You know, Ralph Nader may not win the presidential race this year, but with his decades long history of "winning" for the American people, he is the only candidate who has actually made a positive difference for this country.  Not only that, but he is the only candidate that will actually sit in the oval office and work for us instead of the lobbyists and political action committees that run this country.  If everyone who is as equally frustrated with the way things are going in America as I am, actually voted their conscience and cast their ballot for Ralph Nader instead of the corporate cronies currently running, we WOULD take the United States of America back to where it belongs - in the HANDS OF THE PEOPLE! No one is more eminently qualified to represent us in the White House than Mr. Ralph Nader, a man who has tirelessly worked hard for the American people for the last five decades. No one in our history has accomplished more for the American people than Ralph Nader. Below is just a partial list of what he has done to improve the lives of millions of Americans.

Just some of the organizations Ralph Nader founded or helped start:

Click here to for the full list of organizations, legislation & books Ralph Nader helped to make happen.

  Nothing is done overnight, especially when our corrupted two party system has monopolized the process of running for president and made it virtually impossible for independent and third party candidates to throw their hats into the ring. But if everyone who has complained about the sad state of affairs in this country actually voted for change, then we would get change! If people had the courage to vote outside the box - the establishment of the democratic and republican parties - which have done virtually nothing for the American people in the past decades, we would have this country back to being the once great nation it was.

  Don't be fooled into thinking that he cannot win, even though you agree with him on the issues, because millions of others also think that - imagine if everyone who agreed with Ralph on the issues actually voted for him - then he would win!  We will never turn this country around if we continue to vote for the status quo candidates who are bought by corporations and thus won't turn from oil, coal, nuclear and natural gas to solar, wind and biofuels, won't see to it that ALL Americans have health care, won't stop the war in Iraq, won't penalize corporations that continue to or have outsourced jobs but take American tax shelter, and won't work to equalize the pay between the average American worker and the greedy corporate CEOs so that the average American family can survive day to day,  let alone, God forbid, save money for retirement.  The "won't" list does not exist with Ralph Nader but his "has done" list certainly does which is a long list of major laws and governmental agencies he has gotten enacted to improve the lives of the American people over the past forty years. Now who do you want sitting in the oval office working for you:  the "won't" candidate or the man who "has done" more positive and beneficial improvements for this country than any other American in our history?

  Never, ever vote for a candidate simply because everyone else is or because he or she can "win" and the other candidates cannot. Every single American needs to vote for who they think will best represent them from their local country commissioner to the President of the United Sates. This is why we have primaries - so we can narrow the field down for the general election. During the primary people vote for who they feel is best from what is a glut of candidates. Do we immediately start out only having two candidates in the primaries? NO! We start out with a lot of choices and voices as Ralph would say and that is a very good thing! People have the opportunity to express their preference for the general election and as such, the general election is the same - it is now narrowed down based on the voter's choices to a narrow field.  So if everyone in the primary season voted for only the candidates they felt could "win" in the general election we would be wasting the entire process of narrowing the field. Why not go straight into the general election without a primary then? Why then when we do get to the general election does the mere thought of an independent candidate throw the country into a tailspin? Why are more than two choices for president at that point so threatening to the democrats and republicans? The reason - because all they do is want to win again - no matter who their candidate is so long as he or she is a democrat or a republican! They are in fact threatened when it comes to independent and third party candidates because they see them as taking votes away from their candidate and lessening their chance of winning for their party, whoever the candidate is at the time representing the party. This is why they called Ralph Nader a "spoiler" but in fact, the only spoiled ones are the democrats and the republicans who only want to self-perpetuate and whine and complain when they have legitimate competition. In the business world they call that a monopoly and there are federal laws that govern this.  If we didn't allow competition in the business world we would be in a world of hurt and in politics, we would have a dictatorship without competition to compete for office. Is that what Americans want? I don't think so!!  

  In America we are able to vote for anyone who is legitimately on the ballot. Since when did Americans become so closed minded and jaded that they discount and preclude any candidate other than a republican or a democrat from running for president or any other office? That sentiment is anti-American, unconstitutional and goes against the principles of the founding father's inception of this country and insults every single American who has fought or died in all our wars for our freedom. I find it ironic that Hillary Clinton has said she has every right to continue to run in the primary despite calls for her to quit so that the focus can be on Barrack Obama. She's right - she has every right to continue to campaign right up to the democratic convention. Where along the way did we become so narrow minded that only seemingly "front-runners" can stay in the race, especially when several states have not even had their primary yet? This is so typical of our culture nowadays. We want everything super fast and done so we can go on about our lives without having to think about important matters. In the same vein that Hillary has every right to continue running, Ralph Nader has every right to run as well.  So now Hillary knows how it feels to be told to stay out of the race, to be treated in a disposable way as if she were an annoyance to the country. It appears to me that even her own party is playing the same dirty pool with her that they do with Ralph Nader. They are elitist and only care about beating the republicans. At this point, they want her out so they can focus on Barrack Obama beating John McCain. If they do these tactics with a dyed in the wool, well known democrat like Hillary Clinton, imagine how ruthless they will be with Ralph Nader.

  The problem with any democrat or republican, including Barrack Obama, Hillary Clinton and John McCain, is that they are members of a "duopoly" that care more about keeping their party together than actually working for the American people. Too many legislators are corrupted figures who "owe" corporations and political action committees for helping them get elected, therefore, even if they hear the voices of their constituents they do not "listen" because they are expected to "payback" the evil lobbyists who got them to where they are. What have the democrats and the republicans done for us in our lifetimes? I remember Jimmy Carter back in the 1970s oil crisis saying we needed to conserve energy and to get off of foreign oil. Did any president or session of the Congress get us off of foreign oil or push for renewable, clean, home grown energy sources? NO! Has health care for all Americans been a priority? NO! The reason you ask? Because the energy and health care corporations that dominate this country have dominated Washington, D.C. and have squelched any progress. Please check out my habitat section to read more about these issues. So why should we elect any member of these parties who has done nothing for us to improve our lives and enhance the country, let alone bring us into the 21st Century of economic and energy efficiency? I say we shouldn't! Imagine what message would be sent to our "representatives" if we chose to NOT elect them to the highest offices in the land and chose to elect truly independent representatives who are NOT bought out by corporations and political action committees. Wouldn't it be truly wonderful to NOT have partisan bickering going on in the nation's capitol? Would it not be just sensational to have Ralph Nader representing us in the White House, a person who has worked his entire life making this country better by enacting laws that keeps us safer, forming governmental agencies that improve our lives, forming non-profit groups that help the poor and under-represented?

  I realize that the ills of the country are much bigger than just electing an independent like Ralph Nader. But we need to take baby steps in order to make giant steps. It all begins by realizing the challenges that lay ahead of us and doing something positive about them. You have much more power than you think. Your vote is the most powerful card you have at the table. By voting for or against candidates you let your voice be known and known loudly! When you continue to vote for the status quo candidate or re-elect a candidate who has done nothing in office, your vote says you don't seem to be bothered by the "do nothing" disease so pervasive in our politics. But when you vote for an independent candidate or do not re-elect a candidate who has not represented your interests in office, then your vote screams that you have had enough, that you will not be taken for granted anymore! It will only be then that we can get our representatives to truly "represent" our interests and desires.

  So typical of the pervasiveness of lobbyists today, I was told by a staff member of my Congressman, Robert Wexler, that he would not meet with me to discuss issues because "he does not meet with individual constituents."  This staffer then told me that I should join the Sierra Club so that the issues I wanted to speak about would be "represented" when the Sierra Club's lobbyists met with Congressman Wexler's staff at some point. I was informed that the lobby group for the Sierra Club does meet with the congressman's staff from time to time and that the congressman had a good voting record on the environment. Well...there are so many things wrong with this picture I don't know where to begin! How come even the Sierra Club has a lobby group? They try to get clean air and water and save animals and they have to lobby our representatives to do that?  Furthermore, my congressman only meets with lobbyists, not the citizens that elected him into his office? How pathetic is this? This is all so common and yet so destructive to our country. We NO LONGER have a republic form of government where our elected officials go to their office to "represent" our interests. But we have all allowed this to happen because of our apathetic attitude towards the government, our indifference to how they vote on the issues, our ignorance of what truly goes on in our local, state and federal offices. The words of Thomas Jefferson are more true today than when he first spoke them: “We in America do not have government by the majority. We have government by the majority who participate.” Ben Franklin was asked the question “Well doctor, what have we got - a republic or a monarchy” upon leaving Independence Hall at the close of the Constitutional Convention in 1787. His reply, “A republic, if you can keep it.” According to Jefferson the American people have not kept it.

  Ralph Nader DOES NOT take campaign contribution from corporations or political action committees! 

  Florida spoiler in 2000?  To all those around the country who think Ralph Nader was the "spoiler" in the 2000 election and that Al Gore lost the election because of him, I say they have a fatally flawed argument. If you search the internet you will find more scholarly articles on why Al Gore lost the 2000 election than what I write here. There are plenty of articles on the net that break down the vote in Florida and elsewhere that prove that Al Gore was responsible himself for losing the election. What I write here is more folksy, not analytical - its from my own knowledge and heart and common sense on the topic. I have a several layer point to counter their argument that Al Gore would have won had it not been for Ralph Nader.

  The first layer is that Al Gore was on the ballot here in Florida and the other states - if Ralph Nader voters had wanted to vote for Al Gore, they would have! What makes people think all the Ralph Nader voters would have voted for Al Gore had Ralph Nader not been on the ballot? They had their opportunity to vote for Al Gore and passed him up for someone else, just like all the people who voted for George W. Bush did! So what is the difference between George W. Bush and Ralph Nader voters? How come George W. Bush voters weren't called "spoilers" by the Democrats? Get my point? What people fail to think clearly about is that people who voted for Ralph Nader are truly independent voters, people who have realized neither democrats nor republicans have any value about them so they vote for neither, whether Ralph Nader's name is on the ballot or not. I can assure you, I would never have voted for Al Gore even if Ralph Nader had not been on the ballot. I would have voted for the libertarian candidate or written in a name. I don't know but I suspect that most independent voters like me would have done the same. When I moved to Florida I registered as an "independent" because even back then I was fed up with the two party "duopoly" as Ralph would say. People make the erroneous assumption that Nader voters are just a millimeter away from liberal democrats and therefore, given the chance, will always vote for the democratic candidate if Nader is NOT on the ballot. This is actually insulting because it presumes the Nader voter to be an idiot - a person who cannot make up their mind without being told who to vote for! Nothing could be further than the truth that Nader voters automatically equate a democratic candidate with Ralph Nader! The democratic party, while paying lip service to environmentalists, has done as much for the environment as the republican party - zip, zilch, zero, nada! The candidates all pander to the environmentalists but when they get into office their only allegiance is to the corporate backers who helped get them elected, the same groups and corporations that also cough money up to the republican candidates. There really is no sizable difference between how democrat and republicans get elected and which corporations back their candidacy. Nader voters know this and that is why they choose him over the corrupt and bought status quo candidates of the duopoly. No democratic president has ever pushed to get off of foreign oil or pushed for renewable, home grown, clean energy sources. For all the hot air Al Gore spewed about global warming and the environment, he did absolutely NOTHING about these issues when he was vice president. If he wasn't in a position to use his power and influence as vice president than I don't know who would be. Why would I vote for a man whose talk is not backed up by action? I was so not impressed with the environmentalist in Al Gore and I know many other Nader voters who equally were not as well. Al Gore has only himself to blame for that, not Ralph Nader. As vice president, he auditioned for the part of president and he failed miserably on one of the most important issues facing this country. If you don't believe me, Google "Al Gore environmental record" and see for yourself what a pitiful, and actually harmful record he and Clinton had as environmentalists in the White House.