[Marxism] Fwd: An Analysis of Green Party Primary Results

Fri Feb 22 09:16:37 MST 2008

--- Alex Briscoe <obeynow20001 at yahoo.com> wrote:

> Date: Fri, 22 Feb 2008 08:11:58 -0800 (PST)
> From: Alex Briscoe <obeynow20001 at yahoo.com>
> Subject: An Analysis of Green Party Primary Results
> To: Cook County <cookcodiscussion at yahoogroups.com>, 
>     Illinoisgreensfocus
> <illinoisgreensfocus at yahoogroups.com>, 
>     GreenAllianceList2
> <greenallianceus at yahoogroups.com>, 
>     GreenAllianceCookCounty
> <greenalliancecookcounty at yahoogroups.com>
> 
> I was all tied up with work in February, so this is
> late, but here it is (apologies for any
> cross-postings):
> 
> 
> 
> February 5th's results show that name recognition is
> key.  In California, Ralph Nader, allowed to be on
> the
> ballot directly, came away with slightly over 61% of
> the vote to Cynthia McKinney's 28%.  The total pool
> of
> votes in the CAGP primary was 27,511.
> 
> In Illinois, where Nader was effectively not allowed
> to appear under his own name, Howie Hawkins, his
> stand-in, garnered just 17% to Cynthia McKinney's
> 69%.
> The total pool of votes in the ILGP primary was
> 2,555.
> 
> California had a 10.8 times greater pool of voters
> in
> the primary, while California's population registers
> at 2.8 times greater than Illinois.  In terms of
> media
> coverage, "CAGP Primary" had 183,000 hits on google
> to
> "ILGP Primary"'s 180,000. Both parties' primaries
> had
> little to no mass media coverage.
> 
> In Arkansas, where the deciders of the state party
> barred even a stand-in for Nader appearing on the
> ballot, Cynthia McKinney got 32% of the vote. 
> However
> more than half of the members of the ARGP voted for
> "uncommitted".  How many of that number would have
> voted for Ralph Nader?
> 
> Past experience has shown that Ralph Nader
> galvanizes
> Green and left-of-center voters to participate, as
> we
> can see from the California example.  There is also
> the example of 2000, where Nader even helped bring
> out
> voters for Al Gore, giving Gore 1/2 percent more
> votes than he would have otherwise gotten, according
> to Al From, then-Chair of the Democratic Leadership
> Council.
> 
> Depending on who the Democrats' nominee is, our
> Presidential candidates will have an easier or
> harder
> time of it.  Hopefully, Hillary will grab the
> nomination, frustrate the rank and file of the Dems,
> and fundamentally weaken the party.  
> 
> Why do I say this?  Because the Democratic Party is
> the swamp of movement politics.  All one has to do
> is
> to look at the insanity and idiocy of the 2004
> election where many supported Kucinich and then
> Kerry,
> ending up with a pro-war pro-corporate candidate
> that
> could not even defeat an even more pro-war
> pro-corporate candidate.  Obama is the Kerry of
> 2008,
> masquerading as the Ralph Nader of 2000, but with
> the
> aim of a Kucinich 2004: to further weaken real
> alternative political parties.  
> 
> As has been pointed out in "Green Party Ignored to
> Death on Stupor Tuesday",
> http://buildgreens.blogspot.com/ the Green Party has
> been weakened by the demoralization of 2004, the
> lack
> of consiousness among Green Party members and the
> resulting support for the fake alternative Obama.
> 
> As fragile as the Green Party is right now, millions
> of Obama supporters turning away from the Dems and
> towards the Greens would infuse new life in the
> GP-US.
>  As Green activists point out, the Green Party is
> the
> only viable alternative party at the moment, that
> does
> not take corporate contributions, and thus is not
> tied
> to increasing corporate profits, wars of occupation
> and ecocide.
> 
> I do support Cynthia McKinney as a national
> candidate.  However, in 2008, given Nader's greater
> and McKinney's lower level of name recognition, I
> feel that the best possible outcome for the Green
> Party, the movements and the candidates would be for
> Ralph Nader to run as the Green Party US
> Presidential
> candidate and Cynthia McKinney to run as the Green
> Party Vice-Presidential candidate.  Then, in 2012,
> with greater name recognition, Cynthia McKinney
> would
> be positioned nationally to run as the Green Party
> U.S. Presidential candidate.
> 
> We should not forget that the corporate media and
> the
> NGO industrial complex will again be hostile to a
> viable Green Party Presidential campaign that
> presents
> a real challenge to the corporate parties.
> 
> Our experience in the Chicago primaries has shown us
> that the Democrats will practice an array of dirty
> tricks to suppress our vote, where the populace is
> concentrated and the stakes are higher.  The stakes
> will be even higher in November, so our hopes for
> establishing the Green Party nationally is with the
> candidate with the highest level of name
> recognition,
> along with a solid candidate who can draw from core
> activists and people of color.  If we are serious
> about establishing the Green Party nationally in
> 2008,
> we should be pushing for a Nader/McKinney ticket.
> 
> Let's say that the left liberals dreams come true
> and
> Obama wins the Dems nomination and the White House
> in
> November.  The best case scenario is that people
> wake
> up and start to mobilize for their rights after a
> year
> or two of being sold out by Obama and the
> "Democratic
> Leadership Council" and from suffering increasingly
> worse effects of peak oil, climate catastrophe and a
> 10 year economic slump.
> 
> Even in this rosy scenario, the more consciousness
> we
> can raise between now and November, the stronger the
> Green Party and the planet will be.  Raising
> consciousness depends in large part in being heard. 
> With a name recognition of 90 to 95 percent to
> Cynthia
> McKinney's one to five percent, Ralph Nader has a
> geometrically greater chance of being heard.
> 
> Even though many liberals have been demoralized by
> their demobilization by the Democratic Party and
> their
> supporters from 2004, we should still expect
> slander,
> stonewalling and exclusion, most of all from the
> corporate press.
> 
> In order to overcome entrenched opposition, we must
> have a Presidential candidate that can galvanize
> Green
> and left of center voters to raise consciousness of
> Green goals, and organizationally, to put the Green
> Party US Presidential candidate over five percent.  
> 
> This result would trigger real financial resources
> for
> the national party and spur larger growth and power
> for the GP-US.  Importantly, it would also widen the
> crack in the dungeon door through which the American
> people could start to push.
> 
> Alex Briscoe
> North Side Greens
> Illinois Green Party
> 
> 
> ***************************
> ***************************
> http://www.draftnader.org/
> http://www.ilgp.org
> http://www.northsidegreenparty.org
> http://www.greenallianceusa.org
> http://www.labornotes.org
> http://www.solidarity-us.org
> http://www.internationalviewpoint.org
> 
> 
>      
>
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***************************
***************************
http://www.draftnader.org/
http://www.ilgp.org
http://www.northsidegreenparty.org
http://www.greenallianceusa.org
http://www.labornotes.org
http://www.solidarity-us.org
http://www.internationalviewpoint.org


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