The Green Party is in the news again. And the stories
aren’t flattering. No, we’re not seeing articles how this
“third” party has struggled heroically against all odds to win
elected posts from Maine to San Francisco, or how Green
mayors, city councilors and school board members are
dramatically improving the lives of constituents from coast to
coast. The Green Party is in the news again because the
general sentiment which emerged from a recent meeting of
national delegates is—gasp!—we want to run a candidate for
president.
The pundits are having a field day. Never mind that this
country has dispatched troops to Afghanistan and Iraq (and
Colombia, Panama, Grenada, Vietnam, etc.) all in the name of
multi-party democracy. That sort of thing is fine elsewhere,
but watch out if you try it here—in the land of the free. It’s
as though the United States performs amazing feats of
democracy abroad all the while flashing a message: Kids, don’t
try this at home.
So, here
we go again. The same old tired arguments will be trotted out
for one more tired run. Never mind that Gore actually won the
popular vote in 2000 but ran such an awful campaign that he
managed to lose his home state of Tennessee, or that the
Republican-dominated Supreme Court handed the election to Bush
in a decision that famed prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi called
treasonous, we’ll hear once again how the Greens took enough
votes from Gore to hand the White House to Bush. The Democrats
and pundits conveniently ignore the real causes of Bush’s
selection and manage to overlook this fact: the Democrat’s
problem wasn’t Greens voting for Nader, the Democrat’s problem
was so many Democrats voting for Bush. And that is something
the Democrats are clearly in a position to fix.
But since this is politics, we’re best off to ignore
reality. Perception is what counts. And the perception is that
the Greens cost the Democrats the presidential election. And
if that is the case, then lo and behold, we are the mightiest
of the mightiest, for we have the power to decide the fate of
the free world! All hail and bow to the mighty Greens!
If the Greens are in fact so almighty powerful, then why
haven’t the Democrats come to us and offered concessions in
exchange for working together to defeat Bush and improve the
lives of our fellow American citizens? Has anyone bothered to
look at the facts or outcome of the recent Green meeting?
Nader’s support is lukewarm; many Greens want a registered
member of our party to run (Nader is not) and also want people
to know that the Green Party is bigger and broader than one
individual. Greens also agreed to focus our critiques on
Bush’s disastrous blunders and lies. While this doesn’t mean
that the Greens will abstain from the presidential race, it
does pave the path for potential cooperation with a Democratic
candidate, provided that we are treated with the respect we
deserve.
The Greens will most likely run a candidate for president
in 2004. We are a political party. That’s what political
parties do. Please don’t insult us or the American ideals of
Free Speech and Democracy by suggesting that we do otherwise.
Challenge us on our platform, or our record of
accomplishments, but don’t challenge our very existence. The
pundits would love to see us as the big bad bogeymen in one
more election; that kind of thing sells newspapers. The
Democrats, I hope, will take responsibility for their own
choices and their own candidates and campaigns and won’t blame
others should they fail. However, I am confident that a
majority of Americans don’t want to see George Bush
re-elected. Heck, a majority didn’t want to see him elected
the first time and our lives and economy certainly haven’t
improved since then.
The Greens will likely run in ’04, but how we run, where we
run the hardest and what we say has yet to be decided. Like
any other political party, we have to consider both what’s
best for our country and for our party. We’re willing to
listen to serious and sensible proposals from potential
coalition partners who recognize our strength, integrity and
independence. There’s no hope for the pundits but the
Democrats ought to stop the blame game and start thinking
about how they can recapture the White House and whose help
they’ll need to do that.
Blair Bobier, a lawyer and political activist, is one of
the founders of the Pacific Green Party of Oregon and served
as the party’s first gubernatorial candidate in 1998. He can
be reached through his website.
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