Looking for Mr. Nader

Where's Ralph? That's what many enthusiastic supporters of Nader's 2000 presidential campaign have been asking. Even though more people were paying attention to politics during the Florida election mess than they were during the campaign, Nader chose not to go to the Sunshine State. Nor has there been a coordinated effort to mobilize the tens of thousands of active Naderites recruited during the campaign to take their energy into the Green Party, let alone any serious attempt to enroll rank-and-file Nader voters as Greens. Indeed, Nader himself is still not a Green Party member. Nor has any organization been formed to give those Nader supporters who are not prepared to join the Greens another vehicle for independent, issues- oriented political action. So what's going on?

Ask Nader, and he maintains he has been doing a lot. "It's very hard to get press attention, much more so than in the campaign," he says. Undoubtedly true -- but Nader gave no press conferences of his own in December or January, and sent out only two press releases; nor did he stage any media events with pizzazz.

And what about Florida? "Medea Benjamin represented the Greens in Florida," he says, "and she did a great job." But the Green Senate candidate from California garnered no national media attention of the kind Nader might have, given the thousands of hours of airtime the cable news networks devoted to the endless squabbling over the vote count.

As for the Greens, Nader says he hasn't become a member because, "I don't want to get involved in Green Party internal disputes and struggles -- if I was a member, I'd have to take sides." Besides, adds Nader -- who has made it evident he almost certainly intends to run another presidential campaign in 2004 -- "we've got to appeal to the independent vote" that includes "tens of millions" whose concerns extend beyond the Greens' agenda "and historically, I've never joined any party."

As to his invisibility during the confirmation hearings for Bush's cabinet, Nader says the Democrats shut him out: "I sent letters to [Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick] Leahy -- we even had one hand-delivered -- asking to testify against John Ashcroft, and he didn't even have the courtesy to respond." He also tried to testify against Spencer Abraham and Gale Norton, but was refused.

Why, then, didn't Nader hold a press conference denouncing the spineless Senate Dems for their token opposition to Ashcroft -- who lied repeatedly without challenge at his hearing -- and their failure to seriously contest the anti-environmental appointments of the reactionary Norton and the polluter-friendly new EPA head, Christie Todd Whitman? And when the Democrats symbolized their moral bankruptcy by choosing notorious bagman and fixer Terry McAuliffe as chair of the Democratic National Committee, where were the salvos from Nader? "Well," he says weakly, "I've done a lot of all this on radio."

Nader repeatedly emphasizes how preoccupied he has been trying to comply with the Federal Election Commission regulations governing campaign spending and the transition out of campaign mode, including restrictions on how campaign staff can be deployed to other activities. (Nader's Washington campaign office is still open, but down to a skeleton staff.) "The FEC-dictated process is very strict and very complicated," Nader notes, adding, "did you know that it costs $5,000 a month just to rent the software for FEC compliance?"

But as one who publicly supported Nader's candidacy in 2000 and his symbolic non-campaign of 1996, I feel compelled to be frank: These excuses sound to anyone steeped in politics like "the FEC ate my homework." Clearly, there's more to Nader's absence from the public scene than he's willing to admit.