. It strikes me that the same scorn Dems pour on Nader voters ("Do you want us to lose again?"), should fairly be directed by Obama voters toward Clinton supporters.

Here's where I stand: My more-favored candidates, Kucinich then Edwards, have bailed. I lean slightly more toward Obama than Clinton, but neither of them has convinced me they'll do what I think is most important. Nonetheless, I'll support whomever gets the '08 Dem nomination. I say this to explain I have no strong interest in undermining Hillary. I'm simply looking at the bigger picture.

It strikes me that the same reasoning used to scorn Nader Voters ("Do you want us to lose again?"), also applies to Clinton supporters. It can fairly be used by Obama supporters to urge Hillary supporters to re-think their choice, and Clintonites should consider how their personal stubbornness in not supporting the Dem with the widest appeal may be putting the next presidency at risk.

Let's face it, the Clinton campaign has made some serious strategic errors, and has not lived up to their poll-expectations in the primaries. The belief this would change, and Hillary would do better than her poll-expectations next fall, stretches credulity. Are her supprorters willing to take that risk of losing the Oval Office in '08?

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