Ralph Nader was interviewed on KSRO by Pat Thurston in July 2005, talking about the annual retreat of the Bohemian
Grove Society about to take place along the Russian River. In the interview Ralph explains what these rich and powerful men
do up in the woods each summer, and why we should care.
Indicators of avoidance are what come to mind while absorbing the various rescue, recovery, stimulus and guarantee programs
coming out of the Obama Administration to slow and reverse a splintering and shattering economy. If the Obamites do not act
now when the political time is ripest, to put into motion forces of deterrence and prevention, the casino capitalists of tomorrow
will again be able to de-stabilize our economy.
The other day I saw Alan Greenspan, former chairman of the Federal Reserve, just about predicting another round of recklessness
in about fifteen years. But he called it “human nature” not casino capitalism.
Here are seven avoidance indicators which outline what Washington is not doing to prevent another round of greed and misdeeds
by the Wall Street few against the innocent many throughout the country.
Where are the resources for comprehensive law enforcement against the Wall Street crooks, swindlers and purveyors of costly
deceptive practices? Isn’t there a need to add two to three hundred million dollars for more FBI agents, prosecutors
and corporate crime attorneys under the Justice Department to obtain the fines and disgorgements which will far exceed in
dollars what is spent by the forces of law and order?Americans want justice. They want jailtime not bailtime for these crooks.
Look how many of the swindled just turned out in a New York City winter to let Bernard Madoff have a piece of their mind as
he entered the courtroom and immediate imprisonment.There has been very little movement so far in Congress or the White House
toward this necessary action.
Where are the anti-trusters to revive the moribund divisions in the Justice Department and Federal Trade Commission? Failed
banks, brokerage firms, and now insurance companies are being taken over by shaky acquirers, often with the encouragement
of the federal government. Other industries are experiencing similar mergers and acquisitions in an already over-concentrated
economy.Our government needs to be on top of this accelerating creation of more companies deemed to be “too big to fail.”
A variety of antitrust policies are needed to prevent, restructure or, at least, require spinoffs to minimize the anti-competitive
effects of the “urge to merge.”
What about Congress and Obama shifting some power to the investors and shareholders who are paying for all these losses?
The corporate bosses have made sure for many years that shareholders, who own their companies, have little or no right to
control them. Had there been less of a gap between ownership and control, the bosses could never have engaged in such reckless
speculation, looting and draining of the trillions of dollars with which they were entrusted. These include mutual funds,
pension funds and various trusts. Power to the owners seems to be off the table.
The federal officials are talking up stronger regulation and re-regulation proposals but we have not yet been informed
of their specific plans. There is not much talk of regulatory prohibition. That is, flat-out prohibition of banks, insurance
companies, and other fiduciary institutions from speculating in derivatives or, to be more specific, bets on debts and the
even more hyped creations of bets on bets on debts on debts.
By now, Washington should be devising ways to pay for these gigantic deficits and bailouts. A fraction of one percent
sales tax on the hundreds of trillions of dollars in derivative transactions annually would produce hundreds of billions of
dollars in revenue and tamp down some of this Wall Street gambling with other peoples’ money.Such a tax on speculative
trades in these abstract instruments can make the Wall Streeters pay for their own bailouts and reduce some of the taxes on
human labor.
Our government doesn’t highlight not-for-profit institutions like the 8000 credit unions that are increasing their
loans and continue to serve over 80 million Americans without a single insolvency. One would think that with the financial
goliaths in a free fall, despite ever-larger bailouts from the federal government, that the cooperative model of credit unions
would become a useful teaching instrument.
In his new paperback book, Agenda for a New Economy, David Korten makes an important distinction between
the “phantom wealth” of Wall Street and the “real wealth” of Main Street.
His twelve-point agenda raises the fundamental question of why Wall Street is needed and how the functions of a just and
progressive economy can be fulfilled with a sensible transition to a “real wealth” economy engaged by and accountable
to real people striving for the necessities and wants of life through environmentally friendly, more efficient institutions.
Lest any remaining doubters out there are thinking about our country returning to business as usual Wall Street style,
please read the confidential powerpoint presentation “AIG: Is the Risk Systemic?” by the AIG financial giant grasping
$180 billion, so far, in federal aid and guarantees
In 21 pages of very large type, you will see why the AIG bosses believe that failure of their gigantic corporation would
only “trigger a cascading set of further failures which cannot be stopped except by extraordinary means.” In other
words, AIG says to Uncle Sam and you the taxpayer save it or be prepared for a global collapse through a dominoes effect of
unknown catastrophic sequences. For the full astonishing AIG text, see: http://www.aig.com/Related-Resources_385_136430.html. Right from the horse’s mouth!
2008 Presidential Candidate Ralph Nader responds to a
question from the audience about impeachment/prosecution of Bush/Cheney. Excerpted from the Open the Debates super rally in
Minneapolis on September 4, 2008. Video by Karen Kilroy - http://karenkilroy.com
ACHIEVEMENTS
OF NADER/GONZALEZ
in 2008
election
Moving a Progressive Agenda Forward in the Electoral Arena.
Nurturing anew the survival seeds and sprouts for a functioning democracy, so that someday the fruits
of this campaign will be traced back to the political pioneers of 2008 who carried forward the torch of conscience and justice
high across the land.
We followed the model of Presidential candidates Eugene Debs and Norman Thomas; if they had not run
within the electoral arena many people would not know key elements of the progressive agenda. As Thomas Paine once said, "a
long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of right."
In 2008, without third party and independent candidates there would have been no opposition to the
bailout, no discussion of single-payer, no opposition to nuclear power plants, no support of living wage, no peace advocacy
over blow-back militarism, no advocacy of electoral reforms, no crackdown on corporate crimes, etc.
Civil Liberties for Independent and Third Party Candidates
Working to break down unfair ballot access laws that shred the rights of minor party candidates to
run for office.
Example: Victory in Arizona, declaring in-state petitioning law unconstitutional at the 9th circuit
court of appeals.
Example: Victory in Ohio case at the 6th circuit, declaring Secretary of State Blackwell was wrong
to throw Nader/Camejo off the ballot in 2004 and that the Ohio law requiring in-state petition circulators was unconstitutional.
Bringing in New People to the Political Process
We will be over 700,000 votes in 2008 as absentee ballots and write-ins are counted over the coming
days and weeks. Many of those voters would have stayed home and not voted if Nader/Gonzalez had not been on the ballot.
60% of Nader/Gonzalez donors have never contributed to any other political candidate before.
Thousands of citizens developed skills in clean politics and many will run for office where they live
in coming years.
Documenting the Multi-faceted Oppressiveness of the Two-Party Controlled Dictatorship of
Our Country
The exclusion from the debates and the media blackout helped deflate the myth of a competitive electoral
democracy. Exposing myths is the first step toward reforms.
International Solidarity
The Nader/Gonzalez campaign helped show the rest of the world that there are voices inside the Presidential
campaign who speak vigorously to the United States becoming a humanitarian superpower that knows how to wage peace, advance
justice and enhance the security of all peoples, as envisioned by the UN Declaration of Human Rights.
Ballot Access & Voting Success
Bronze Medal: Nader/Gonzalez got more votes than any other Presidential third party
or independent candidate.
45 State Ballot Lines and the District of Columbia: We got on more state ballots
than in any previous Ralph Nader Presidential campaign (including the state of Idaho for the first time).
Ralph Nader and Matt Gonzalez were on the ballot as Independents in 36 of those states, and in the
District of Columbia.
The Nader/Gonzalez campaign was nominated by the Independent Parties of Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii,
Maryland and New Mexico. Nader/Gonzalez was also nominated by California's Peace and Freedom Party, Florida's Ecology Party,
Michigan's Natural Law Party, and Oregon's Peace Party.
Nader/Gonzalez qualified as write-in candidates in Georgia, Indiana, North Carolina and Texas.
Only Oklahoma voters did not have an opportunity to vote for Nader/Gonzalez.
Former Nader 2000 & 2004 campaign manager Theresa Amato will be coming out in 2009 with a devastating
indictment of the political duopoly that crushes diversity and dissent in American elections. Her forthcoming book is titled
Grand Illusion: The Myth of Voter Choice in a Two-Party Tyranny (New Press).
Party formation was more active than in 2004, and Nader/Gonzalez achieved several notable ballot access
accomplishments.
Independent Party of Maryland. Obtained ballot status and the party will be able
to field candidates in 2010 without petitioning.
Independent Party of New Mexico. Obtained ballot status and achieved .5% vote threshold
allowing 2010 candidates without petitioning.
Independent Party of Hawaii. Obtained ballot status. Because of low vote totals the
party must petition candidates for two more elections to obtain a 10 year ballot access status. Chairman Shaun Stenshol pledges
to keep party alive and field candidates in 2010.
Peace Party of Oregon. Obtained ballot status by securing 1% of the statewide vote
total and the party will be able to field candidates in 2010 without petitioning.
Connecticut Independent Party. Obtained ballot status by securing 1% of the statewide
vote total and the party will be able to field candidates in 2010 without petitioning.
Preserved ballot status of the Natural Law Party in Michigan.
Ballot status of Delaware Independent Party, California Peace and Freedom Party,
and Florida Ecology Party continues because of criteria other than vote totals.
Some Memorable Campaign Accomplishments
Our Vice Presidential Candidate Matt Gonzalez was the first Mexican-American VP Candidate
in American History.
Debates: We participated in three third-party Presidential and Vice Presidential
Debates:
Thursday, October 23, in Washington, D.C. at the Mayflower Hotel between Ralph Nader and Chuck Baldwin
-- sponsored by Free and Equal -- covered by CSPAN.
Thursday, October 30, in Cleveland, Ohio between Ralph Nader, Bob Barr and Chuck Baldwin -- sponsored
and hosted by the Cleveland City Club -- covered by CSPAN.
Sunday, November 2nd, Vice Presidential Debate in Las Vegas, Nevada -- sponsored by Free and Equal
-- which included Libertarian Party VP candidate, Wayne Allyn Root, Constitution Party VP candidate, Darrell Castle, and Independent
Ralph Nader running mate, Matt Gonzalez.
Wall Street Rally: Thursday, October 16, 2008. Thousands of people gathered in front
of the New York Stock Exchange to join Ralph Nader and Matt Gonzalez in protesting the bailout of Wall Street and to demand
a crackdown on corporate crime.
Massachusetts Marathon: Saturday, October 25, 2008. Dozens of organizers helped Ralph
Nader set the Guinness Book of World Records for most campaign speeches in a single 24-hour period. We made 21 campaign stops
in 21 different Massachusetts towns in a single day.
Uplifting Facts
When issues, not party mattered, Nader won: In a local Brooklyn High School on Oct.
28, 2008, students were allowed to vote for five Presidential candidates but were told only what the candidates stood for,
not their names. Nader/Gonzalez handily won the election with 46%. Read about it at http://berkeleycarroll.org/news/detail.asp?pageaction=ViewSinglePublic&LinkID=3614&ModuleID=183
Ralph Nader talking about protecting our rights under the United
States constitution on the Annotated News Network (ANN) with Sarah Palin look-a-like Lisa Nova
From Nader Headquarters… sent on 11/5/08
Against all odds.
We prevailed.
On $4 million total -- what Obama raised in one day.
Nader/Gonzalez overcame ballot access obstacles.
We put our shift the power agenda on 45 state ballots.
We set the world record for campaigning in 21 towns and cities
in 24 hours during our Massachusetts Marathon.
We exposed Obama and Biden for the corporate politicians
they are.
(And today, ABC News is reporting that Obama wants the militarist
reactionary Rahm Emanuel as his chief of staff.)
We drew the line.
And together, we choose to make a stand.
You stood with hundreds of thousands of Americans.
Against the corporate militaristic machine.
Our consciences are clear.
Our hands are clean.
We made the moral choice.
History will look back and say -- those Americans back in
2008 who supported Nader/Gonzalez -- they were right.
So, thank you fellow traveler.
Thank you for your donations.
And your hard work.
It has been a joy -- standing with you.
Fighting for justice.
Onward
The Nader Team
Dear Senator Obama:
November 3, 2008
Open letter to Senator Barack Obama
Dear Senator Obama:
In your nearly two-year presidential
campaign, the words "hope and change," "change and hope" have been your trademark declarations. Yet there is an asymmetry
between those objectives and your political character that succumbs to contrary centers of power that want not "hope and change"
but the continuation of the power-entrenched status quo.
Far more than Senator McCain, you have received enormous,
unprecedented contributions from corporate interests, Wall Street interests and, most interestingly, big corporate law firm
attorneys. Never before has a Democratic nominee for President achieved this supremacy over his Republican counterpart. Why,
apart from your unconditional vote for the $700 billion Wall Street bailout, are these large corporate interests investing
so much in Senator Obama? Could it be that in your state Senate record, your U.S. Senate record and your presidential campaign
record (favoring nuclear power, coal plants, offshore oil drilling, corporate subsidies including the 1872 Mining Act and
avoiding any comprehensive program to crack down on the corporate crime wave and the bloated, wasteful military budget, for
example) you have shown that you are their man?
To advance change and hope, the presidential persona requires character,
courage, integrity-- not expediency, accommodation and short-range opportunism. Take, for example, your transformation from
an articulate defender of Palestinian rights in Chicago before your run for the U.S. Senate to an acolyte, a dittoman for
the hard-line AIPAC lobby, which bolsters the militaristic oppression, occupation, blockage, colonization and land-water seizures
over the years of the Palestinian peoples and their shrunken territories in the West Bank and Gaza. Eric Alterman summarized
numerous polls in a December 2007 issue of The Nation magazine showing that AIPAC policies are opposed by a majority of Jewish-Americans.
You know quite well that only when the U.S. Government supports the Israeli and Palestinian peace movements, that
years ago worked out a detailed two-state solution (which is supported by a majority of Israelis and Palestinians), will there
be a chance for a peaceful resolution of this 60-year plus conflict. Yet you align yourself with the hard-liners, so much
so that in your infamous, demeaning speech to the AIPAC convention right after you gained the nomination of the Democratic
Party, you supported an "undivided Jerusalem," and opposed negotiations with Hamas-- the elected government in Gaza. Once
again, you ignored the will of the Israeli people who, in a March 1, 2008 poll by the respected newspaper Haaretz, showed
that 64% of Israelis favored "direct negotiations with Hamas." Siding with the AIPAC hard-liners is what one of the many leading
Palestinians advocating dialogue and peace with the Israeli people was describing when he wrote "Anti-semitism today is the
persecution of Palestinian society by the Israeli state."
During your visit to Israel this summer, you scheduled a
mere 45 minutes of your time for Palestinians with no news conference, and no visit to Palestinian refugee camps that would
have focused the media on the brutalization of the Palestinians. Your trip supported the illegal, cruel blockade of Gaza in
defiance of international law and the United Nations charter. You focused on southern Israeli casualties which during the
past year have totaled one civilian casualty to every 400 Palestinian casualties on the Gaza side. Instead of a statesmanship
that decried all violence and its replacement with acceptance of the Arab League's 2002 proposal to permit a viable Palestinian
state within the 1967 borders in return for full economic and diplomatic relations between Arab countries and Israel, you
played the role of a cheap politician, leaving the area and Palestinians with the feeling of much shock and little awe.
David
Levy, a former Israeli peace negotiator, described your trip succinctly: "There was almost a willful display of indifference
to the fact that there are two narratives here. This could serve him well as a candidate, but not as a President."
Palestinian
American commentator, Ali Abunimah, noted that Obama did not utter a single criticism of Israel, "of its relentless settlement
and wall construction, of the closures that make life unlivable for millions of Palestinians. ...Even the Bush administration
recently criticized Israeli's use of cluster bombs against Lebanese civilians [see www.atfl.org for elaboration]. But Obama
defended Israeli's assault on Lebanon as an exercise of its 'legitimate right to defend itself.'"
In numerous columns
Gideon Levy, writing in Haaretz, strongly criticized the Israeli government's assault on civilians in Gaza, including attacks
on "the heart of a crowded refugee camp... with horrible bloodshed" in early 2008.
Israeli writer and peace advocate--
Uri Avnery-- described Obama's appearance before AIPAC as one that "broke all records for obsequiousness and fawning, adding
that Obama "is prepared to sacrifice the most basic American interests. After all, the US has a vital interest in achieving
an Israeli-Palestinian peace that will allow it to find ways to the hearts of the Arab masses from Iraq to Morocco. Obama
has harmed his image in the Muslim world and mortgaged his future-- if and when he is elected president.," he said, adding,
"Of one thing I am certain: Obama's declarations at the AIPAC conference are very, very bad for peace. And what is bad for
peace is bad for Israel, bad for the world and bad for the Palestinian people."
A further illustration of your deficiency
of character is the way you turned your back on the Muslim-Americans in this country. You refused to send surrogates to speak
to voters at their events. Having visited numerous churches and synagogues, you refused to visit a single Mosque in America.
Even George W. Bush visited the Grand Mosque in Washington D.C. after 9/11 to express proper sentiments of tolerance before
a frightened major religious group of innocents.
Although the New York Times published a major article on June 24,
2008 titled "Muslim Voters Detect a Snub from Obama" (by Andrea Elliott), citing examples of your aversion to these Americans
who come from all walks of life, who serve in the armed forces and who work to live the American dream. Three days earlier
the International Herald Tribune published an article by Roger Cohen titled "Why Obama Should Visit a Mosque." None of these
comments and reports change your political bigotry against Muslim-Americans-- even though your father was a Muslim from Kenya.
Perhaps
nothing illustrated your utter lack of political courage or even the mildest version of this trait than your surrendering
to demands of the hard-liners to prohibit former president Jimmy Carter from speaking at the Democratic National Convention.
This is a tradition for former presidents and one accorded in prime time to Bill Clinton this year.
Here was a President
who negotiated peace between Israel and Egypt, but his recent book pressing the dominant Israeli superpower to avoid Apartheid
of the Palestinians and make peace was all that it took to sideline him. Instead of an important address to the nation by
Jimmy Carter on this critical international problem, he was relegated to a stroll across the stage to "tumultuous applause,"
following a showing of a film about the Carter Center's post-Katrina work. Shame on you, Barack Obama!
But then your
shameful behavior has extended to many other areas of American life. (See the factual analysis by my running mate, Matt Gonzalez,
on www.votenader.org). You have turned your back on the 100-million poor Americans composed of poor whites, African-Americans,
and Latinos. You always mention helping the "middle class" but you omit, repeatedly, mention of the "poor" in America.
Should
you be elected President, it must be more than an unprecedented upward career move following a brilliantly unprincipled campaign
that spoke "change" yet demonstrated actual obeisance to the concentration power of the "corporate supremacists." It must
be about shifting the power from the few to the many. It must be a White House presided over by a black man who does not turn
his back on the downtrodden here and abroad but challenges the forces of greed, dictatorial control of labor, consumers and
taxpayers, and the militarization of foreign policy. It must be a White House that is transforming of American politics--
opening it up to the public funding of elections (through voluntary approaches)-- and allowing smaller candidates to have
a chance to be heard on debates and in the fullness of their now restricted civil liberties. Call it a competitive democracy.
Your
presidential campaign again and again has demonstrated cowardly stands. "Hope" some say springs eternal." But not when "reality"
consumes it daily.
WHEN: Monday, Oct. 20, at 7:15
and 7:30 p.m., respectively
WHERE: Bagdad Theatre and Pub, 3702 SE Hawthorne Blvd, Portland, OR 97214
On Monday, October 20 at 7:15 p.m.,
consumer advocate and presidential candidate Ralph Nader will hold a press conference at the Bagdad Theatre and Pub, 3702
SE Hawthorne Blvd, Portland, OR 97214, followed by a 1:30 p.m. rally. Mr.
Nader will speak on a variety of topics including the economic crisis, the fraudulent Commission on Presidential Debates which
excludes alternative voices from participating, and other pressing issues especially pertinent to Oregon residents.
Nader/Gonzalez
laments news of the closure of a German-owned Daimler plant in Portland. Giant corporations, whether American or foreign,
feel little or no sympathy for the workers and communities they harm when they make profit-driven decisions to move jobs oversees
or into poorer countries where they exploit lax worker and environmental protection laws. The closure is set for 2010 when
the company’s contract expires and will result in the laying off of about 900 workers represented by a number of unions
including the Teamsters, Machinists and others.
While news of the plant’s closure rightly inspires a sense of
powerlessness, Nader/Gonzalez is encouraged by plans to construct new solar panels on 328,000 square feet of a warehouse in
northeast Portland. The solar project, which is the largest of its kind in the Northwest, will produce 1.1 megawatts of electricity
for local customers by December which is enough to power about 800 homes.
Nader/Gonzalez supports bringing jobs back
to communities by investing in clean, sustainable projects such as solar and wind, and in needed local labor-intensive public
works to improve and rebuild infrastructure, fully fund education and redirect large bureaucratic and fraudulent health expenditures
toward preventive health care. Of all places, Portland, which recently topped a list of the Greenest Cities in the world by
Popular Science Magazine and is widely considered to be the most bicycle friendly city in North America, has clearly proven
its openness and ability to accomplish just that while setting an example for others.
Mr. Nader will also address other
critical issues the major party candidates have taken "off the table" that the Nader/Gonzalez Campaign has put on the table,
including:
- a comprehensive, six-month negotiated military and corporate withdrawal date from Iraq; - a single-payer,
private delivery, free-choice public health insurance system for all; - a living wage and repeal of the anti-union Taft-Hartley
Act; - a no-nuke, solar-based energy policy supported by renewable, sustainable, energy-efficient sources; - a carbon
tax to deter global warming and a securities derivatives tax to pay for the Washington bailout of Wall Street; - an end
to the corporate welfare and corporate crime that has resulted in millions losing pensions, savings and jobs and squandered
tax dollars; and, - more direct democracy reflecting the preamble to our constitution which starts with "we the people,"
and not "we the corporations."
About Ralph Nader Attorney, author, and consumer advocate Ralph
Nader has been named by Time Magazine one of the "100 Most Influential Americans in the 20th Century." For more than four
decades he has exposed problems and organized millions of citizens into more than 100 public interest groups advocating solutions.
He led the movement to establish the Motor Vehicle Safety Act, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA),
the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Consumer Product Safety Commission, and was instrumental
in enacting the Safe Drinking Water Act,, the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and countless other
pieces of important consumer legislation. Because of Ralph Nader we drive safer cars, eat healthier food, breathe better air,
drink cleaner water, and work in safer environments. Nader graduated from Princeton University and received an LL.B
from Harvard Law School.
About the Nader/Gonzalez Campaign The Nader/Gonzalez independent presidential
candidacy will be on the ballot in 45 states, is polling at 5-6 percent nationally, and a recent Time/CNN
poll shows Ralph Nader polling 8 percent in New Mexico, 7 percent in Colorado, 7 percent in Pennsylvania, and 6 percent in
Nevada — all key battleground states.
For more information on the Nader/Gonzalez campaign, visit: votenader.org.
-End-
Video
(1)
Ralph Nader 10-20-08 Bagdad Theater Portland Oregon part 1
They're
charging through airports, eating up highways, setting up, taking down, rushing ahead, and framing the shot. They capture
video of real people asking questions at events, not just the candidates.
And, of course, they get Ralph Nader's and Matt Gonzalez's
responses out to you and to the world. The media team you helped to build with your donations is hitting its stride.
The Nader Media Team has some new videos up on YouTube
that we'd like you to watch and send around to your friends.
Remember, you made these possible!
First, check out the Vice-Presidential Debate video that will give you an entertaining way of showing your
friends and family how Matt Gonzalez would've handled Joe Biden and Sarah Palin.
Then, watch
videos from Ralph's recent swing through New England:
It's very important, as November draws near, that we
all try and expand our social circles. Many people have never seen Ralph or Matt speak and video is the next best thing to
a live event.
Please choose the videos you like, and send them to your e-mail
list. Post links to them on blogs that you read, or on your own blog. Your contributions continue to make our video production
possible and we are still ramping up to our best stuff. Stay tuned by subscribing to our YouTube channel.
2008 Presidential candidate Ralph Nader discusses the situation in the Gaza strip and challenges
Senator Barack Obama's comments to AIPAC. Music: Wassaic by Atmospheric Diver. http://www.votenader.org
And I'm listening now to the debate on the Senate floor over legislation that will give President Bush
new warrantless eavesdropping powers.
The bill will also grant immunity to telecom companies for cooperating with Mr. Bush in his illegal
warrantless wiretapping on Americans - on any one of you.
We were taught as young children that in our democracy, under our system of justice, nobody is above
the law - nobody.
But this bill puts the President and the telecom companies above the law.
It also conveniently assures a coverup of Mr. Bush's past crimes in this area - of wiretapping and
surveillance.
On the Senate floor, Senator Feingold has just warned his colleagues that the Senate "will regret that
we passed this legislation."
As my home state Senator, Christopher Dodd, said:
"If we pass this legislation, the Senate will ratify a domestic spying regime that has already concentrated
far too much unaccountable power in the President's hands and will place the telecommunications companies above the law."
What does it say that Senators Dodd, Feingold, Harry Reid, and Patrick Leahy have led the valiant fight
against this bill, but Senator Obama has said he will vote for it?
Again, this bill gives the President vast new warrantless eavesdropping powers and allows the government
- for the first time ever - to tap into America's telecommunications networks with no judicial warrant requirement.
President Bush and the Democrats who support him argue that the telecommunications companies were only
doing what they were told by the President and were acting as "patriotic corporate citizens."
This is pure hogwash.
First of all, corporations aren't citizens.
Second, the President can't order anyone - citizens or corporations - to break the law.
This legislation, which the Senate is debating right now, sets up a double standard of justice.
Break the law as a citizen, go to jail.
Break the law as a corporation, go to Washington and get immunity.
Remember, there were telecom companies, such as Qwest, that refused to follow President Bush's illegal
wiretap orders and chose instead to obey the laws of the land.
The Senate is now posed to bury the rule of law.
What to do?
Join Nader/Gonzalez - the candidacy that will shift the power from the corporations back into the hands
of the people.
We strongly oppose the wiretap surveillance legislation that Obama and McCain support.
We stand strongly with the American people and for the Constitution.
The Nader/Gonzalez campaign is now at six percent in the most recent CNN poll.
We're in the middle of a fundraising drive right now to put Nader/Gonzalez on the ballot in 45 states
by September 20.
Ralph Nader, activist, author and lecturer, shared his views in the matter of the "Next
Steps for the Peace Movement," at a panel discussion on Oct. 11, 2007. The event
was held at Bus Boys and Poets, in Washington, D.C. It was a fundraiser for DemocracyRising.US. For more information, please
go to: www.democracyrising.us./ Mr. Nader's latest book is entitled: "The Seventeen Traditions."
This link here is about Ralph suing the Democrats 10/30/07
The lawsuit was filed on behalf of Nader, his vice presidential running mate
Peter Miguel Camejo and a group of voters from several states. It names as co-defendants the Kerry-Edwards campaign, the Service
Employees International Union, private law firms, and organizations like the Ballot Project and America Coming Together that
were created to promote voter turnout on behalf of the Democratic ticket. According to the lawsuit the defendants used “groundless
and abusive litigation” to bankrupt Ralph Nader’s campaign and force him off the ballot in 18 states.
