MILWAUKEE -- Last night the Green Party of the United States held a raucous hour-and-a-half presidential candidate forum in which one of the two top contenders for the spot was absent, two candidates admitted that they grew up "without a flush toilet," and self-proclaimed compromise candidate Kent Mesplay staked a claim to being the only candidate "who grew up in a rain forest."
While women in bejeweled ball gowns and men in tuxedos filed in to the downstairs rooms at Milwaukee's Midwest Airlines Center for the "Entrepreneur of the Year Awards Dinner," Green Party members wearing an elfin selection of green T-shirts, dresses, and wraps rushed to the room where the debate was held, many arriving after the debate had started to find it standing-room only. There they shouted at the candidates, held signs aloft, broke into spontaneous room-wide chants, demanded changes to the party's rules, and alternately lamented the internal divisions in America's largest third party and celebrated them.
"This convention, dare I say, is more important than the Democratic Convention will be and than the Republican Convention will be," said Mesplay, 41, an air-quality inspector with the San Diego Pollution Control District who is running on the slogan "Anybody but Bush or Kerry!"
He may not be exaggerating. At issue is whether or not the Green Party will endorse consumer activist and independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader and his newly selected vice-presidential partner, former California recall gubernatorial candidate Peter Camejo -- or whether the party will nominate home-grown candidate and Texas attorney David Cobb and his vice-presidential pick, Pat LaMarche.
If the party selects Cobb during day-long balloting on Saturday, Nader will have a much tougher time getting on the November ballot in 22 states and Washington, D.C., where the Green Party already has assured access. Nader has already run into ballot-access problems in Indiana, where he failed to gather sufficient signatures, and Arizona, where his signatures are being challenged in a lawsuit by the state Democratic Party. Typically, it is much harder for a candidate running as an independent to get on many state ballots than it is for a representative of a third party, so the Nader strategy for the fall has been to win the endorsements of as many third parties as possible in order to use their ballot lines.
Nader has sought and won the Reform Party endorsement, which could get him onto ballots in the seven states with Reform ballot lines, Michigan and Florida among them. He is also forming his own party, the Populist Party, and said he intends to be on the ballot in as many as 45 states.
Nader's willingness to work with multiple parties is a subject of much contention amongst Green Party members, many of whom fear that Nader will simply be using their party to push his own agenda, rather than helping to build and increase the influence of their party. The party has 203 officeholders in 27 states, largely at the lower levels of the electoral food chain, such as water & sanitary commissioners or school board members. While Nader has been the most prominent spokesman for the Greens on the national scene, in practice, it is these local officeholders who have been most successful in pushing for policies consistent with Green ecological and political values.
The suspicion, says one source close to Nader, cuts both ways. Nader wound up somewhat disappointed with the Greens in 2000, says the source; that helps explain why he chose not to run in the Green Party primaries during the spring, will not be on the internal Green Party balloting on Saturday, and is not attending the Green Party convention this week.
Cobb came out the runaway leader in the primary balloting; the only way Nader can gain the party's endorsement now is if enough delegates on Saturday decide to chose the "NOTA" option and select "none of the above" as their candidate. Delegates vote in multiple rounds until someone gains a majority. If "NOTA" wins a majority, the party can then choose to endorse Nader. What that "endorsement" -- which falls short of being an official nomination -- will mean in practice is anybody's guess. Each state's election commissions can interpret an endorsement differently, with some taking it as the equivalent of a nomination and others seeing it as inadequate to give Nader the Green Party line. In states that rule against Nader, the Greens could risk losing their hard-won ballot line -- and in states where Nader runs as a Reform or Populist candidate instead of a Green, the Greens may not be able to gain a new ballot line for future presidential elections.
Before the forum yesterday, Cobb seemed confident that he would be the Green Party contender in 2004. "I think I'll win on the second round," said Cobb. "I think there's a possibility we can do it on the first round but it is genuinely a contested nomination."
If he wins the nomination, says Cobb, "it will force progressive voters to grapple with what the purpose of a Nader independent vote is, as opposed to a Green Party vote." It could also mean that, come November, Sen. John Kerry may have to grapple with two candidates challenging him from the left, instead of only one.
It may sound like a nightmare for the Democrat, but it would actually be a blessing in disguise. Cobb represents the pragmatic wing of the Green Party -- his critics call him an advocate of "lesser evilism" -- that believes that ousting Bush is the most important goal in 2004 for those who have Green values. He says he'll encourage voters in battleground states to "vote your consciences" and vote against Bush, while encouraging those in 34 safe states to vote Green. "Damn it all, it matters!" Cobb told the crowd last night, to cheers from his supporters. "I want to run a campaign that grows the Green Party and culminates with Bush out!"
Camejo, in contrast, warned attendees last night against ever voting for the Democrats, regardless of the consequences. "Don't fall for the trap -- Bush is backed by the corporate world. The job of the Democratic Party is to protect Bush!" he said, bringing half the room to its feet with applause. "To fall for this argument that you are defeating Bush if you vote for Kerry, you're not. There has to come a day when we say, free at last, I will never vote for them again! I will never vote for them again!"
His words were soon drowned out by a chorus of voices shouting, "No safe states!" and "No sell-outs!"
Garance Franke-Ruta is a Prospect senior editor. Her column appears each week in the online edition.
