Pennywit's Place

In discussing American politics, few things are easier than criticizing consumer advocate Ralph Nader's perennial, quixotic quest for the White House. What's left to be said? That his continued quest is impractical? Ego-driven? Farcical? Ruining his legacy as a consumer advocate? You'd think the criticisms would stop. Then again, you'd think Nader would stop running, too.

On Wednesday, Nader took to the USA Today op-ed page to defend himself in a piece headlined "It's not about me. It's about our broken system." Nader's complaint is all too familiar: that corporations exercise undue influence over the political process, are corrupt and greedy, and are generally bad for people. And, oh yes, Republicans and Democrats are both slaves to the corporate machine.

Nader has ranted about this every four years. I call bullshit.

Think about it for a minute. How many people, including myself, have paychecks signed by these big corporations in one way or another? I've been out of undergrad for more than 10 years, and for all but a handful of those years, large corporations paid me for my services.

How many citizens of China, of Indonesia, and of Mexico have jobs because large corporations pay them to work in factories? How many citizens of India earn incomes -- solid incomes at that -- performing work for large corporations? How much capital flows around the world and back again because these large, supposedly evil corporations connect consumers with goods and laborers with jobs?

For a bunch of moustache-twirling villains meeting in smoke-filled rooms, these corporate honchos seem to do quite a bit of good.

I will not argue that corporations are unmitigated forces of goodness, light, and cute, huggable puppies. They're plainly not, as Enron and any number of other corporate malefactors amply demonstrate. However, tarring all corporations with that brush rings hollow. These companies do all they can to gain economic advantage, but they are no more uniformly evil or good than are the people who run them. Or work for them.

Nader's op-ed is particularly telling. Throughout it, he complains that consumer advocates no longer have a voice in Washington because the two parties, feasting at the same corporate teat, are addicted to the campaign donations that flow into their campaign treasuries.

There are ways to counter this. Howard Dean and Barack Obama have pointed the way, running campaigns that efficiently channel donations from "real people" to campaign treasuries via the magic of the Internet. Presumably, a Web-savvy political organization, led by, say, a respected consumer advocate such as, well, Ralph Nader, could endorse candidates, bring political pressure, dole out contributions, and help elect city councel members, state representatives, congressmen, governors, senators, and even the occasional president. And just like the establishment politicians who are the supposed lapdogs to corporate interests, these people-powered candidates would presumably remember the campaign donors who put them into office. (That would be the Nader-led organizations).

I have every confidence that if he chose to do so, Nader could assemble that sort of effective public-interest organization. But with the halo of his consumer-advocate career long gone, Nader has apparently chosen not to do this. Instead, he's running for president. Apparently, it really is all about Nader.