Three Questions for the Greens
by James Norton

Congratulations, Ralph Nader.

Congratulations, Green Party.

You hit Gore where it hurt, shaking Oregon and Wisconsin, and reaping New Hampshire and Florida, where a razor thin margin separated victory from failure. Key swing states that might've gone to the Vice President tumbled as Green votes poured (or trickled) in for America's favorite consumer crusader.

It's a victory for the hard left against the ooey-gooey center of the New Democratic party! Hoorah!

But who's the real winner?

Well, not the Democrats. They're still, in essence, relatively soulless pragmatists — but now, after a bruising decision from a divided Supreme Court, they're also losers. Ouch. Bad combination. Passionate idealogues who lose can come back to fight another day. Pirate ships just break up and fall to pieces.

The Republicans — well, yeah. They've got the White House.

But it's not as clear-cut for the Greens. Having destroyed a President, they have given themselves a powerful reputation and a moral imperative to continue their crusade. The Greens have muscle. 2.7 million votes isn't necessarily a lot — but it's nothing to sneer at. The Valley Advocate reported that the Greens have greatly expanded their presence in scores of states. They used to be on 24 statewide ballots; they're now on 40. In Connecticut, the party's doubled its mailing list. In Texas, Greens went from being organized in one metro area — Houston — to eight. Greens in Colorado report a 50 percent increase in registered supporters — and so on.

And the scores of new volunteers across the country aren't necessarily going somewhere — provided that their busy hands and passionate hearts are given a new windmill to tilt at.

Some key questions for the party to ponder as it picks up the post-election mess and looks forward:

1. Can the Greens galvanize their loose coalition of the active and the alienated into a coherent, organized, national political force?

2. Will Ralph Nader be around to be the party's charismatic figurehead again in four years? Secondarily, would it even be such a good thing for one figure (remember Ross Perot) to dominate this nascent party so thoroughly?

3. Finally — most importantly — can the Greens build as well as destroy? As a national angry mob, the Greens made their point against a two-party system that almost certainly represents a single bootlicking, money-chasing point of view.

Reader Email "[The Naderites] are a pimple on the ass of democracy and will recede..." More ›

But an angry mob can't govern. It can't nurture new leaders, or plan national strategies, or build strategic political alliances. It can only rage, burn... and sputter out.

The ball's in the court of the bright young idealogues who gave the Green party its strength. If they lead the party into coalitions with the poor, the disadvantaged and the alienated, they might give absorb power from America's urban centers and execute another brilliant strike against the Democrats... before disintegrating. But if the party's ranks can swell across idealogical lines to include the principled-but-wary American union workers, soccer moms, entrepenuers, government employees and family farmers, there may be a populist revolution on the horizon.

Of course, this revolution needs to begin from the bottom up, to some extent. Greens hold very few local offices around the country — with a little bit of effort, they could make real inroads in progressive areas like the Great Lakes states, New England and the West Coast. From this sort of a base, a stronger, more committed crop of votes could be reaped for the next presidential run. But for the Green party to manage this, they will need to tune into the local issues that make or break candidates school boards, city councils and country boards — and provide national support to the local Greens who stand the best chance of winning.

After building a local base in progressive states and fine tuning a message of rebellion into one of peaceful revolution, the Greens might stand a chance. It isn't wise to hold one's breath, but with a fresh, young nationally credible leader — perhaps someone like Wisconsin Senator Russ Feingold or Minnesota's Senator Paul Wellstone — the Greens could become a national political force to be reckoned with. The anger against corporate excesses is there, waiting to be tapped by an organized force with an approachable face. If this happens, 2004 could be an even more interesting election than 2000, to the betterment of almost everybody.