[Marxism] Anti-Nader shock troops

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx>]

Salon.com, Feb. 22, 2004
From tragedy to farce
He's running for president as an independent, not as a Green. He has no 
organization. He's starting late. Does Ralph Nader's narcissism have no bounds?

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
By Todd Gitlin

Ralph Nader's narcissism has metastasized to such proportions that he came 
forward to announce his candidacy without being able to brandish a single 
one of the celebrities who surrounded him in 2000 -- not Michael Moore, not 
Tim Robbins or Susan Sarandon, not Patti Smith. In fact, more important, he 
cannot offer the Green Party, whose nomination he disdains to seek -- so 
much for his claim that he is the principled champion of third parties and 
their indispensability in American history. To the struggle against 
"corporate-occupied territory," Nader offers only himself. La troisième 
partie, c'est moi. He has gone way over into flying saucer territory. He 
occupies an Area 51 of his own. Will he make the headquarters of his 
campaign in Roswell, N. M.?


full: 
http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2004/02/22/nader_candidacy/index_np.html

===

Todd Gitlin, former leader of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), and 
now a sociology professor at New York University, says the backlash helped 
elect Richard Nixon. Gitlin believes Hubert Humphrey, as president, would 
have been under far more pressure within his party to end American 
involvement quickly.

Gitlin: Among those who bear the blame for that turn of events, the ?68 
default, are those militants in the anti-war movement who didn?t vote for 
Humphrey. I don?t exempt myself. Most people I know, including myself, 
didn?t vote for president that year. That was a big mistake.

full: http://www.americanradioworks.org/features/vietnam/us/waragainstwar.html

===

NY Times, February 23, 2004
Nader, Gadfly to the Democrats, Will Again Run for President
By ADAM NAGOURNEY and JIM RUTENBERG

Brushing aside urgent appeals from his own friends and Democratic leaders, 
Ralph Nader announced yesterday that he would run again for president this 
year, sending shudders through the camps of Democratic presidential 
candidates just as they had grown hopeful about unseating President Bush.

Mr. Nader said in an interview that he would seek to get his name as an 
independent candidate on the ballot in all 50 states. He rejected the 
notion that he was the spoiler who helped Mr. Bush win in 2000 and would do 
the same in 2004.

(clip)

The Rev. Al Sharpton, a Democratic presidential candidate this year, 
provided Mr. Nader a platform at his headquarters in Harlem in 2000. But 
Mr. Sharpton said in a telephone interview yesterday that he would campaign 
across the nation urging Democrats to reject Mr. Nader.

"The only reason he's running is either he's an egomaniac or as a Bush 
contract," Mr. Sharpton said. "What's the point? This is not 2000 when 
progressives were locked out. I'm going on a national crusade to stop 
Nader. This is only going to help Bush."

===

Village Voice, February 5th, 2004 8:20 AM
A Bush Covert Operative Takes Over Al Sharpton's Campaign
by Wayne Barrett with special reporting by Adam Hutton and Christine Lagorio

Roger Stone, the longtime Republican dirty-tricks operative who led the mob 
that shut down the Miami-Dade County recount and helped make George W. Bush 
president in 2000, is financing, staffing, and orchestrating the 
presidential campaign of Reverend Al Sharpton.

Though Stone and Sharpton have tried to reduce their alliance to a 
curiosity, suggesting that all they do is talk occasionally, a Voice 
investigation has documented an extraordinary array of connections. Stone 
played a pivotal role in putting together Sharpton's pending application 
for federal matching funds, getting dollars in critical states from family 
members and political allies at odds with everything Sharpton represents. 
He's also helped stack the campaign with a half-dozen incongruous top aides 
who've worked for him in prior campaigns. He's even boasted about 
engineering six-figure loans to Sharpton's National Action Network (NAN) 
and allowing Sharpton to use his credit card to cover thousands in NAN 
costs?neither of which he could legally do for the campaign. In a 
wide-ranging Voice interview Sunday, Stone confirmed his matching-fund and 
staffing roles, but refused to comment on the NAN subsidies.

full: http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0405/barrett.php


Louis Proyect
Marxism list: www.marxmail.org 


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