Image by George Cassutto
Used with Permission
Copyright 2012

After Obama was elected, middle class housewife Velma Hart looked right at the President and told him she was “exhausted” defending him. She was an African-American supporter of Obama in the 2008 campaign, but by 2010, she was tired of fighting the Right on the health care battlefield, and she was tired of defending the President’s moves to the Right as he tried to reach across the aisle and govern from the center. She must have also felt forgotten as an African-American, someone who voted for Barack Obama with high hopes for her own community, many of whom have felt abandoned as he failed to address the needs of the Black community in the inner cities and nationally. Many of Obama’s supporters know how she feels, and they have been experiencing the same “Obama Fatigue” as the fever pitch against the President has increased and the election of 2012 draws near.

Now that we have entered the Republican primary season, supporters of the President are spoiling for a fight. Day after day, they hear on Fox News and even in the mainstream media attacks on the President, his record, and his ideals. Over the past three years, the president has been vilified, his personal and political history has been distorted, and his accomplishments have been forgotten or belittled. Those who admire and support the President are constantly on the defensive. Obama’s faithful argue that the President’s measures have saved the American economy, pulling it out of the worst recession since the Great Depression. They claim the President’s policies have created 22 months of consecutive private sector job growth, and that Obama has consistently kept his promises, leading to the most productive legislative agenda in the first two years of his term since Franklin Roosevelt. Even though the President himself has stated that there is much work to do, the passage of the Affordable Health Care Act, the reduction of the unemployment rate to 8.5%, the creation of the Consumer Finance Protection Board, and the end of “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” are just a few of the progressive policies the President has put in to place. Obama supporters are asking their fellow Americans to give the President four more years to accomplish the changes that they hoped President Obama would bring to fruition during his first term. Immigration reform, education reform, deficit reduction, and economic growth are still high on the President’s agenda, according to Obama’s army of volunteers.

As I walked into a McDonald’s just after New Year’s Day, an elderly gentleman spotted the Obama 2012 sticker on my winter coat. He said “you gotta be kidding me.’” I responded with an enthusiastic smile, “very serious, and I hope you join us.” He shook his head ruefully and just kept on walking. My adrenaline kept flowing as though I had just emerged from a barroom bawl. I couldn’t help but wonder what his criticisms of the president were, if they were based on regulations that restricted his business, if he had been one of the long-term unemployed, or if he was just a good ol’ boy who could not accept a black president as the leader of his nation.

As a Civics teacher, I am confident that I can hold my own in any discussion with a rabid Republican or undecided Independent. I get lots of good practice defending the President on Facebook when his policies and decisions come under fire from both the Right and the Left. The Republican primary season has revealed the weaknesses of the GOP candidates, which are made up largely of the bombastic personalities and extreme positions maintained by the candidates themselves. President Obama himself will be able to counter many of their arguments as the nation moves towards the general election because he has implemented many of their own suggested policies, much to the chagrin of the President’s progressive critics, such as Congressman Dennis Kucinich and former Green Party presidential candidate Ralph Nader.

As the President’s approval ratings slowly inch upwards, being an Obama supporter will become easier. Disaffected Democrats yearning for a primary challenger will be silenced because the Democratic Party can offer no one with both executive experience and legislative accomplishments of the President. Most Republicans won’t be able to let go of the idea of removing the President, so the efforts of Obama’s grassroots campaign volunteers will be aimed at swaying undecided Independents. It is this largely moderate block of voters that need to be convinced not so much that they are better off than they were four years ago, but that their lot will be improved with second Obama Administration in the White House for four more years. Obama’s volunteers need to make the case that the President’s accomplishments will benefit the nation at large, but he needs a second term to bring them into reality, hopefully with a weakened Tea Party in the House of Representatives and Democratic majorities in both the House and Senate.

Barack Obama generated a record level of voter turnout and support in 2008 because there was no incumbent. He used the Internet effectively and brought out the youth and Hispanic vote to his advantage. His volunteers are determined to reach out to those voting blocks and to present adamantly their case for a second Obama term in the Oval Office. They will also have to assure older voters that he is their champion to protect entitlement programs to which they contributed and from which they expect a return on their investment. Obama’s supporters will have to do an even better job to insure his re-election as the forces against their President coalesce around Mitt Romney or whoever the presumptive Republican nominee will be. They will have to make the case that Obama isn’t just their president, but that he is the nation’s president, Left, Center, and Right.

So what am I talking about? In Dubai, the monarch has a set period each day where he meets with citizens, face to face, no walls, no phones, no bars, and the citizen is able to voice their complaints in front of their ruler without fear of persecution or punishment. An agency isn’t doing it’s job? A citizen can talk to the ruler and the agency will be put in its place very quickly.

Here in America we have a detached view of our politicians, they do their thing in congress and if we have a complaint about what they’re doing we just think “oh well, that’s how it is” and pray for better choices come next election. That’s not how it should be at all! We put those bastards in office, they should be forced to spend at least a month out of every year doing nothing but meeting with constituents and hearing our problems, our disagreements with their policies, and our suggestions face to face. They should be looking right at us every month and listen to US speak for once, listen to US tell them OUR problems. They need to remember and be reminded yearly who put them where they are, who made them who they are, and who can switch them out if they don’t do a good job. Congress needs to be reminded that they don’t answer to the democratic or republican party council, they answer to us, the citizens of the U.S.

It may not seem like much, but by forcing congress to convince thousands of us every year that they’re doing a good job, individually, face to face, we give ourselves a government that knows its being watched. If our politicians know what we want and know we have our eye on them our ideas will hold that much more weight.

Is there any unity with any political party in our country? Lately, it seems that some of the Republican candidates that are running to be the GOP nominee for the presidency in 2012 have forgotten what unity means.

As with recent Republican debates, accusations and misgivings about each other have been shared. Some of the candidates are so busy trying to lead above all the others that it seems they say and do non-unified things to get ahead in the polls.

Many people will say that this is the way politicians run for office. Just live with it. Should it be the way that they should run? Aren’t Americans worthy of much more dignity, honor and professionalism in their candidates’ behavior than they are getting?

Is this really what we want our candidates focusing on or the news pounding us with day by day? We need candidates that will concentrate on how they can lead our great nation into prosperity and happiness. By focusing on their own strengths and respecting America enough to show us why they each would be great in winning the presidential office, is what we truly need.

It feels as though year after year when it is time for candidates to debate their opponents, they cannot debate without personally attacking each other. Maybe, their own abilities to focus professionally on matters that affect all Americans are not there. Just maybe, these candidates cannot work professionally. It seems that some of them are not showing us that they can.

Candidates should debate about what each can do to help keep our country wonderful and free. They need to show us as voters that they have the experience, desire and ability to get our economy back on its feet. They need to show us that they can resolve such issues as low employment, the housing market instability and foreign policies, especially with handling appropriate terrorist activities.

If the Republican party, as well as other parties debated without focusing on personally attacking each other, than maybe we would see each and every one of their strengths and abilities. The debates would show us which candidate can focus and follow through on problems that affect all Americans and do a terrific job as the President of our United States. In essence, some of these candidates are showing that they want to win anyway they can. That is not America. We are a proud nation and want to show that, regardless.

     Unlike in England, the president has to be the face of the country and the last word on any issue congress has. There is no Queen of America to cut the red ribbon on a new state building, or visit elementary schools to promote reading. Our president is the guy with the double job of keeping up appearences and running to unpopular war. Sadly, Obama doesn’t seem to be good at either of these jobs.

     The people are upset. Its time for a change. Like reconstruction after the Civil War, the US needs reconstruction now. Might I make the first suggestion? End political parties.

     Political parties only give the people two choices of people to run our country, and usually both people suck. So instead of voting for the best person to be president, people end up voting for the lesser of two evils, which leads us to our current economic situation. People can argue that the independent party solves this, but when is the last time any independent party candidate has even had a chance of winning? Close to never.

     The two major parties, the democrats and republicans, are two extremes that split up the country. They force people to chose one extreme over the other when in reality, most people are in the middle. People then, again chose the lesser of two evils. The lean more towards one party over the other and are then forced to vote for all democratic beliefs or all republican beliefs. There is no compromise and no middle ground. So in reality no person or group of people work together to run the government, the party does. Obama may have a great plan to help our economy, but the democratic party and hope for re-election would keep him back.

     Congress especially is unproductive due to political parties. Its always a battle on which party is in control and a fight to see which extreme gets which bill passed. It also brews corruption. So much needed money for our country goes straight into the pocketbooks of our congressmen. Its amazing how they can sleep at night, knowing that the money they spent on their beach house, or plane ticket to Argentina for an affair, could have fed families, or gone to save the drama program at high schools, or to disaster clean up for hurricane damage.

     For a country that is supposedly the “Land of the Free” we are all locked under the power of the Democratic and Republican parties. Its time we got rid of them. Time that the individual patriots of our country rise to govern our country together. The way it should be.

Image by Bernt Rostad via Flickr

The new America
It is time that Americans start making a stand on our beliefs and standing up for our liberties. Some of you may not agree with my opinion but we can all thank our Constitution which allows each of us our freedom of speech and the freedom to express. During my life time the Democrats and Republican and been in charge of Washington, and the White House, our country has made very little change in. The politicians have become more and more on the line of business either making self profit or profit for lobbyist, business and personnel. Every year our politicians find themselves in more scandals. It is my opinion that there are still good politicians that want to work for the people that elected them, but once they reach State or Federal level they get lost in what I call the Washington playing field. This needs to be fixed.
Our Nation has been at war since Vietnam, taking on threats and Humanitarian Missions,  deploying our Armed Forces on every continent on the entire world. Employment in America has been on a decrees for the last decade, occasionally rising when agreements are made with foreign businesses which usually bring their own work force or use the local citizens for cheap labor. I  am tired of the American Government sending soldiers and money to every emergency situation in other countries. We have enough catastrophes in America to keep our First Responders and Soldiers busy. The International Community will do just find without our help until  America has cleaned up her own yard.
Why are CEO’s of major company are still getting big bonuses while the average workers struggle from paycheck to paycheck, with yearly pay ranging around $20,000 to $30,000 yearly. The workers may get a turkey for a Thanksgiving or Christmas bonus, while some CEO’s received around an extra $200,000 and more.
The Health care battle will never end and will never be dealt with seriously, because to many Republicians and Democrats have to much personal interest in getting cuts from the top or getting paid by pharmacy lobbyist to keep pharmaceuticals at higher rates. I am also tired of the Federal Government taking advantage and are being bias towards different state due to income and bi-partisanship.
The standard of living for the average American have deteriorated. Did you know that families with natural gas pay approximately 46% higher rate than those that have electrical AC/heat.
I make a proposal of starting over, not as a republican, nor as a democrat. But starting The New America Party. A political party for the people made by the people. On Sept 1, 2009 the average cost for natural gas was $2.50 per mmbtu per month on FEB 2, 2010 the average natural was $5.40 per mmbtu per month. This is breaking the backs of the average American. Me personally I have no choice but to have natural gas due to that I rent a house and do not own one. Therefore I have no choice if I natural gas or electric. My gas is used for hot water and heat. In the warmer seasons my gas bill is around $20 a month for hot water only, buy runs over $300 for heating and my thermostat is never set higher than 65 degrees in the winter. The unemployment level went from 9.3% in 2009 to 9.7% in February 2010. Gas prices for automobiles are still out of control.  I think it time for a change. I have witnessed on TV and the internet how American are wanting more state and individual right. It’s time to bring the constitution back to the people.
It is very important to keep individual state rights free. It is just as important to maintain individual right as stated in our constitutions. I do not have all the answers and I am not what someone would call a well educated man, but you don’t have to go to Harvard to figure out what’s going on in our country. I say it is time for the American People to stand for what they believe in and not let this two party government continue to destroy our nation as the unemployment increases or while money and troops are being sent to foreign countries on Humanitarian aids while we have devastating mudslides across our country and floods. We still have people living in the streets with nothing to eat, homeless young adults trying their hardest not to get off track and stay in school. Children getting their first pair of shoes at 5 years old.
These are thing we are not supposed to know about, but I’ve seen it first hand. And right now government has NOT DONE ENOUGH for our country and citizens. Help bring back the land of the brave, the home of the proud, the home  that sets examples for other to seek. I hope you agree with what I have presented to you. I do accept the ones that do not. Now is the time for the change. We need another political party. Not one that scrutinized and only attacks President Obama with rude picture and out cries. Lets make a political party that will make a difference in our lives. One that is willing to fight for our future, and our freedom.

Politics and Society – Correlation

Politics and Society are interrelated with each other and have been coexisting ever since the evolution of human society in the world. There is a great variance in the politics and the social issues in each country across the globe. Fundamentally, politics emanates from society, since it is the society that gives rise to politics. Social issues in contemporary society are addressed by politics.  

The Political & Social Condition

The political and social situations dominate the economic condition of the country. In a country where the political situation is full of turmoil and internal strife besides extreme animosity between diverse political parties, the government becomes weak and is incapable to control the social state of the country. This results in the social issues unresolved and this adversely affects the economic condition of the country. However, where the political condition of a country is stable, it has all the resources to cater to resolve the social issues in time. It is obvious that the economic state of the country will also show a phenomenal ascent towards global economy. In adverse conditions, the overall economic development of the country becomes a Utopia.

India – A Perspective

India is one of the very few countries in the world that has a plethora of regional and national level political parties. With over 500 political parties engaged in both political tussles and internal fighting, the country is literally bleeding away and this makes the common suffer the maximum. The massive weight of these parties is hardly doing any good; rather it is creating more complications and destroying the political and social fabric of the country. For more than a decade or so, there is not even a single party that has passed through the Parliamentary or State elections with a full majority. The result has been a ‘government on crutches’ drawn up through coalitions and outside support. One of the most devastating features of such coalition governments ruling the country is, no concrete decision in favour of the general public can be taken constructively, since with the opposition crying foul; and the ruling government looking up for support from coalition parties, is at a loss to take decisive action and each of their proposals stands defeated. In fact, coalition parties most of the time pose as obstructions and also attempt to blackmail the ruling government for vested interests.

Summary

Social issues can only be resolved through a cohesive political environment. A country such as India, which is riddled with political crisis at all times, would never emerge out of a political crisis. Only God Almighty can come to the rescue of our hallowed country. 

His occupations and avocations are business mogul, television celebrity, TV producer, author, and professional sports handicapper. He is founder and chairman of Winning Edge International Inc., a publicly-traded company. Starting in the year 2000, he began producing an infomercial series, “Wayne Allyn Root’s Winning Edge” on the Discovery Channel, focusing on the business of sports handicapping.

He is an entrepreneur, citing his business success as “living proof that the American Dream is alive and well”. His childhood ambition was to be this generation’s Jimmy “The Greek” Snyder, Mr. Snyder having been the sports handicapper who predicted football winners for CBS television during the 70’s and 80’s. By age 27, he was a fixture of CNBC’s Financial News Network, being one of the youngest anchormen to do so.

His television production company is named “Cool Hand ROOT”. Along with producing “Wayne Allyn Root’s Winning Edge”, he has also created, produced, and co-hosted the prime-time TV series “King of Vegas” on the SpikeTV channel. “King of Vegas” is a reality show in which contestants compete in gambling games; completing the series wins the title.

He has his own testimonial star in the “Las Vegas Walk of Stars” in front of the New York New York Hotel Casino on Las Vegas Blvd. He has also written three books, “Root on Risk: Betting to Win on Sports”, “The Zen of Gambling” and “The King of Vegas’ Guide to Gambling- How to Win Big at Poker, Casino Gambling & Life”. He has also made many television appearances, being a guest on shows such as “CNN’s Crossfire”, “Politically Incorrect with Bill Maher”, “NBC’s Today show”, “Fox News Channel’s O’Reilly Factor”, “On the Record with Greta Van Susteren”, and many others. He is frequently cited as a gambling and odds expert.

His platform is that he supports smaller government, reduced spending, reduced entitlements, reduced bureaucracy, dramatically lower taxes and more freedom for the individual. For education, he says that he would like to support more parental control, more emphasis on school choice, and increased competition through vouchers. He also supports gun rights for the individual. He describes himself as a fiscal conservative in the mode of Ronald Reagan and Barry Goldwater. He is, however, socially Liberal, believing that most social issues should be determined on the state and local level.

He emphasizes that he is not one of the power-elite who seem to currently be in charge of the country. He promises to lead America back to prosperity by restoring fiscal discipline, personal responsibility, rugged individualism, and individual rights and freedoms. 

He describes himself as a “Libertarian Republican”, although he is running on the Libertarian ticket. He has announced his candidacy for President of the United States for 2008. He has never held public office. However, he stands well on his success and fame as an indicator that what he could do for his business, he could do for the country. He is optimistic about his chances, citing many times that he happened to go to school with Barack Obama and that he is from the Ivy League.

He won a seat in the Colorado House of Representatives in 1976, where he served two terms from 1977 to 1981, while retaining his position as a high-school history professor. Then in 1981, he was appointed by President Reagan to be the Department of Education regional representative for Denver. He remained at this position from 1981 until 1992, and then in 1993 became President of a conservative think tank called the Independence Institute and based in Golden, Colorado. He was to remain at this position until joining Congress.

In 1999, he joined Congress in the United States House of Representatives, as the Representative of the 6th Congressional District of Colorado. While serving in this position, he has sponsored the Sudan Peace Act which became law in 2002, and introduced the Mass Immigration Reduction Act, repeatedly in 1999, 2001, and 2003, although so far it has not passed. An anti-choice candidate by nature, he voted in favor of the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act, and in favor of legislation requiring parental notification when a minor seeks an abortion. He has called for the repeal of Roe v. Wade. He has also founded the Congressional Immigration Reform Caucus.

Unusual for the second-generation descendant of Italian immigrants, he has been perhaps the most outstanding voice against conceding a single square foot of U.S. soil to anything but natural citizens who speak English. This has carried to the point where he came down heavily on the Denver Public Library merely for purchasing reading materials written in Spanish and supporting Spanish-speaking students. He has also criticized President George Bush because he feels his many measures to control immigration have not been enough, in part over concern about terrorists. He has described himself as being a person not wanted at the White House because of his hard-line beliefs.

In 2004, he founded the Team America political action committee whose purpose was to donate to any congressional candidate who opposed immigration to the same degree he did, however due to campaign finance laws he had to disband the effort. According to one quote posted on the website of the home page of the U. S. Border Control organization, he is quoted as saying that immigrants “need to be found before it is too late. They’re coming here to kill you, and you, and me, and my grandchildren.”

In 2005, Tancredo sponsored legislation to eliminate H-1B visas for temporary workers, stated that he opposed to amnesty for illegal aliens, worked to eliminate the automatic granting of citizenship to the babies of illegal aliens, and sponsored of a successful amendment to a Department of Homeland Security appropriations bill that would withhold federal emergency services funds from sanctuary cities.

Tom Tancredo has announced his bid for the United States Presidential election as of 2005. His campaign is simply: “Secure the borders. Deport those who don’t belong. Make sure they never come back.”, with little to no focus on anything else. It is difficult to define what sort of voter base he would appeal to – certainly he is neo-Conservative, but he is so extreme as to carry himself past all hard-line right-wingers into fanatical Independent candidate territory. If there were such a thing as an “Archie Bunker party”, he might find support with them.

Now they’re running our of Reagan surrogates. So they are searching for the next best thing. While Giuliani didn’t have an official ceremony where he was presented with a sword and knighted by Reagan in front of a Skull ‘n’ Bones altar or anything, Giuliani is certainly doing his best to act like he’s the next Republican in the line. He has certainly rubbed elbows with George Bush, Jr. He has marched boldly into political battle, with a 9/11 sword and an Iraq War shield, with an accompanying minstrel band singing of his mighty deeds in cleaning up New York City.

With that kind of setting, what kind of President is he going to make? It should be noted that Giuliani is unique among the Presidential front-runners, in that the highest office he has held is City Mayor. However, he has served that time presiding over the city of New York, which cannot by any means be regarded as a city in the regular sense. Being Mayor of New York for seven years has got to be about as challenging as being Governor of someplace like, say, Oregon, for the same length of time.

Nevertheless, he suffers in comparison to other candidates, almost unfairly so, because his experience as Mayor reflects smaller, civic duties which do not map well to the job of running an entire country. He has been a working lawyer for 19 years, more than double the time as Mayor, and furthermore was a prosecuting attorney for much of that time. Granted, he brought down both white-collar crooks and the Mafia, which qualifies as the best job any prosecuting attorney anywhere can do. But even this deprived him of the kind of experience that former lawyers such as John Edwards had, since even Edwards’ cases had more of civil rights and liberties attached to them. Putting crooks in jail is a fine deed, but there’s more to running a country.

Rather than look at his past record, exemplary as it is, we can focus on his campaign promises. He has made a list of “twelve commitments”, the full text of which is available on his website. Briefly, the bullet points are protection from terrorists, secure borders, restore fiscal discipline, cut taxes, make Washington accountable, energy independence, better health-care access, be pro-life, be tough on crime, safe communities, school choice, and more American involvement with the global economy.

These are certainly impressive goals, and meeting them would keep the best of us busy. But on the other hand, they aren’t that radical. Most candidates would pledge to do these things, with the exception of the pro-life one. It sounds like somebody took a default campaign promise template and read it off.

To his credit, he has demonstrated that he has plans in place for meeting some of these goals. For instance, the health care goal has behind it the plan that proposes a tax deduction – not a tax credit, which would benefit everyone – of up to $15,000 for families and up to $7,500 for individuals who purchase private individual health insurance policies. In the case of a tax deduction, you must owe that much in taxes in order to derive any benefit – and then, even the simplest treatment can cost many times that amount.

His sole role in national defense thus far has been his decisive actions in the aftermath of 9/11. And indeed, he revealed himself as a strategic problem-solver during a crisis, and handled the response much better than, say, the Federal government did with FEMA and hurricane Katrina. However, it is also a point that any Mayor in any city would have done much the same thing.

Nevertheless, Rudy Giuliani has a lot going for him on the campaign trail so far. He’s polling at the top for his party, his campaign contributions are at or near the top for the Republican ticket, and he has won the endorsements of Steve Forbes, Tommy Thompson, Rick Perry, and Pat Robertson. If this were only a Republican election, he’d be home free. But he’s polling either tied or below the Democratic front-runners in overall bipartisan polls, indicating that the Republicans may want to think twice about sending a Mayor to compete with a couple of Senators.

Ralph Nader was born February 27, 1934 in Winsted, Connecticut. Both of his parents were immigrants from Egypt and Lebanon. He graduated from Princeton University in 1955 with a B.A. in government and economics and Harvard Law School in 1958. 

He joined the United States Army in 1959, but served less than a year before his discharge. He then began work as a lawyer until 1961, when he became a Professor of History and Government at the University of Hartford until 1964. He then relocated to Washington D.C., and took up a position on the staff of Assistant Secretary of Labor Daniel Patrick Moynihan. He also counseled the United States Senate subcommittee on car safety, and was also a faculty member at The American University Washington College of Law. He has continued to practice law throughout his career, but only in between his other accomplishments.

Through the years and throughout his career, Ralph Nader has been an outspoken activist for consumer rights, the environment, and civic government. He has based much of his career on criticizing big corporations, which have largely taken over control of the United States at the detriment of its citizens. He is the founder of many organizations both in the government and in the private sector whose purpose serves to protect private citizens from the greed and misanthropy of large corporations, including the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), Public Citizen, and several public interest research groups. He has also founded a huge number of non-profit activist and watchdog groups.

He has run for President four times, in 1992, 1996, 2000 and 2004. He has never held a public office. However, he has created several regulatory government agencies, most particularly the EPA and OSHA. Virtually every industry from airlines to fast food has changed its practices or added safety features as a result of his work.

Not surprisingly, he has had clashes, run-ins, and struggles with multinational corporations who wanted to silence him. The most famous of these incidents happened after he published his study of car safety, which he gave General Motors failing marks for. General Motors, Inc., responded by numerous tactics to discredit him, spy on him, and even “hiring prostitutes to trap him in compromising situations”. These activities were later the subject of a lawsuit by Nader against General Motors, which he won and received a public apology and a six-figure cash settlement.

Ralph Nader has so far authored, co-authored, or edited 31 books on the topics of consumer safety, consumer rights, and how society is abused by corporate interests. His published bibliography includes a list which would fill this article, but some of his more famous and signatory books are “Unsafe at Any Speed”, “Corporate Power in America”, “Who’s Poisoning America”, “No Contest: Corporate Lawyers and the Perversion of Justice in America”, and “Why Women Pay More”. He has also appeared in several documentaries, and is fluent in English, Arabic, Chinese, Russian, Spanish, and Portuguese.

The current effort to draft Ralph Nader is an expression of his huge fan following. At times, his previous nominations have been what are called “protest candidacies”. So far, the closest thing he has made to accepting the nomination is that he has stated that he might run if Hillary Rodham Clinton receives the Democratic nomination. Since Clinton is indeed the front-runner in the Democratic race, that seems like a very good possibility.

Surprisingly enough, Ralph Nader has shown many signs that he might make a good President, despite not having held public office. He has continuously acted in the best conscience and public interest, he has set up and run many organizations, has gotten things done to improve the quality of life in America well beyond the capacity of many Governors and Congressmen, and has vast knowledge in many subjects which would qualify him to handle almost any problem that came up.