Hot News!
• Tea Party leader gets grilled by NAACP membership
On today's date in The Beacon archives, we published:
•Smitherman still saying the issue is about a “streetcar” (2009)•More on Amy Goodman’s Arrest and the Struggle for a Free Media (2008)
•Journalist Amy Goodman Unlawfully Arrested At RNC (2008)
•Seizing Illegal Guns—Thinking About 2% (2007)
•Information or Advertisements? (2007)
•Nick Lachey: “I have never supported George W. Bush.” (2007)
Contact Us
v mail: (513) 685-0678
e mail: click here
Saturday, February 23, 2008
Ralph Nader will be on NBC’s Meet the Press with Tim Russert this Sunday, February 24
Posted by Justin Jeffre
The most important part of the electoral process is to have a deep discussion about the direction of our nation. Nader has fought for the public interest for over 40 years and recently announced his Presidential Exploratory Committee. If Nader runs he will be the only candidate that proposes cutting the bloated military budget, adopting single payer Canadian-style national health insurance, election reform, tax relief for working people, repealing the Patriot Act, impeaching Bush/Cheney and opposing nuclear power among many others.
This is from the Nader Presidential Exploratory Committee.
As you know, we’ve been exploring the possibilities in recent weeks.
And here’s one question that keeps coming up:
What’s been pulled off the table by the corporatized political machines in this momentous election year?
Answer:
Cutting the huge, bloated and wasteful military budget, adopting a single payer Canadian-style national health insurance system, impeaching Bush/Cheney, opposing nuclear power - among many others.
Who will pick up these issues and put them back on the table?
Hope you get a chance to tune in to watch Ralph Nader this Sunday on Meet the Press.
Please tell your friends and family.
And thank you for your ongoing and generous support.
Onward
The Nader Team
PS: Remember to forward this message to your friends. If you received
this message from someone else, sign up here.
Paid for by the Nader 2008 Presidential Exploratory Committee
To find out more about Ralph Nader’s positions and bio go to http://www.votenader.org. To volunteer go to http://www.naderexplore08.org.
• Share This Article! | Listen to this article |
|  |
Register
Anonymous comments are allowed, but you can create an account above to stamp your name and to avoid typing the anti-spam code.
If you are not familiar with our rules for leaving comments, click here! The Cincinnati Beacon is not responsible for the contents of any comments. Comments do not represent the views of the moderators of The Cincinnati Beacon.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 License.
23 Feb 2008 at 09:05 pm | #
Nader’s purpose for running is not to win…it’s to take vote from Obama/Clinton and allow McCain to keep troops in Iraq for 100 years!
23 Feb 2008 at 09:54 pm | #
Oh-oh L.G. This presents a problem. When I say what you’ve said—and you’ve been much more harsh than I—it’s war. I’m called everything but, well, everything from insane to a liar to stupid to, inevitably, racist. How will Justin respond to these same inferences by someone that’s not a white female Democrat? I await with baited breath.
23 Feb 2008 at 11:47 pm | #
Race is not relevant to a discussion concerning Nader.
I don’t think my statement on Nader is harsh…it’s about being realistic. Nader doesn’t have a chance of winning. People who say that Nader could win the presidency are living on another planet. I’m an equal opportunist…the Republicans have messed things up for the past 7 1/2 years…it’s the Democrats’ turn. The bottom line is this country still is under a 2 party system. I will be a Democrat on March 4th, since I must to vote for my guy Barack Obama. We’ll see if I remain one. If I do, I’ll be one of the more moderate guys in the party.
24 Feb 2008 at 01:29 pm | #
LG is right- split the vote- let McCain walk into the White House. I swear he gets money under the table for this every election year when things get close.
He doesn’t stand a chance-but to split the votes of the Democrats and then just let Doubletalking-More Affairs than Clinton ever could have dreamed of having McCain and Drugs stealing wifie walk into the White House.
This is bad, very bad.
24 Feb 2008 at 02:32 pm | #
Nader got support from outside his party the last time he ran because neither Bush nor Kerry were talking about ending the occupation of Iraq. The Democrats need not worry about Nader, who netted about 464K votes, mainly due to his stance against the war. In 2008, we have a choice in Barack Obama, the only major party candidate who is against it. What the democrats need to worry about is muzzling Hillary, whose divisive antics will do more damage to the party than Nader could ever dream of.
24 Feb 2008 at 02:55 pm | #
LG and Great!
I think that Nader gave a good answer to the question you present. Did you not watch the program and if not why not?
Apparently you would rather shoot of your mouth with retorts rather that discussing Nader’s response. It is as if you are deaf to the other side of any discussion.
24 Feb 2008 at 06:37 pm | #
L.G., I’m surprised and disappointed by your political bigotry. Nader is running to represent single payer health care for all Americans because Obama has taken more health industry payola than McCain and even Clinton. Why must he allow HMO’s and the big insurance companies to make huge profits off of our health? Ahh, must be the money! They make a killing and he’s complicit.
Obama says he’s against the war, but he always votes to fund the war. If he was really against the war he wouldn’t vote to fund it. And he wouldn’t expand the already bloated Pentagon budget which is what he said he’ll do. We already spend more on our military than the rest of the world combined.
Nader is a better candidate on the issues and that’s why Obama and Clinton will refuse to debate him. They think they’re entitled to our votes and so do you. They have to earn our votes and Obomba’s generic talk of unity, hope and change rings hollow. There’s no real substance there.
Here we have the losing mentality of the lesser of two evils. Instead of demanding more out of your corporate candidate, you just say ‘hey, they’re not as bad as the other guy’. By putting no demands and pulling them in your direction you get taken for granted and the American people get taken every time. Instead of supporting the bipartisan corporate agenda we should support shifting power back to the people.
There’s nothing in the constitution about our country being a two party system. This alleged two party system is manufactured for the rich by the rich to give you the illusion of choice. Obama protectively imitates Hillary’s positions and takes them off of the table. Clinton is the candidate big business has already endorsed.
Both parties are bought and paid for. They both support an imperial foreign policy, a prison industrial complex and the most corrupt and inefficient health care system in the industrialized world. You should be able to see on a local level that there is no difference.
Imagine if there had been no third party of abolitionist. The Democrats and Whigs were entrenched in slavery then as the Democrats and Republicans are entrenched in the Corportocracy today. Third parties bring important issues to the forefront and make the major corporate parties take on those issues. That’s how the new deal and every other progressive change in our nation’s history came about.
Imagine if in business there was no competition, just two wings of a monopoly. That would stifle innovation. This mentality isn’t democratic and doesn’t move our country forward. We need more voices and more choices. You are living in a two party prison and you should really free your mind.
What’s Obama going to do about the rampant corporate crime, fraud and abuse going on in Iraq Afghanistan and here? You don’t know because he isn’t talking about it.
Great and get real, here we go with the Nader is irrelevant and yet he will swing the election argument. Corporate Democrats want to have it both ways, just like when they’re for the war and against it at the same time.
Nader is not for sale and he represents millions of Americans on the most important issues of the day. It is Clinton and Obama that are taking all that corporate and Republican money, not Nader.
dieterschmied, I’m glad you pointed that out. The fact is that Nader is right on the issues and that’s why the corporate Dem’s never really argue the issues. They just say he can’t win because he won’t raise as much money as the corporate candidates.
What they won’t tell you is how the Democratic Party harasses our signature gatherers and launches lawsuits to drain our funds and take up resources. They are even more undemocratic than the Republicans.
The only reason Obomba and Clinton have a chance of beating Nader is because the debates are controlled by the Republicrats so they shut him out, we have a corrupt campaign finance system and the corporate media gets the money from that system so they don’t cover people that would clean up this pay to play system where both parties sell us out to the highest bidder. You won’t hear Obama or Clinton talking about campaign finance reform or free airtime for candidates. This will be a billion dollar election and the costs rise every time.
It’s too bad that these Republicrats don’t listen to Nader because they would really learn something and that is supposed to be part of what the electoral process is about.
cincysuz, Evildoer and Urbanist, I’m deleting your comments because you need to grow up. Go back and read the rules and if you have anything other than childish remarks you can post those here. I won’t hold my breath.
24 Feb 2008 at 07:01 pm | #
LG’s going to vote for the Black guy? What a shock! I’m guessing that in LG’s calculus, voting for a Charterite does not take a vote away from a Democrat and help a Republican get elected, unless that Charterite is (was since he’s now apostate) Smitherman.
Justin: you may be surprised to learn that in 2000 I not only seriously considered voting for Nader up until I was in the voting booth, I actually read not only the Green Party Platform BUT the Green Party (England) Manifesto to better understand the philosophical underpinnings of Nader’s candidacy.
Can’t say I won’t vote for him in November assuming he’s on the ballot.
24 Feb 2008 at 07:57 pm | #
Urbanist, only a little bit surprised. The reality is that many conservatives don’t like Bush because he isn’t really a conservative, he just hijacked the name. Real conservatives don’t run up record deficits and destroy the environment. Barry Goldwater (Mr. Conservative)would be considered extremely liberal today and he said the religious right scared the hell out of him.
Bush is a NeoConservative and that’s why Nader did get some of his votes from Republicans. Clinton isn’t a liberal, she’s a NeoLiberal. NeoConservativism goes hand and hand with the NeoLiberal policies that the corporate Republicrats in the US are pushing around the world.
24 Feb 2008 at 08:49 pm | #
A brief study in the evolution of health care in America will enlighten those who espouse universal coverage. In America, health care coverage was an incentive used by employers during the manufacturing explosion in the mid 1900’s to get people to work for their company. That is why today, in 2008 there is such a close link to working and having coverage. Third party payers (insurance companies) have been around for a long time and will continue to be there. Insurance companies will have to be involved in any type of reform.
Health care is a product of the society in which it’s found. Universal health care is not going to work for Americans because we do not believe that health care is a birthright. The majority of Americans are covered and will not want the government rationing out benefits and services. If we want to restructure our system, we should look toward Germany whose system of universal coverage is also linked to employment.
Nader is not irrelevant but he will not get as many votes as he did last time.
24 Feb 2008 at 10:10 pm | #
what does it take to get him on the ballot in ohio?
i would love to help collect signature at the mccain rally on tuesday