It felt like meeting someone from history
For my Newsnight film on the American election (see below), I flew up to Connecticut and drove through the beautiful golds, crimson and browns of New England in the autumn, to meet a historic figure - , who is standing for the presidency for a third time.
He met us in his home town of Winstead, which still looks like an old-style American town, with a main street full of good old-fashioned private shops, and not wrecked by a soulless shopping mall. We caught up with him at the local high school, and then he took us into the local fix-it shop, the health food store, and his barber's, where even a famous presidential candidate has to wait in line to get his hair cut. Nader's aides told us that it was the first time he had ever allowed a TV team to film him on his home patch.
Ralph Nader, who is now 74, is known to many people these days as they man who ruined things for (and won it for George W Bush) by standing in 2000, when he gained almost three million votes, and 2.74% of the national vote. In Florida, he won more than 97,000 votes, many times Al Gore's losing margin of 537. Nader insists this argument is "rubbish", and claims that his candidature in 2000 actually helped Gore, by pushing him to take up more popular, radical positions.
Nader is quick to point out that has twice included him in their list of the 100 most influential Americans of the 20th century, not for his role in 2000, of course, but his work as a citizens' rights advocate, pushing through laws in the 1960s and 1970s on consumer issues, environmental protection and workers' rights. In 2006 a panel of historians recruited by in their 100 most influential Americans in history, just one ahead of Richard Nixon. Neither of the president Bushes, nor Clinton, made it into the historians' top hundred.
His main pitch is that too much power in concentrated in corporate America, at the expense of ordinary citizens. Indeed, he insists it is no longer possible to push his causes through the Washington system (to the extent that the bills he sponsored had to be signed by resident Nixon) because corporation have become so powerful on Capitol Hill, and congressmen depend on corporate money to finance their campaigns.
Nader had only a handful of officials with him the day we filmed in Winstead, and his sister Clare. It's a tiny operation, and although he's only on the ballot in 45 states, Nader plans to campaign in all 50 by election day. It's something neither Obama, nor McCain will be able to boast, at least not in terms of where they've gone during the general election campaign (since they were picked as their party candidates). Richard Nixon promised to campaign in all 50 states in 1968 and deeply regretted it as a waste of time, and nowadays, of course, the main candidates concentrate simply on the handful of swing states such as Ohio, Virginia and Pennsylvania. Everywhere else they assume is either sewn up, or hopeless.
This must be pretty annoying to Americans - probably the majority - who live in states where the main contenders don't bother.
One of Ralph Nader's policies is to abolish the , and decide to contest simply on the overall popular vote. This would encourage candidates to campaign much more widely, since every vote would count equally.
And if the Electoral College didn't exist then America wouldn't have had the problem of Florida in 2000. Al Gore would have won on the popular vote, and, of course, Ralph Nader wouldn't be blamed for his defeat.
Watch my film on changing US politics
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I'm Michael Crick, and I'm Newsnight's political editor. My guiding rule is that in any story there's usually something the politicians would prefer the world not to know. My job is to find that out. Follow me on
Comment number 1.
At 23rd Oct 2008, nomorefakenews wrote:WAKE UP MICHAEL!!!!!!
WE HAVE THE "NORTH AMERICAN UNION" TAKING PLACE IN A FEW YEARS TIME...
CANADA...USA AND MEXICO JOIN IN A UNION WITH A NEW CURRENCY ...THE AMERO
WE LIVE IN A SCRIPED AGENDA, THE WAR IS ON THE MINDS OF POPULATIONS, THE CREDIT CRUNCH WAS MANUFACTURED TO HAPPEN, I CANNOT WAIT FOR YOU TO SAY THE WORDS ON TELEVISION...
"NORTH AMERICAN UNION"
"NEW CURRENCY"
WHICH ACTOR WINS THE SO CALLED ELECTION DOES NOT MATTER THIS UNION WILL HAPPEN.........
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Comment number 2.
At 28th Oct 2008, thegangofone wrote:I think Obama is the best thing to happen to the US - assuming he does indeed go on to win. It also assumes that the neo-Nazis don't get him.
But I have to agree with Nader.
I would kill for the something like the US Constitution in the UK. But their electoral system is worse than ours - and that takes some doing.
Perhaps Obama could do something second term but I think there are too many big issues like Iraq and the economy to start adding to the list.
To me bad electoral systems ensure incompetence in government. Good ones don't guarantee it of course but thats democracy.
Given the far right (or far left in their world) post on the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ I am very happy with democracy thanks.
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