If I can get even one Bush voter to stay home, I'd be successful.

Politics, especially in this climate, is not for the polite or the squeamish. Which is why, after flirting with voting for Cobb, I decided against it, for the same reason why Nader refused to run as a Green Party candidate this year: the Greens are ready to be a mainstream party. They keep waffling on running a presidential candidate of their own, and even when they do run their own candidate, they waffle and say "but it's OK if you vote Democratic instead."

It is NOT ok to build a party with that spineless sort of waffling. More than anything, Greens, like liberal Democrats, want everyone to like them.

IMO, I and the electorate don't need to personally like the candidates we vote for, but we do need to know they have a strong enough spine to stand strong and tough against special interest pressures, pressures from fellow politicans and lobbyists, and have a strong, clear vision with a strategy for working to realize that vision, for the citizens of the nation and the world.

Politics is a rough and tumble business, especially for honest people like Nader. But I can't think of any politician who has been stronger and tougher than he has over the years, accomplishing a tremendous amount of positive stuff, pushing legislation through a completely hostile (to him & his issues) Congress, executive branch, and judicial branch. Nader is exactly the kind of leader I would love to have in the White House, because he knows how to take the career politicians and lobbyists to task to get the job done.