Gore Can't Blame Nader
For His Own Lame Race
I will not vote for Ralph Nader. But if Al Gore loses any of the eight states where Nader has become a factor, the fault will not be Nader's. It will be Gore's.
Gore has run a fractured campaign. There is a program for this group or that group, prescription drugs for you, insurance for me, but no sense of the whole. He is all prose, no poetry, and he leaves me feeling empty, unsure of where — in his search for one last vote — he will draw the line.
It was Gore, after all, who showed his mettle by jumping right into the Elian Gonzalez soap-opera controversy, advocating that the boy stay with his nonfamily in Miami. This was a blatant attempt to pander to Florida's Cuban vote, and it suggested only that Gore will tunnel through many subbasements of principle before he hits bedrock — if ever.
It was Gore and his running mate, Joseph Lieberman, who suggested that the entertainment industry would be reined in by the government if it did not mend the way it advertises to children. Never mind any niggling concerns about civil liberties — the two didn't mean it anyway. This was just more pandering, but it was on an issue of some concern to liberals. We take the First Amendment seriously.
It was Gore and Lieberman — the Nerd and the Nebbish — who have absolutely refused to utter even the mildest condemnation of Louis Farrakhan, a documented bigot and demagogue if there ever was one. This is not a complicated matter. When asked, as Lieberman has been on several occasions, if he would meet with Farrakhan, he soiled himself with equivocation. It was an ugly sight.
It is Gore who constantly says he is his "own man," which is utter nonsense. He is Albert Gore Jr., the son of a senator, which is why he got into politics in the first place. He is the Democratic presidential nominee because — and only because — Bill Clinton chose him as his running mate. It would have been appropriate for Gore to denounce Clinton's womanizing and lying under oath, but his evident distaste for the man — his feelings of betrayal at not having been told the truth about Monica Lewinsky — seems juvenile. It's the moralism of the naive.
This insistence on going it alone, on proving he can do it all by himself, is troubling. Look around Gore and you see an inner circle consisting almost entirely of family — his wife, his daughter and his brother-in-law. This inability to share the limelight, this need to dominate, this willingness to abandon old friends sends a disquieting message.
I am no Naderite, although I tip my hat to the man. He has truly made a difference, which is more than most politicians can say. But he is wrong on globalization and wrong on trade and just plain idiotic when he says there's no difference between Gore and Bush. On the environment alone, the difference is immense. Nader is exquisitely unsuited for the presidency. He alone doesn't seem to know it.
Yet Nader might have turned to Bush during the second debate and told him to "wipe that smile off your face" when he talked about putting people to death.
All along, Gore has conducted his campaign as if people like me have nowhere to go. The essence of it was distilled in Lieberman's apparent assessment that the black vote was somewhat in play, the Jewish vote was not, so why knock Farrakhan? I understand. But if these moments were offset by some grand vision — some splendid stand on principle — then Nader would not look so good.
Now Gore and Lieberman are knocking Nader, telling us why we should not vote for him. We know that. We even know why we should vote for Gore.
But it's like a visit to the dentist. It's going to hurt.
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