Smash the Nader Backlash

After eight years of countenancing welfare repeal, stagnant social spending, commercial logging in national forests, a forced mass march into managed health care, 10 million more without health insurance, and a doubling of the number of Americans behind bars, Democratic liberals finally found something to get outraged over: Ralph Nader.

A week after this bizarre election, I am blue in the face from arguing that Al Gore's predicament is exclusively his own fault. I find it curious that Democrats have dispatched Jesse Jackson and an army of Democratic National Committee lawyers to Florida to crusade for the sanctity of each individual ballot while, at the same time, continuing to demonize Nader supporters for voting their consciences. My only personal regret is that I had but one ballot to cast for Ralph.

Meanwhile, the roasting of Nader continues unabated. AFL-CIO President John Sweeney went as far as to call Nader's campaign "reprehensible." So regardless of who eventually triumphs in the Florida micro-count, it seems inevitable that the ugly breach opened this season between Naderites and Democratic "progressives" is bound to be a factor in the next phase of domestic oppositional politics.

This, then, is a good moment to try and sum up what was won by the Green campaign, where it goes from here, and what is to be done about the Big Split.

First the good news: The Nader campaign was able to present a reform, anti-corporate agenda to a couple of hundred thousand Americans. Yes, the Greens fell two points short of the 5 percent total they needed for federal matching funds, but a full 2.5 million voters did respond to Nader's radical call. And Nader must be credited for engaging unknown numbers of otherwise cynical young activists and newly minted voters.

Before the vote, Green parties had ballot access in 24 states. After the vote, that number may go as high as 40. Further, there are now dozens, perhaps scores, of congressional and legislative districts coast to coast in which the newly emerged Green margin will loom as the swing vote -- forcing Democrats to accommodate and negotiate. This is only positive. The hysterical moanings that the Greens will now run against and spoil the chances for such stalwart liberal Democrats as Minnesota's Sen. Paul Wellstone or Wisconsin's Sen. Russell Feingold can be discounted. Green strategists know that campaigns in those districts would be nothing short of suicide.

The challenge for Nader now is how to most effectively use the network he has assembled into the sort of "watchdog party" that he promised in the final days of the campaign. He's got a funding base of 75,000 campaign donors and a database of thousands of volunteers and organizers. He's got several hundred new campus-based groups that supported him. And with either Gore or Bush in the White House, Nader will have a juicy menu of issues before him, ranging from campaign finance reform to media reform to fair trade.

The bad news is that the obstacles in Nader's path are formidable. The biggest problem is probably the Green Party itself -- which is actually multiple decentralized parties scattered throughout the states. Some of its newer incarnations, such as in Texas, show promising signs of broad outreach. But too many of the Green enclaves are insular, marginal echo chambers for a progressive-to-radical fringe.

I have spent a lot of time reporting among the Greens and I always come away with equal amounts of admiration and horror: admiration for the serious and thoughtful activists among their ranks, and stone cold horror for the collection of wingnuts and goofballs all around them. The menu of litmus tests for becoming a Green -- ranging from a marked counterculturalism to a sympathy for vegan cuisine -- is currently too demanding and too narrow to be viable and effective.