Nader-Camejo: Why Now? Why Not?

(first of a series)

As promised, the beginnings of a conversation for those who believe: (A) that it is not a matter of controversy whether Bush needs to vacate the White House by January 2005, and (B) that John Kerry is a piss-poor alternative, the alternative of a settled, slowly decaying distopia at best and, at worst, Bush with a northeastern drawl. What should we do? Should we vote for one of the smattering of smart, committed activists running on various third party tickets--Walt Brown of the Socialist Party? The Socialist Equality Party (keepers of the great WSWS.org site)'s Bill Van Auken? Martin Koppel, a competent editor and writer for the Militant and a cordial, disciplined activist, is at the head of the Socialist Workers Party ticket. I would and will happily consider arguments for voting for any of these comrades.

Four years ago, I proudly voted for Ralph Nader and Wynona LaDuke, and although I did so in a solidly Republican state, I encouraged votes for him everywhere. I did so knowing that, if a gun were held to my head, I'd have chosen Gore over Bush. I even did so knowing that Bush probably lacked what little egalitarian conscience slept unstirred in Gore's rigid brain. I did so because the Green platform, and Nader's, differed radically from the Democratic party platform, and as a matter of principle, I felt one should vote for what one could predominantly agree with, even if, as I believed, that vote was more for the purpose of protest and coalition building than for a realistic choice of president.

At the time I rejected arguments from those left of Nader who correctly pointed out that Ralph was no socialist. I rejected those to the right of Nader (whether they knew they were or not) who correctly warned of the consequences of another Bush in the White House. I was all Eugene Debs: "It's better to vote for what you want and not get it, than to vote for what you don't want and get it." I reject the notion that Nader cost Gore the White House; the primary blame should go to the crooks who, by deploying false felon records, cost Gore thousands of votes in Florida. But more importantly, a society which holds my political conscience hostage to the ruling class is a society that deserves bad presidents. And so I could proudly say, for the last four years, Don't Blame Me, I Voted for Nader.

Things are considerably more uncertain for me this time around. As a matter of policy choices, those of George W. Bush will be qualitatively worse than those of John Kerry, on the whole, and the undesirable impacts of those policies will cross many class lines (although the poor and working class will suffer disproportionately, as we do under any administration). Bush is a particularly brazen, stupid, uninspired little man. Worse, he willfully surrounds himself with empire builders and criminals of the highest caliber. This administration has behaved like a one-term administration, aware that they can only go so far, determined to push the country as far to the right as possible, pulling out all the stops to reshape the world in their image. Their purposes may be sincere (although that doesn't explain all the lies; even Marx and Engels insisted that the communists not hide their aims), but regardless of their intent, the end result has been a less democratic nation and a substantially uglier and more unscrupulous world.

Four years ago, progressives were asked to jettison all other considerations to "prevent" the first four years of the above scenario. We were asked to hold our noses and vote for the archetypically cynical Democrat, a candidate with substantial financial holdings in both big oil and big tobacco, who supported the death penalty, who wanted to lock up pot smokers even though he himself had spent a couple of years doing bong hits in his living room, who, as we all predicted, went rhetorically leftward when he thought it mattered, and remained, by all significant measures, a bourgeois right-centrist. (The Al Gore of today? A different picture entirely. One is at least tempted to like him for his fiery, antiestablishment rhetoric. Still, one can't be too careful.)

One cannot discount the significance of Nader's choice of a veep. He may have accepted the Reform Party's endorsement in order to court disaffected conservatives, but Nader has chosen Peter Camejo, a former presidential candidate for the Socialist Workers' Party, and (despite the sectarian, ultraleft rantings about him) a committed leftist whose "socially responsible investing" makes him no worse than the advertising department of The Nation. Camejo is the real deal, quite possibly the most leftward public figure at this level of national political exposure. His Marxist-honed intelligence and analytic discipline, combined with a natural rhetorical flair forged in decades of grass roots activism, is more Debs than Nader. He outshone his opponents in the California Gubernatorial debates almost effortlessly.

This Saturday, the Greens will choose their Presidential nominee, and there is still a real possibility that the honor will go to David Cobb, a truly great activist and longtime builder of the Green Party, who has promised to nominate a female as his running mate. Delegates like Ted Glick believe this would be a much better choice than Nader, even with Camejo on that ticket:

A Cobb nomination will give us a Presidential candidate who is 100% committed to using his campaign to build upon what we have already accomplished this year and carry it forward not just until election day but post-November 2nd and into the coming years. No one except perhaps Ralph Nader knows what will come out of his Independent campaign. [recent LBO-talk post]

Although these reasons don't seem extremely well-developed, and seem to ignore the presence of Camejo on the ticket (as well as the extensive, well-articulated and thoroughly leftward catalog of Nader's positions on the issues at votenader.org), all progressives should wait and see what happens in Milwaukee this weekend. Speaking for myself, if Nader does not receive the Greens' endorsement, this will be cause for a reevaluation of where I ought to orient myself politically in this very important election cycle.

I say this acutely aware of the limits of electoral politics. I know that real change comes from mass movements as well as the endless interpersonal conversations that occur in workplaces, classrooms, churches and bars. I realize that Corporate America will pick a winner, and that this is unlikely to change in response to mere electoral agitation. But I also know that the electoral stage is a political space and that, in fulfilling the first half of Debs' dictum, "voting for what you want and not getting it" can be a powerful educator and motivator for more effective politics down the road. What I will not do, regardless of my eventual endorsement decision, is make a virtue out of necessity by falling into the tempting trap of seeing John Kerry as a savior, a hero, or a friend to people like me. Too many of my comrades gave Clinton a free pass; if you love everything George W. Bush stands for, thank Clinton, and the soft left, for smoothing the road for him.

(to be continued)