- WASHINGTON (Reuters) -- Ralph
Nader, whose third-party White House bid in 2000 was blamed by some Democrats
for helping elect President Bush, said on Sunday he will try again this
year as an independent.
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- Ignoring pleas from Democrats to stay out of the race,
the veteran consumer advocate said he wanted to challenge the two parties'
stranglehold on the political process and their shared addiction to corporate
interests.
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- "Washington is corporate-occupied territory, and
the two parties are ferociously competing to see who is going to go to
the White House and take orders from their corporate paymasters,"
Nader said on NBC's "Meet the Press."
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- Nader said claims that his candidacy would spoil efforts
to beat Bush in November were a "contemptuous" attempt to restrict
democracy and maintain a "two-party duopoly."
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- "It is an offense to deny millions of people who
might want to vote for our candidacy an opportunity to vote," he said,
adding the "corporate government" practiced by both parties had
led to rollbacks in labor, environmental, health care and economic standards.
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- "It's time to change the equation and bring millions
of American people into the political arena."
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- Nader's Green Party bid won nearly 2.9 million votes
in 2000 and was blamed for siphoning support from Democrat Al Gore -- particularly
in Florida, where Nader won 97,488 votes and Gore's loss by a bitterly
contested 537 votes cost him the presidency.
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- Nader started an exploratory committee late last year
to raise money for a presidential run. He had ruled out another bid for
the Green Party, which was split on his candidacy and will not pick its
nominee until this summer.
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- A public opinion poll in October found two-thirds of
Americans did not want Nader to run again, and Democrats from across the
ideological spectrum have asked him to stay out of the race.
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- A liberal Internet site, ralphdontrun.net, is devoted
to urging Nader not to run again, and Democratic Party chief Terry McAuliffe
had met with Nader to try to convince him to stay out.
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- "It's very unfortunate that Ralph decided to run,"
McAuliffe said on CBS' "Face the Nation," adding: "There
are people all over the country wishing he hadn't done it."
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- Democrats expect Nader to have less of an impact this
year than in 2000, saying party and left-wing activists have learned how
wrong Nader was when he claimed in 2000 there was no difference between
the two parties.
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- "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," New Mexico Gov. Bill
Richardson said on "Fox News Sunday."
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- Both Democratic presidential contenders, front-runner
John Kerry and rival John Edwards, told reporters they were not worried
that a Nader candidacy would hurt them if they face Bush in November.
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- "I think my campaign is speaking to a lot of the
issues Ralph Nader is concerned about," Kerry said. Edwards said "it
will not impact my campaign" because he could attract many of the
voters who might otherwise go to Nader.
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- Republicans tried not to celebrate the news. "Regardless
of what Ralph Nader does, President Bush is going to be re-elected in November,"
Republican Party chief Ed Gillespie said.
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- Nader admitted he would have difficulty meeting the requirements
to qualify for all 50 state ballots in the November election, describing
the process as "like climbing a cliff with a slippery rope."
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- "This isn't just our fight," he said. "This
is a fight for all third parties ... I don't think America belongs just
to the Democratic and Republican parties."
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