Unsafe in any election
In 1996, Ralph Nader electrified the disenchanted and ran as a third-party Green candidate for President. When it was all said and done, he came in fourth with .71% of the popular vote, not carrying enough votes to win one single small state. However, he did edge out Harry Browne ( remember him? ). This so motivated Nader that he decided to run again in 2000. In a highly polarized race, Nader garnered over 2.8 million votes, coming a distant third with 2.73% of the popular vote. In essence, he became the Ross Perot of 2000. It can easily be argued he cost Al Gore the election. Catapaulting on that dizzying feat, he ran again in 2004. He once again held third place, but this time with fewer votes than he got in 1996, nailing only .38% of the popular vote. Based on that twelve year span of losing profoundly badly, Ralph Nader is pondering a run this year as well. He doesn’t cite any popular support for his Green run. What he does cite perplexes me:
Nader, who ran as an independent candidate in each of the past three presidential elections, told ABCNews.com that he will run in 2008 if he is convinced over the next month that he would be able to raise $10 million over the course of the campaign — and attract enough lawyers willing to work free of charge to get his name on state ballots.
For someone who’s railed against corporate greed for forty years, he sure sounds like a corporate man to me.
I will give him this much tho. The Green Party debates would definitely be the ones to watch!
