Don’t Ralph, Don’t!

I field a lot of questions these days from people who want to know, am I supporting Ralph again this time? If not, why not? If I strongly feel Bush should be defeated by any means necessary, why didn’t I last time, etc.?

None of these questions have particularly easy answers, but they do have answers. To wit, no, because I like Kerry, because I didn’t like Gore.

Am I furious at Ralph for running again this time (the way so many people I know are)? No. He has a right to run and I don’t think he’s doing it out of ego, if anything it hurts him.

Do I wish he weren’t running? Yes. I really do. At first I really wished it for him, because I thought it was worse for him. But right now, with polls showing Bush and Kerry neck and neck with Ralph with 4-9% (depending on the poll). That troubles me. Read this article on Nader taking aim at Kerry on war.

Of course, everything Ralph is saying is fair game and true (it almost always is) and it is very hard to justify Kerry’s tap-dancing on Iraq. Maybe Ralph’s numbers and visibility will force Kerry to take a firmer stance on the war–and maybe, just maybe that’ll still be able to swing the right voters in the right states. Right now, all we can hope is that most of the Ralph support is coming in states that will go for Kerry anyway–after all, that’s where I campaigned for Ralph last time.

More to come on this subject.