Reading Kestrel’s diary on Ralph Nader and the comments that follow, it amazes me to this day just how profound an impact that little man’s selfishness had on the world and will continue to have on the world for, literally, generations.

Sure, Ralph Nader was not the only reason Al Gore lost Florida, or the overall election for that matter. The fact is, however, that Nader’s effect on the election was so severe, that without him – without that one single factor, Gore would have won. That puts the “Nader Factor” in a different category of reasons, and it is one reason he will never escape culpability for his acts. As many faults as the two party system has, Nader exploited the faults to make the system worse, not better.  He did it in a way to maximize his impact on the election rather than his impact on policy. His selfishness costs us all dearly to this day.

Some perspective, below the jump.

The story is not that Gore won the popular vote by a relatively narrow half million votes or so. Rather, generations historians will shake their heads at the fact that the popular vote was basically tied. The important number was a decisive win for Gore in the electoral college where he rightfully won 54% of the electoral vote to Bush’s 46%. However, when the Supreme Court reallocated Florida’s electoral college votes by rigging the tallying system, Bush was awarded a state that he had lost by thousands of votes. That created a swing of 8% in the electoral column. (& without Nader swinging New Hampshire – the other State where Nader singularly changed the outcome – it would have been a 55-45% electoral college victory).  

The biggest Nader effect was in Florida. Without Nader, instead of winning Florida by just 8,000-20,000 votes, which was Gore’s approximate margin of victory after an honest count of the vote, Gore would have had such a large margin that Nader’s narcissistic sabotaging could not act as the final straw in the ensuing post-election debacle. Admittedly there were other factors that prevented Gore from receiving the Florida electoral votes he won. Nader was one individual factor that, by himself, cost Florida and the presidency.

Also, like Florida, without Nader on the New Hampshire ballot, Gore would have won that state as well, no.question.about.it. With a win in New Hampshire, Gore’s presidential victory would also have been impossible to deny.

Gore won Florida outright, yet Nader’s sanctimonious interference was the biggest electoral factor in nullifying the victory. The biggest practical factors were the fraud and conspiracy within the both the Florida Sec’y of State’s office, and the result-oriented activism of the the Republican Supreme Court that stepped in and socially promoted a drunk from Texas.

Fifty years from now, the Republican theft of the 2000 election, through ballot fraud, the corruption of the GOP Supreme Court (Scalia, Thomas & Rehnquist especially), along with Nader’s obscene act of treasonous self-love, will rank in significance with events as tragic as the RFK assignation due to the disastrous historical courses set in motion by both events.  

Sometimes a single day's news offerings present an irony one can't ignore. Today in Rhode Island, HRC mocks Obama's gift of speech with a bizarre, risky parody against heaven itself:

“Now I could stand up here and say, ‘Let’s just get everybody together. Let’s get unified. The sky will open. The lights will come down. Celestial choirs will be singing and everyone will know we should do the right thing and the world will be perfect.’

Fair enough.  If you're elouence-impaired, go ahead and make a joke out of the best orator to come along since, say, Bill Clinton.

But then — what's this? — Glenn Thrush of Newsday.com pens a 4 page report with this biographical bombshell:

In 1975, a 27-year-old Hillary Rodham, acting as a court-appointed attorney, attacked the credibility of a 12-year-old girl in mounting an aggressive defense for an indigent client accused of rape in Arkansas – using her child development background to help the defendant.

Praise the Lord and Pass the Plea Bargain! 

The Glenn Thrush article, “An Early Look at how Clinton Deals with Crisis” is a must read, so here's the link again:

http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/ny-usark245589997feb24,0,2670956.story?page=1

Now it's no surprise that Hillary Clinton will do just about anything to win, win, win.  Except, apparently, the winning itself.  But what is truly amazing is her pitbull tenacity against a 12 year-old rape victim.  

In her 2003 autobiography “Living History,” Clinton writes that she initially balked at the assignment, but eventually secured a lenient plea deal for Taylor after a New York-based forensics expert she hired “cast doubt on the evidentiary value of semen and blood samples collected by the sheriff's office.”

However, that account leaves out a significant aspect of her defense strategy – attempting to impugn the credibility of the victim, according to a Newsday examination of court and investigative files and interviews with witnesses, law enforcement officials and the victim.

Rodham, records show, questioned the sixth grader's honesty and claimed she had made false accusations in the past. She implied that the girl often fantasized and sought out “older men” like Taylor, according to a July 1975 affidavit signed “Hillary D. Rodham” in compact cursive.

Ok, she didn't ask to represent a rapist.  She even told the judge she would be uncomfortable doing so.  And of course, it was her job to provide the best legal defense for her client.  

But, come on, Hillary. 

'She was just a real bulldog'

Rodham immersed herself in the work, people involved in the case say, mounting a ferocious and exhaustively researched defense that made a strong impression on some in the male-dominated legal community in northern Arkansas.

“She was just a real bulldog – a real bulldog,” said former Washington County prosecutor Mahlon Gibson, her opponent in the case.

Susan Carroll, senior scholar at the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University, says Clinton's attitude toward her work in Arkansas foreshadowed the workaholic approach she's adopted today in her uphill battle against Barack Obama.

 Really.  Now this we can believe.  As a matter of fact, we can see a young  Hillary Rodham going after a 12 year-old in 1975 just like we see her going after Obama in the last few days, capped off with her deragatory “celestial choir” reference to Obama supporters.  Do whatever it takes.  Don't concern yourself with the fallout.

So it was Hillary Rodham's job to defend a hard-drinking 41 year-old Thomas Alfred Taylor in a rape trial.  The story, as best described by Newsday, went like this:  

Around midnight, Taylor and his 20 year-old cousin found a 12 year-old girl willing to go for a ride with them.  Taylor then picked up a 15 year-old boy and proceeded to a liquor store.  He then poured some Old Grandad in the girl''s Coca-Cola.

Then some bowling; then a trip to a place off the highway.  The two older men went for  a walk; the girl and boy had sex; then the 41 year-old guy came back to take a turn.

What kind of argument did Rodham make?

…the record shows that Rodham was also intent on questioning the girl's credibility. That line of defense crystallized in a July 28, 1975, affidavit requesting the girl undergo a psychiatric examination at the university's clinic.

“I have been informed that the complainant is emotionally unstable with a tendency to seek out older men and to engage in fantasizing,” wrote Rodham, without referring to the source of that allegation. 

Given the fact that Hillary Rodham was a young attorney put on a case she did not desire, there should be no complaint against her for representing Taylor.  But that's not the point.  There's an old adage I find to be useful in cases like this:  “It's not what you say; it's how you say it.”

Listen one more time to the video clip from the Rhode Island speech today.  Imagine HRC being one of the kids in your childhood schoolyard.  Imagine being a 12 year-old girl being questioned by 27 year-old Hillary Rodham.  Consider yourself part of the growing “choir” raising it's voice through the Obama campaign.

Maybe it's not irony I'm seeing in today's news offerings.  Maybe it's a definitive pattern of behavior.

Nate Freeman

Northfield 

before I head off to bed:

I have no idea where this came from.  It got posted to Kos and I stole it.  

Well, then. It's been a bad week for St. McCain. First, the lobbyist story breaks, then Bud Paxson, the broadcaster at the focus of the debate comes out a day or two later and contradicts McCain's statement that they never met. Now, Howard Dean has announced that the DNC's  going to file a complaint with the FEC against McCain due to his on and off public financing fiasco. From the WSJ:

“We are in this complaint to the FEC asserting that the senator and his campaign are still bound to the conditions by matching funds including the spending limits of approximately $56 million dollars,” Dean said.

McCain and his campaign have vigorously disputed that assertion in light of a recent letter from FEC Chairman David Mason to the McCain campaign stating that he cannot formally withdrawal from the system until the FEC obtains more information regarding the terms of a $4 million loan his then cash-strapped campaign obtained last year as well as a formal vote from the commission, which would require an approval from four of the six members on the panel.

The DNC’s complaint alleges that McCain used the promise of matching funds to secure the multi-million dollar bank loan. He also said McCain has benefited from the public financing system which helps facilitate candidates’ ability to get their names on state ballots. He said these actions bind McCain to the system, and he is asking the FEC to investigate those issues.

“The law is very clear. He can not withdraw if he has used the promise of matching funds as collateral for his loan,” Dean said, “John McCain cannot unilaterally withdrawal from the spending limitations.”

 What does this mean? Well, it's pretty serious. There's a good plain ol' synopsis of it over at Americablog right now. The last paragraph's a doozie:

What does it mean for John McCain? It's yet another issue where John McCain tries to legislate one way and do something completely different. In this case it has to do with campaign finance issues. As Brad Smith, the former Republican FEC commissioner noted, if McCain drops out of the system the FEC will subpoena McCain, and his staff during and their records to determine whether they violated the law. If they're found to be in violation of the law they can be fined up to $25,000 and they can be jailed for up to five years.

Being that McCain is really trying hard to give us a Bush third term, what are the odds he ignores it in classic Bush fashion? Should be an interesting week. 

Just a quick note that my GMD coffee mug and bumper sticker came in the mail today from Cafe Press!!!

Ok, so my daughter Lydia convinced me that the mug should be hers for hot chocolate, but the bumper sticker — I’ll be proud to put that on the back of the Volvo!  It will be my first, and only, bumper sticker since I slapped Dean for America on the now departed minivan.

Get yours today!  The mug and sticker total was under $23 including shipping.  Just the sticker is like $3 I believe.

Show your pride in GMD!  Click on the mug icon today!

Nate

Crossposted at rednalsiofvermont.blogspot.com

So I already voted by absentee ballot, and no, I couldn’t vote for Hillary.  Our nation needs to move forward, not backward.  We already had 8 years of a Clinton in office, anyone else remember what it was like?  No, I’m not ready for Whitewater Gate 3, or Lewinsky Gate 4.  Unfortunately that’s what I akin her running to, a bad sequel.

When I look at where we are now, and how we got here, I really wonder.  It seems to me the NAFTA Hillary’s husband signed into law did more harm than good.  I guess that’s really the only place I let Bush off the hook.  The job’s began headed out of the US before he took office, of course, did he do anything to stop it?  Stem the tide?  No, I feel the Clintons deserve some of the blame as well.

I realize she was only the first lady then, and she wasn’t running the country, or was she?  Sure seems like she wears the pants in that family, so that would mean she’d bare part of the responsibility.   As far as I’m concerned NAFTA was the plug that was pulled, that allowed the slow drain of jobs from our economy.  Maybe if the focus of her campaign was to undo NAFTA and the bad things her husband and Bush did, I’d be a little more inclined to listen to her.  But so far, and we’re late in the season, I’m hearing nothing new.

At least with Obama his message of change resonates, and he’s not afraid to speak his mind.  Talking about climate change, jobs and green energy he’s at least talking about heading in a positive direction.  I’m still apprehensive of putting all my eggs in his basket, but between him, McCain, and Hillary, I’ll take the chance on Obama.  This country needs a new direction, and a change from the old guard.  Hopefully Obama will be the champion he purports to be.

I for one appreciate reading and participating in the discussion continuing in the diary, Taming the Tiger 1.

Hierc, would you like to put some teeth into the assertion of “tax flight” please?

Doug, can you split out the numbers for wage earners over $300K; their total tax burden; and the percentage of total tax collected by the state of Vermont, please?

Cairn, can you help split the difference between the Progressive and Republican points of view, please?

Nothing below the fold, except continued discussion, if you will.

Nate Freeman  

Well, I thought it was a petty complaint and I wouldn't even have written about it, but now I'm not so sure.

I've been subscribing to the Burlington Free Press, daily and Sunday, ever since I moved to Vermont in 1983. Naturally, sometimes the delivery service is good, sometimes not so good. In the last few years it's been generally good, but last weekend we had two days in a row when we got an incomplete paper. Saturday we got a very skimpy paper, even skimpier than usual, but there was at least one section missing. I called and spent some time trying to deal with the awful (and new) voice recognition automated attendant, then I finally started hitting the 0 button until I got to talk to a human being, who advised me that it wouldn't be possible to have someone deliver the whole paper to my house.

Sunday, the same thing. I'm not sure what sections were missing, except I know for sure that the comics and the color supplement were missing, and I missed my Doonesbury and Dilbert, so I called again. Same routine, same repeated banging on the 0 button until I got to talk to someone. That time they promised they would send me a replacement paper, not that day (remember, they aren't bothering to deliver replacement papers anymore) but the next day, along with my Monday paper. They also promised to have a district manager call me.

Monday: no Sunday paper, no call from a district manager. So far, this just seems routine, right? Bad service from a company you do business with isn't usually surprising, it happens all the time. What makes it a bigger story is what I read in Seven Days this week:

Vermont’s largest daily newspaper, which is owned by media giant Gannett Company, has outsourced nearly all of its circulation and delivery calls to a regional calling center in Louisville, Kentucky. The change, which took effect about two months ago, is part of a push by the nation’s largest newspaper publishing chain to consolidate the business operations of its 85 media properties across the United States.

So thanks, Gannett: worse service, job losses for Vermonters, more irritated customers.

Oh, and if that district manager feels like calling, I have the same phone number you've had on file for me since 1983. 

Mark Levine, former Counsel in the House of Representatives:

The hard work began here in Vermont. There is more work to be done.

Toward the end of this 7 minute video, Mr. Levine tells us what our part is.  

…and so should you.  Here’s why:

Let’s briefly review the established record of the Clintons:

-pro gun control

-pro choice

-family and medical leave

-AmeriCorps

-increased minimum wage

-liberal or moderate judges on the Supreme Court

-“balancing” the budget (I know they used part of the Social Security surplus to do that, but you can blame President Johnson for the unified federal budget theory)

-a fairer and more progressive tax structure (increases on the rich and decreases for everyone else)

-no endless, completely unnecessary wars

I could go on and on…you all remember the 1990s right?  I know we can never really “go back” to another time (and I don’t want to), but come on…it’s wasn’t that bad at all back then.

Continued pleading below the fold…

I know the Clintons aren’t perfect…either personally or politically…I didn’t like what they did to Welfare along with the GOP, and I was disappointed that they botched health care reform.  I think that there’s a real chance now that we can make some significant progress on health care at the national level though.  The Clintons don’t govern as liberal as I’d like them to be (or I think even as they’d like to be given the political realities of this nation), but they have a proven track record of real, positive, progressive change for the better I think.  Who better to clean up the huge mess that another Bush has made than a Clinton?   🙂

What we want, I think, is change from Bush…not change just for the sake of change.  I don’t buy at all that Clinton is “Bush-lite”.  Why would many on the Right-wing be so up in arms at the threat of her being President if they thought she was just like them?  I like Edwards (and even voted for him after my boy Dean dropped out in 2004), but he brought nothing to the table to get anything done IMO.  He couldn’t have even won a second term in the Senate in NC if he wanted to, he botched grilling Cheney in 2004 like the dog that he was and still is, and he didn’t have the cred to carry any southern states.

The Clintons have a proven track record of being able to win in crucial states like NH, NV, AR, NM, and TN & maybe even OH, WV, and KY.  Keeping the GOP on the defensive across a wide portion of the country will be a key to winning this fall I think.  I’m sure that a lot has already been said for and against Obama here, so I’ll try not to go on and on about that now.  I’m just afraid that a lot of the support that Obama has gotten so far from states like SC, GA, AK, MN, CO, MO, KS, AL, ID, ND, UT, LA, NB, VA, and WI will dry up once the threat of a Hillary Presidency goes away.  Some of the above states are solidly Republican states that I doubt will stray away from McCain so easily.  I do acknowledge that Obama has his newness, youth, and appeal to independent voters (which will cut into McCain’s strength) in his favor though.  I’m still not sure whether this country as a whole has gotten over its prejudices against blacks more than against women (or vise-versa).  

I have no problem being a good Democrat and voting for their nominee in November, but let’s not repeat 2004 again…ugh…  Iowa picked the two candidates in that race that were exactly wrong to go up against Bush and Cheney in 2004.  Iowa doesn’t have a very good record of picking candidates that can win in the general election either (besides incumbents).  

I know that Bill Clinton also gave us NAFTA and DOMA, two really bad pieces of legislation IMO.  DOMA was the GOP though…Clinton just signed it because he basically had to.  The GOP would have raked him over the coals even more if he didn’t…”What…you don’t want to ‘defend’ marriage?!”  I don’t mind NAFTA that much (I’m a liberal free/fair trader actually), but there need to be better protections for unions and the environment in future trade deals.

There was a right-wing backlash against the Clintons in 1994 after they raised taxes to help balance the budget and after they overreached on health care.  Things are different now…we’ve tried “supply-side” economics twice now (under a Democratic and GOP Congress) in the last 30 years, and it’s failed every time.

So, I’m for Hillary Clinton in 2008.  It’s waaaay past time that we elected a woman to be President.  Look at the messes that all those white guys have gotten us into so far.   🙂

Remember to vote, no matter who you want to vote for, this year!

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