A third-party candidate - a renowned green lobbyist - has the US ballot watchers in a tizzy over possible outcomes of this year's presidential polls
Hour of the green crusader
THE consumer rights crusades of Ralph
Nader during the '60s and the '70s had
the us government running around in
circles. No wonder alarm bells have
been ringing ever since Nader
announced plans to take on the us
President Bill Clinton from the left as a
Green Party candidate, in Califorriia's
election primaries this month.
Nader's name has become synonymous with the consumer movement in
the us ever since he bur 'st onto the
national scene in 1965 with his hardhitting book, Unsafe at any Speed: The
Designed-in Dangers of the American
Automobile. The book accused us
automakers of knowingly producing
unsafe cars, and led to the framing of
the National TrafEc and Motor Vehicles
Act. Since then, due to his relentless
campaign, dozens of laws have been put
on the statute books, ranging from the
Consumer Product 'Safety Act to the
Freedom of Information Act. Air bags,
which he pushed for years, are now
standard in American automobiles, as
are safety belts.
Nader became a folk hero when
General Motors - which
he denounced for ignoring
serious design flaws in its
Chevrolet Corvair - hired
a private detective to sleuth
about his private life. In
1970, he eventually
received $425,000 as settlement for an invasion of privacy lawsuit, which gave
a boost to the fledgling consumer movement.
Since then, -over the
years, Nader has created a
network,of over 60 groups.
The launching pad was
Nader's main organisation,
Centre for the Study of Responsive Law,
which he founded in 1968. The Centre
seeks to create awareness about consumer and environmental issues, and,
conducts'research and edu@ational projects to'encourage public and private
institutions to be more responsive to the
needs of citizens and consumers.
Creation of other organisations followed: Public Citizen, an umbrella
organisation, which includes Congress
Watch - a congressional lobbying
group, Health Research. group - a
medical watchdog organisation and the
Centre for Science in Public Interest.
Says Nader in his first anti-establishment salvo, "The people need more
political choices and less cynical posturing. Both the Democrats and the
Republicans refuse to change, won't
give up the special interest money,
won't reform and give the people more
power. This campaign isn't about me
becoming President, it is about getting a
new political movement going for the
long haul."
Political observers agree unanimously that Nader will sail through the
California primaries. Paving the way for
a victory are his high profile consumer
campaigns, his positive ratings in the
polls and his support for Green causes
like demands for a cleaner environment,
the reining in of big money, special
interests and a more equitable distribution of the nation's jobs and wealth.
But not many expect him to get
California to rally behind him on
November 5, leave alone any of the
other states where he may run as a
candidate. These include Colorado,
Maine, Rhode Island, Minnesota and
Pennsylvania. The Greens' emphasis on
democrdcy puts another question mark
over Nader's political future: even if
Nader wins the primaries, a majority of
his party leaders still have to nominate
him for the November elections.
But the real significance of Nader's
possible candidature may lie in the element of uncertainty that it has introduced into the general elections. One
outcome foreseen by political experts is
that it could take away some wavl;ring.
Democrats from President Clinton and
herald in victory for a Republican.
Bill. Press, chairperson, California
Democratic Party, echoes the fears of
several Democrats when he asserts, 'A
vote for Ralph Nader this fall would be a
vote,for Bob Dole, and
can't really believe that's
-what Ralph and -the Green
Party want to accornplish."
Nader definitely has the
potential to woo disenchanted Democrats who,
like him, believe that
Clinton is responsible for a
number of sell-offs: signing
of the ineffective North
American Free Trade
Agreement, ending the
55-mile-an-hour speed
limit for automobiles
and' refusing to push
for stringent Congressional reforms. Says Nader. about Clinton's
approval of a bill to end the federal
55-mile-an-hour'speed limit; "President Clinton will have a very, black
mark on his record because of that
signature."
'Another possibility foreseen is. that
Nader's candidature could force
Clinton to tilt leftwards to prevent the
exo dus of disgruntled Democrats.
Already, Clinton has drawn up strategies to stave off the challenge from the
left by protecting Medicare and other
social programmes against the budget-axing measures prescribed by' the
Republicans. He has also vetoed
bills that the Republicans sought
to push, which included slashes
on Environmental Protection
Agency fundings.
Despite his high-profile successes, Nader's career graph is not
without occasional flops. In 1978,
Nader and a coalition of consumer groups lobbied for the creation of a Cabinet level department - the Federal Consumer
Protection Agency - to protect
consumer rights. In a major setback to Nader, the legislation was
defeated. Ironically, some of his
successful causes have become
pass&.air bags are now 'standard
equipment' in American automobiles, the Freedom of Information Act is now an integral part of investigative journalism, and a
tough bill to register Washington
lobbyists glided through the Senate
on a 98-to-O vote and the House by
421 to 0.
For-political observers, the major
question right now is just how dangerous Nader is for Clinton. "We recently
did a theoretical race between Clinton,
Dole and Nader, and Clinton- still came
out ahead," says Mark DiCamillo of
Field Poll, one of California's most
respected survey groups. "Nader
seemed to draw most heavily from people who had already abandoned Clinton
and Dole, too, for that matter."
Some indication of the votes that
Nader might garner was provided by
another California poll that gave him 11
per cent support in a three-way race
with Clinton and Dole. Nader himself -
remains upbeat about -his political
chances. "I offer an alternative that,
can't easily be ignored," he points
out. "People already know what I
stand for, and the med@a is good
about giving me access. I think that wig
be sufficient to get this movement going."
However, Green Party representatives - over 100,000 members in
California alone - have their I own
apprehensions about the forthcoming
elections. Some members fear that a
favourable showing by Nader might
help put a Republican in the White
- House, thus proving counterproductive.. They would much rather that
Nader uses his candidature,a@ a means
t6'push Clinton leftWards.@ They would
also like the party to concentrate
more'on running local and state candi-7
dates, a means to construct a grassroots
base. "There is not a 100 per cent
agreement on what we should be
doing," says Michael twombly, a
Sacramento lobbyist, long active in
the Green Party. However, the Green
Party has its own limitations: it is little
known nationally and has a miniscule
political basei attracting less than one
per cent of the registered voters in
California.
Although the early portents are that
the Republicans could stand to gain
from Nader's candidature, all is not
hunky dory i 'n their camp either.
Surveys in California and elsewhere
indicate that Republicans have reason to
be wary of a third' party candidate this
yean Thf! Perot vote may have enabled
the Republicans to gain the critical edge
in the 1994 Congressional elections,
which led them to take over both the
Senate and the House - for the first
time in 40 years. However, given the
waning influence of the Republicans, if
that vote goes elsewhere, Republican
candidates @ including their presidential candidate - might have to pay a
heavy price.
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