posted February 22, 2004 11:09 AM            

By SAM HANANEL, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - Consumer advocate Ralph Nader (news - web sites) announced Sunday he will run again for the presidency, declaring that Washington has become "corporate occupied territory" and arguing there is too little difference between the Democratic and Republican parties.

Latest headlines:
· Ralph Nader Announces Run for Presidency
AP - 53 minutes ago

· Nader Announces Another White House Run in 2004
Reuters - 56 minutes ago

· Kerry Decries Bush Over Attacks on Record
AP - 1 hour, 12 minutes ago

Nader, who will turn 70 this week, said he contemplated retirement but decided against that. "I've decided to run as an independent candidate for president," he announced on NBC's "Meet The Press."

"This country has more problems and injustices than it deserves," Nader said, bemoaning a "democracy gap." He said he needed to get into the race to "challenge this two-party duopoly."

"There's too much power and wealth in too few hands," he said. "They have taken over Washington."

"Washington is now corporate occupied territory," Nader said. "There is now a for-sale sign on most agencies and departments. ... Money is flowing in like never before. It means that corporations are saying no to the necessities of the American people. ... Basically, it's question of both parties flunking."

Asked if he would withdraw if he concluded his candidacy would merely ensure President Bush (news - web sites)'s re-election, Nader told interviewer Tim Russert, "When and if that eventuality occurs, you can invite me back on the program and I'll give you the answer."

Nader decided against running under the banner of the Green Party. His candidacy four years ago has been blamed by many Democrats for costing Al Gore (news - web sites) the election against George W. Bush.

Last week, Democratic National Committee (news - web sites) chairman Terry McAuliffe revealed that he had met with Nader several times urging him not to run.

Asked if he was getting into the race to be a spoiler, Nader replied: "A spoiler is a contemptuous term, as if anyody who dares to challenge the two party system .. is a spoiler, and we've got to fight that. You can't do that from the outside, ... You've got to fight that from the inside as well."

"Let me say, this is going to be difficult," said Nader, who planned a round of interviews after his announcement. "This isn't just our fight. This is a fight for all third parties ... They want to have a chance to compete. This is not a democracy that can be controlled by two parties in the grip of corporate interests."

Third party candidacies have been a greater part of presidential politics in recent years; businessman Ross Perot (news - web sites) twice ran for president, winning 19 percent of the vote in his first try in 1992 against Bill Clinton (news - web sites) and then-President George H.W. Bush.

"It's his personal vanity because he has no movement. Nobody's backing him," New Mexico Democratic Gov. Bill Richardson said Sunday in advance of Nader's announcement.

"The Greens aren't backing him. His friends urge him not to do it. It's all about himself," Richardson told "Fox News Sunday."

"Now, Ralph's made some great contributions to consumer issues over the years, but clearly it's not going to help us," he said. "I don't think he'll have a sizable impact, but it's terrible if he goes ahead because it's about him. It's about his ego. It's about his vanity and not about a movement that supposedly he headed for many years very effectively."

As the Green Party's nominee in 2000, Nader appeared on the ballot in 43 states and Washington, D.C., garnering only 2.7 percent of the vote. But in Florida and New Hampshire, Bush won such narrow victories that had Gore received the bulk of Nader's votes in those states, he would have won the general election.

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posted February 22, 2004 11:31 AM            

The more we use the electronic voting machines, the more sure it is that the vote will be altered. The security of these machines is extraordinarily faulty, and proven so, yet most government authorities do not care ... I wonder why?

posted February 23, 2004 11:28 PM              

just wanted to comment that dennis kucinich has a 7th house full of planets, and he won the international gandhi peace prize. it puzzles me why everyone feels he is not, you know, the e-word. i have never been active in politics, but this year i was one of iowa's first-time caucus goers...it will probably be my last, too.

so the drum roll is on...who will be our next president? i am not giving up on dennis kucinich. he has a department of peace ready to go, for goodness sake! sounds way good to me...

it is nice to have a bit of camaraderie here. does anyone know anything about linda's last book about the twelfth night? did she start writing it?

posted February 23, 2004 11:55 PM              

Nader seems to enjoy being a nuisance. Why can't he run as a Libertarian?

posted February 24, 2004 08:01 AM              

because they had attended a lawyers guild peace forum and were considered terrorists under the "patriot act"--a truly abominable piece of legislation robbing us of our bill of rights

and for those of you with a more global perspective, remember what happened the
last time an imperialist went unchecked? NEVER AGAIN. by the way, protestors halted the feds and they have retreated from their dastardly deed, happy to say

apparently many long-time protesters felt a little left out, since they did not get subpoenas. probably just a case of subpoena envy.

but i am sure it was a terrifying ordeal to face those unsmiling feds at their door; i have had similar dealings with usurpation of powers on a very personal lever, when our state of iowa made a brutal phallic intrusion into our young family's inner sanctum years ago, after my now-ex-husband's illness. therefore i am perhaps more alert to other intrusions into our rights and freedoms. in the gentle breeze, iowa's motto waves: "our liberties we prize and our rights we will maintain" but that all can vanish out of sight in the winds of adversity.

i have often wondered why our horoscopes only indicated "another day in paradise" when such a life-altering event happened. i wonder how the drake debacle would have been rooted astrologically. i am not that advanced that i could speculate

but it does take much speculation to see that a man with a seventh house in libra full of planets would make another gandhi. i have wondered if he is not the man himself reincarnated! he IS electable, you know. he has won over many oppositional incumbents and has stood up to the powers that be, saving a locally owned utility from being devoured by the big guys--today the residents of cleveland, ohio, pay 25% less for their utilities [he was the youngest-ever major of a large city]

i guess i am still campaigning for the man. he is my personal choice, not just an abb candidate [anyone but bush]

i hope i have not offended anyone here, but if you are a bush supporter, you need to know these things. please do not be like my family of dittoheads who squeeze their eyes tight shut and stop their ears--no doubt it does help, though, to keep the sand out

i didn't mean to wax political, but i am having serious trouble dealing with the resurrection of these old issues that were re-opened with drake's drama. it is hard to just "let go and move on" when my son is dead as a result and my daughter calls from college hysterical with abandonment issues from all of this. they say we create our own realities, and if that is the case, i have to wonder "what was i thinking?" why would someone create these horrible things? and if that is the case, what have we collectively created for those of us who fought against it? just a question. any answers?

is anyone in england having issues around the support of bush? tony blair has a nice public face, and people love bush's cowboy-hat style, but we have to remember the story of little red riding hood. the price of freedom is eternal vigilance...

there is another more peace-loving bush whose words we need to heed:

"if democracy loses its touch, then no great war will be needed to overwhelm it. if it keeps and enhances its strength, no great war need come again" --vannevar bush

so why are we at war? and do you realize that the disabled vets of america have issued a statement saying it is easier for a terrorist to enter our country legally than it is for a DAV rep to gain access to incoming wounded at walter reed hospital? our men and women are coming home so maimed from these "cluster bomblets" that WE devised for iraq in their war against iran, that their story is being supressed. there is a lot more to bush than meets the eye. my international correspondents tell me they have seen it all along, and only those of us here in america seemed to have been duped by his manipulation of "9/11"

posted February 24, 2004 10:10 PM              

the scariest part of the whole thing is that so few people know about it...there were enough protesters, though, that the feds backed off...for now

maybe i will just post an essay i wrote for the des moines register's "iowa view"--they have not printed it and i do not know if they will...everything is god's honest truth

"recently the torch of patriotism ignited an inferno at drake university, where the so-called patriot act engulfed a peaceful forum--a hotbed of terrorism. the fury churned up memories of how a similarly misguided patriotic zeal had fanned our own young family's personal adversity into an unchecked firestorm

a generation has passed since then, but the blistering and scarring are still visible, especially on the new crop of young adults who were so severely burned--my children.

today our "family portrait" still hangs in the recesses of people's consciousness, painted at the time from reporter sherri ricciardi's imaginative word palette [Des Moines Register April 18, 1982] such fanciful creativity had led me to recommend her for the "picasso of the press" award, but the register apparently did not appreciate her dark, distorted denial of reality, since it remains unribboned--until now. i would like to re-submit my nomination, along with a tour through a more realistic family album...

our story began when toxic paint fumes from my husband's work put him into the hospital with severe hepatitis. with health problems of my own stalking me, from having taught in a third-world mission school, we had reluctantly resorted to welfare

it was encouraging, though, to hear that help was on the way with ronald reagan's ekenomics. just as with our current tax breaks for the wealthy, new circulating moneys were to create jobs and improve working conditions. but as they trickled their way down to his employer, they seemed to pool there, almost as if it had been planned that way

so, being former disgruntled taxpayers ourselves, we welcomed the chance to restore a little dignity to our lives. indeed, life aboard that welfare express gravy train had left us bloated and weakened, lacking as it does the hearty meat of self-determination.

the insanity began with some freak coincidences after the loss of our meager part-time jobs. it was my own idea to put our kids into foster care for a few days, to have them cared for while we secured jobs in nearby waterloo. in response to my naive appeal to the DHS, our family's most private inner sanctum was brutally penetrated with their phallic intrusion, followed by a gang rape by a corrupt judicial system and a sensationalist media. iowa's "helping hand" left its claw-shaped imprint upon our collective jugular--the week before christmas.

i found myself the point person on what turned into a rescue mission deep into enemy territory. goliath was not about to free our little ones without wielding their omnipotent sword of injustice

after several months the children were returned home where they belonged. time has healed many of the wounds, but deep scars will forever mar our family's emotional x-rays

since my daughter had been breastfeeding back then, it was no surprise when she called only a few weeks ago--the week before christmas--displaying her classic abandonment issues to which i have become accustomed. my older daughter had worked through her own traumatization to earn her doctorate, but her baby sister was only nine months old at the time--the most vulnerable age for separation anxiety

so now she faces college graduation lacking the roots and wings i did everything in my power to provide for her. but my powers had been limited by paul riffel, their guardian ad leitum, whom taxpayers paid to protect our children's interests. i had obtained plentiful documentation from the le leche league for nursing mothers, showing the predictable and irreversible harm in what they were doing

but when i offered it to him at our only opportunity, just before a completely unwarranted court session, he shoved it back at me. he knew nothing about our family, never having even talked to us, but now i can see why. it would have been a waste of his time anyway, since everything had been pre-arranged in bremer county's good-ol'-boy network

their invisible mascot, the kangaroo, silently watched while the "honorable" judge, ironically named jack w. frye, gavelled shut the coffin of justice over their formative years and the lawyions in his arena shredded our family apart

somehow we survived that hell, but when i hear of the recent bullying by government agents at drake, i have reason to pay heed. so should you. they strike at random"

posted February 24, 2004 10:46 PM              

gee, cristiname has a way of making me apprehensive about anything i write, after reading that comment. i wonder what deep psychological reasons would compel someone to write such a thing. hmm. we may never know, since that person apparently has no emotions with which to "manipulate"

but C_C_C--i appreciate your telling it like it is...what? do they think we are making up this stuff? for some of us life is a breeze, but for others it is a constant headwind--according to this poster of a shaggy dog in the wind...

i see that "cristiname" is from romania. my quaint grandmother would say, "well, there's another country heard from..." ;o)

cristiname, could you tell me how you came to possess such a cynical attitude? i bet if you look deeply enough, you could find some real genuine emotions...did someone not say in one of the forums that it is such people who are the real softies? when i was in grad school, i was absolutely amazed at how some people viewed the world...it made me realize how narrow my own had been, in spite of having taught school in alien places and acquiring somewhat of a "worldview"

i still think i am right, but then i am a virgo, eh? i am analyzing cristiname's response, can you tell?

posted February 24, 2004 10:48 PM              

perhaps i should just paste it there, too, since no one will see it if they do not look here...how is that for virgo logic? ;o)

posted February 25, 2004 04:43 AM            

It is amazing to me how blind we are, as a society/nation, when it comes to "our" own government.

posted February 25, 2004 08:39 AM              

if you missed my other posts [gee it is hard not to offer an opinion on everything! this is SO like me to have this forum! as a lost middle child, it is great to "have the floor" once in a while!] then i should remind you that my birth path is 33/6, which has left me with a "vision" of this better world where things like this do not happen.

it has also left me horribly depressed and suicidal [three times was not the charm, but it was the end of trying--it was years ago] when others do not grasp OR CARE TO EVEN THINK ABOUT it...they are scrounging more and more at the level of maslow's gettin' by stage. my young iranian student penpal says he sees his countrymen also just kept so busy earning a living that they have no time to think about broader issues...as they usurp more and more power.

has anyone dealt with a credit card company lately? you will see what i mean! THOSE PEOPLE ARE EVIL!

anyone have any advice for me? i have two companies that have made HUGE charges for things like cash advances, every month, when i have not had any...my simple $500 transfer quickly rose to nearly $1300 in their fraudulent charges! HELP!!!!!!!!!!!

and not wishing to be provincial, but american politics ARE vital to the world...look at what bush is doing with the power he usurped! remember we did not elect this man...and if the greens... ( i won't go there...sorry

well it's time to seize the day, only i am trying to let it seize me these days...it seems to work better that way ;o)

have a great one everybody!

posted February 26, 2004 11:18 PM              

Keep people ignorant and distracted and then do whatever you like is what seems to fit this administration. The media only adds fuel to the fire.

It the dumbing down of America.

And you are right, it has already been decided.