Rumor has it Peter Steinbureck left the city council to head up his Washington State campaign again.

Who gives a shit. Nobody voted for him in 2004 and nobody will this time (at least not enough people to make it matter).

Why would he want to retire? Underdog politics is all he has. Have you ever read any biographies of the man? Ralph Nader is one boring human being.

Are you that afraid of Nader?

Are the Democrat candidates that weak that Nader would compromise their victory?

Just because I would vote for him, doesn't mean I would have voted for the others...his presence makes me consider voting...no one else that is running makes me want to vote.

If Clinton/Obama/Edwards are so great then why would anyone consider voting for anyone else?

You sound so scared.

It's sad, really. He's become almost as irrelevant as Lyndon LaRouche.

He and Ron Paul can fight over that key "kinda-leftist dipshit"demographic.

After all, every time we start to complain about the Bush years, we can start by muttering, "Thanks, Ralph..."

Without him, Gore would have won decisively in the electoral vote like he did in the popular vote.

#5 and #6 hmmmm yet still important enough to make all the blogs by saying he is considering a run....

so irrelevant...but we better hang on to him in case we need an excuse in the event of a loss.

THe Democrats are such great candidates that if they lose its not their fault for attracting enough voters...it's someone else's fault for not being a conformist.

Patrick, you sound like you're in the "I'd vote for a Republican before I'd vote for Hillary" camp. If so, then yes, you really are part of the problem. And the rest of really will blame another Republican President on you.

In answer to your questions #4 yes and yes.

The Republicans and Democrats seem to think they have a constitutional right to the presidency.

Unpaid @6 nailed it.  I wonder how many Paul supporters will seize on a new Nader run as an opportunity to save face will bailing on their increasingly hard to defend Paul crushes.

he's running. i'm not supposed to know that someone is going to go work for his campaign. lame lame lame.

You have got to be fucking kidding me.

Ralph Nader has gone from beloved heavyweight to raving lunatic in a matter of years. Should his decision to run become fact, he will effectively destroy what little respect I have left for the man.

It's like seeing Ali turn into Tyson. Someone needs to knock some damn sense into Nader's head.

@13 - If that's true, then why does anyone even care if he runs?

im not voting for ralph nader. but i hate all of these bitter people for blaming him for the W. thats like saying, if it wasnt for al gore, ralph nader would have been the president and so al gore is the reason we are stuck with w. how about al gore didnt appeal to progressives enough to take votes away from nader? and thats why we have w. or americans are so fucktarded that almost half of them voted for w.

Ralph who? Is he Thompson's brother?

The villain Nader - who does he think he is, some fucking free citizen of a democracy who can run for office without asking permission?

I'm no naderite, but it is permanently hilarious that nobody has the persuasive ability to shut him up. It remains kind of inspiring that he can't be bullied, too. Speaks volumes about the true strategic ineffectualness of the Dem party liners.

I would pay good, hard-earned money to see a cadge match between a rabid packs of Paultards and Naderites!

OMG are you totally kidding??

Like, who wouldn't vote for a democrat no matter who the nominee is?

How random is that?

fer sure.

I'd chip in on a vintage Pinto for him, but only if I get to tailgate him...

Dude,

It wasnt Nader who damaged the country...

If Gore had carried his home state, he would have won.

Isn't there an argument that Nader didn't impact the results because he took from both sides?

Google: "A Ballot-Level Study of Green and Reform Party Voters in the 2000 Presidential Election"

Buchanan was on the Florida ballot.

Will Nader take more votes from Clinton or McCain?

I will most definately vote for him.

On a slightly more serious note, I don't have any problem with the IDEA of fringe party candidates, but in reality they're only a nuisance, and sometimes a dangerous one. Unless an actual new political party is formed and elects a sizable number of senators and representatives to Washington, a third party candidate is unelectable. And even if some nutty, fluke thing happened and one were to win, NOTHING would be accomplished. If Nader were to freakishly win in November, he would have NO base of power in Washington, which means he would have no way to actually make very many of his policies and promises come to fruition.

And yeah, Nader DID contribute to Gore losing the election, (well, that and the perfidy in Florida and the Supreme Court).

Don't blame Nader. Blame Bloomberg for President McCain.

#24 I am sure we are all happy to hear that you don't have a "problem" with fringe parties. Just as long as they don't get too uppity.

I had no idea Ralph Nader was a guest on Saturday Night Live in 1975!

Some of my best friends are fringe parties.

I'm just going to recycle what I said about Amy Winehouse earlier...

Just fucking die already, you stupid bitch!

Well, at least it gives all the "I'm never voting for Hillary if she's the nominee" Obamaites someone to vote for, so that they can pretend that they're not a bunch of petulant whiners. I'd say the same for anti-Obama Hillaryites, but I haven't heard even one of them threaten to abandon the Democratic nominee if they don't get their way.

It's a doomed cause, but go Edwards!

I'm glad he's running, the same way I'm glad every time I see further news of Britney Spears' descent. There comes a point in the lives of our more pathetic public figures when they cross the line from "salvageable debacle" to "ever more gruesome train wreck." Nader has long since passed that point. The fun part now is in watching how low he sinks before he finally dies or disappears for good.

C'mon Dan, when will you drop the Nader hating? He didn't cost anyone the election and he didn't give it to GW. Did he even get any votes in Florida?

his candidacy will be ignored by all but the most irrational leftishists.

this is not the year to fuck around. president mccain means 8 more years of occupation & senility in the white house.

I tend to be a utilitarian thinker, so, this is how I see it.

Outcome if Nader had not run for President: Nader is not President, Al Gore is

Outcome of Nader's run for President: Nader is not President, George W is

I would have preferred the former.

He da man. Na-dog don't quit!

Best chance in our lives for a progressive government. Alas. We will continue to suck establishment cock and vote for the Democrat who can ass-kiss the most moderates and businesses. And then see every progressive ideal basically shit and pissed on for yet another four years.

This is why I love our one-and-a-half-party system.

To blame Nader for the W presidency it the cowards/idiots way to not look at their own party for blame. Voter suppression in 00 and 04 gave Bush the election. Not that the Dems did not have a chance to address voter suppression in 00 as one black congress person after another got up pleading for one senator to challenge the election, and not one Vichy senate Dem stepped in. Fuck you Cantwell. Not that Gore could of challenged the Supreme courts decision to stop the Florida vote, because Gore did cast the deciding vote to recognize the supreme courts edict to stop counting. Also, people seem to brush aside who Gore’s running mate was, Jo Lieberman. That tells us a lot of who Gore is, and what he would of done after 9/11. I could go on and on about the complicity of the Democratic party in America’s demise, but it is easier to just say the Dems are at least ½ of the problem, and not the solution. If Edwards gets the nomination, I would vote Dem. If Obama gets it, I might vote for him. If Clinton gets the nomination the Democrats are not serious about winning the Whitehouse and the whole party can go fuck themselves like they always do. As crazy as Paul is, he is better for this country than Clinton.

Man, all the Paultards and Naderites really came out of the woodwork on this one. Don't you people have better things to do? Maybe you should finish digging your survival bunkers or coating all your hats with tin foil?

Nader's 74, and he's never seen another human being naked.

@ 37 You dim bulb. Gore killed his own presidency by casting the deciding vote in accepting the Supreme courts decision to stop the Florida recount. I voted for Gore, and he threw my vote away. I also voted for Kerry, and the goof knew they were suppressing the vote in Ohio, and even fucking around with the numbers, and yet he conceded the next fucking day. Your mentality reminds me of the working Joe that gets his dreams crushed by the world and comes home and takes it out on the kid by beating him for some trivial shit. You spineless fucking coward, Bush inc fixed the election, and Gore slit the throat of his own presidency. I am not the biggest Obama fan, but if Clinton gets the nomination, the young ones that support Obama should look for a third party, or convince Obama to run on his own. The Democrats and the DNC do not deserve you, they gave us Gore, and Kerry, and this fucking war in Iraq, and the coming depression.

@30 You know, maybe it's just that all of the "I'm never voting for Hillary if she's the nominee" Obamaites were never Dems in the first place. We might just all be independents or pissed off Repugs.

@32: Nader won approximately 97,000 votes in Florida in 2000. The official results for Florida had Bush winning by 537 votes. Yes, there was voter suppression and other GOP tricks, but the fact remains that if only a small percentage of Nader voters had gone for Gore Florida would have gone Democratic by a wide enough margin that Karl Rove's handiwork wouldn't have mattered. And anyone who thinks we wouldn't have been better off with President Gore has been living on another planet for the last seven years.

@ 41 Nader’s run for office and the votes he received in Florida is a moot point, since Gore would of won the recount, and Gore voted in the senate to let the Supreme Court decision to stop the vote stand. Gore not Nader delivered the presidency to Bush. You weasels want to scapegoat Nader! Un-fucking believable.

It's like that creature from the Alien movies--I think it was called the Alien....you can shoot it out into space, nuke it from orbit, drop it into molten metal, and it keeps coming back for sequels!

jeb666, you might consider reading the Constitution. Even if the Supremes hadn't handed the election to W, it would have been decided in the House, which in 2000 was controlled by, ummm, Republicans! Your ranting is pathetic: why would you blame voter suppression in Florida on the Democrats?? And yes, if the dumbfuck chuckleheads who voted for Nader had instead voted for Gore, W would have spent the past 7 years chopping cedar on the ranch, instead of causing the deaths of tens of thousands. And yes, I truly believe the blood of Iraq is on Nader's (and his insane supporters') hands. Now, if you feel the urge to support Ron Paul (as, given your state of mind, you well might), go google "white supremacist" and "Ron Paul Political Report" and see what you turn up.

yammer, YAMMER. These playa-hatin' middle-of-the -roaders need to stop playing in traffic, and messin' with my man. Ralph Nader is HOT, has a backbone, and more synapses firing at 74 than some do at 40-something (Dan).

Besides somebody's got to keep me awake about the presidential election, because I am not feeling it. I'm bored watching the nepotist upper-class white woman duke it out with the o.k. black man over who represented the sleaziest client as an attorney; or about which token should be president, rather than the stuffed-shirt white dudes we usually get.

ZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz....
Whuh? ...oh. ZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz....

@ Prof Ummmm, well I suppose it is easier to blame Nader for the blood in Iraq, than say Clinton, who voted to give Bush the authority to invade Iraq. I suppose it is easier to blame those that voted for Nader than the Democratic controlled congress that funds the war. Paul is a cracker populist, with a lot to disagree with, but he will end the racist war in Iraq, and it is racist, since the only crime Iraqis committed on 9/11 war being a brown Arab. The racist mentality of all you American liberal fucktards that supported this war in the beginning is grotesque. Fuck you and your war in Iraq and your politicians that keep funding it.

jeb666 you and your arguments are naive at best.
Those Democrats in office were: 1. getting the same misleading intelligence that the rest of us were being spoon fed by the mislabeled "liberal" media 2. were seeing overwhelming public support for the war in 2002-2003 3. smart enough at the time to realize that not supporting the effort would have labeled the Democratic party for generations to come as "pro-terrorist." As it stands now the Dems have a pretty good shot of winning.
As a proud Democrat I have to admit I am not sure I want us to....
If the Democrat nominee wins they will no doubt have to raise taxes and make some huge sacrifices in order to make a dent in cleaning up the Bush mess. It might be better if we let Republicans clean up their own mess or just die off completely...

Ralph Nader is the greatest living American. Fuck you Dan for saying something so patently false as "[Ralph Nader] has already done enough damage to this country." You are so full of shit. Get over your blind partisanship, please.

nader the "moaning prig." love it.

Wow, Dan. I'm surprised at your ageist comments and blatant disregard for the wisdom and leadership our nation's seniors can offer. The future of democracy in our country and around the globe to some extent rests on our ability to allow many voices to be heard, instead of systematically silencing any voice who challenges the dominant paradigm. If Ralph Nader runs again, I believe his motivation is not his ego, no far from it. His motivation is to continue to ask extremely difficult questions of the other candidates and the citizenry. How many of us have that kind of courage? The right to vote brings with it a great responsibility, the responsibility to vote for REAL leaders, people we can believe in and who hold corporations, politicians and citizens to a higher standard of behavior and civic participation. Ralph Nader is a person we can believe in.

Say what you will of Ralph Nader. But he is a rare breed these days: a true progressive. Which is more than I can say about Billary, Obama, or Al Gore.

Say what you will of Ralph Nader. But he is a rare breed these days: a true progressive. Which is more than I can say about Billary, Obama, or Al Gore.