RALPH NADER AND THE GREEN DREAM

DENVER - The birth of a radical political movement was celebrated in
Colorado last month as consumer activist Ralph Nader accepted the
nomination to become the Green Party candidate for President of the
United States.

About 1,000 Green Party delegates and spectators waving signs and
throwing confetti cheered wildly as Nader accepted the nomination June
25 at the Denver Renaissance Hotel and agreed to champion Green values
in an all-out national campaign. Nader called for universal health
care coverage, campaign finance reform, stronger environmental and job
safety laws, and an end to corporate welfare. He also wants to end the
war on drugs in its current form and legalize industrial hemp.

Nader's speech culminated the three-day Green Party National
Nominating Convention, the first major national convention of the
growing third party that now has 79 elected Greens in 19 states -
including recently elected Breckenridge Town Councilman Jim Lamb.
Delegates representing 38 states, including Colorado, convened in
Denver to ratify the Green Party platform and choose among three
candidates for the presidential nomination.

Nader easily beat contenders Jello Biafra, the former lead singer for
the punk rock band Dead Kennedys who said his purpose in running was
to attract attention to the Green Party, and Stephen Gaskin, a human
rights activist who founded a Tennessee commune.

The Green Party, which began organizing as a grassroots political
movement in the U.S. in 1984 and has been building momentum across the
nation over the last few years, ratified a platform at the convention
with the themes of economic justice, environmental sustainability,
human rights, health care and democracy.

Throughout the weekend, these issues were addressed by speakers such
as radio commentator Jim Hightower, anti-nuclear activist Helen
Caldicott, Columbia University Professor Dr. Manning Marable and
lesbian activist Ann Northrup.

Labor union activist Tony Mazzocchi spoke to a central theme in the
Nader campaign: a new partnership between labor unions and
environmentalists. The so-called "blue/green alliance" is a growing
political coalition of blue-collar workers with concerns about labor
issues and greens concerned about the environment - two traditionally
divergent groups that found common ground during the WTO protests in
Seattle. The Green Party, often associated with environmental issues,
also takes a strong stance on labor issues with a platform advocating
a living wage, the right to unionize, workplace safety, lifelong
education and fair trade.

The California Nurses Association, the largest nurses' union in the
U.S., has officially thrown its support to Nader, and several other
union groups are reportedly considering endorsing his candidacy.

Mazzocchi called for universal health care in the form of a single
payer national health insurance system, an idea supported by Nader.

Caldicott suggested the money for health care could come from the
third of a trillion dollars currently being spent to produce nuclear
weapons in the U.S.

Winona LaDuke, an Ojibwe activist from the White Earth Reservation who
is Nader's vice presidential running mate, calls for the reallocation
of the federal budget to meet human needs. LaDuke cited the $289
million currently being spent in military aid to Columbia - one of the
most violent nations in the world - as one example of money that could
be better spent on human needs.

LaDuke also supports adding what she calls the "Seventh Generation
Amendment" to the U.S. Constitution, which would mandate the
preservation of all commonly owned public property and require that
public-policy deliberations include consideration of the impacts to
people who will live here seven generations from now.

In the words of Ralph Nader

After three days of hearing about how Ralph Nader's relentless
consumer activism over the last 30 years has saved millions of
American lives and is chiefly responsible for the formation of the
Environmental Protection Agency, the Occupational Safety and Health
Administration and the Freedom of Information Act; and after hearing
impassioned Nader endorsements from prominent human-rights activists
-- including a nearly-in-tears Helen Caldicott who solemnly
proclaimed: "There is one man who can save the world and that is Ralph
Nader." -- it was time to hear from the man himself.

But first: the lights dim and a wall-size TV screen erupts to life
with images of Nader testifying before Congress, appearing on national
news shows and hosting Saturday Night Live -- all part of an MTV-style
video designed to pump up the crowd, and presumably prove this will be
a savvy campaign much different from Nader's 1996 bid for the
presidency. Back then, Nader agreed to let the Green Party put his
name on the ballot, but he raised only $5,000 and rarely campaigned.

This time around, Nader has already raised $1 million and is shooting
for $5 million in what he promises will be a serious campaign effort.
He has already campaigned in all 50 states, the only presidential
candidate yet to do so.

"Green values are the majoritarian values," Nader said, kicking off
his acceptance speech. The movement is "a fresh green plant pushing up
between the two fossil parties that are built on, driven by and fueled
by business cash," he said.

Nader said the theme of his campaign will be the shift of power away
from the top 1 percent of wealthiest Americans, who earn more than the
bottom 95 percent of Americans combined.

"We can have a democratic society or we can have the concentration of
wealth in the hands of a few. We can't have both," Nader said.

Nader suggests using "people's yardsticks" instead of "corporate
yardsticks" to measure economic health. In the midst of the current
economic expansion, 20 percent of children live in dire poverty, 10
million people have minimum-wage paying jobs and 47 million people
don't have health insurance. The benefits of the current economy have
instead accrued to the top three percent of wealthy Americans.

"It's time to put the injustices on the table," Nader said. "Over the
next four and a half months, this campaign must challenge the
campaigns of the Bush/Gore duopoly in ever locality."

Nader called for an end to corporate welfare -- a main theme of the
campaign. "Over the last 20 years, corporations have been very
demanding on government, and they've gotten most of what they demand,"
Nader said, including debt forgiveness, tax shelters, bail outs, gifts
of natural resources and non-enforcement of worker safety and
environmental laws.

He used as one example how the New York Stock exchange got millions of
dollars from the government for a new building after threatening to
move to New Jersey. He also sharply criticized the use of public funds
for sports stadiums.

"Tax money should be used for serious issues affecting human beings,
not for corporate entertainment," he said, likening
publically-financed sports stadiums to "the coliseums in Rome with one
difference: They let the spectators in for free."

Nader also called for a national debate on corporations and their
rights as persons under current U.S. law.

On the drug issue, Nader asked of the Drug Enforcement Agency: "What
standard of failure would you apply before we can go back to the table
(to discuss drug policy)?"

He also recounted his visit to the country's only legal crop of hemp
currently growing in Hawaii, calling it "a bizarre medieval
experience" to see "a fraction of an acre of hemp surrounded by a
barbed wire fence." He promised that, if elected, he would petition
the DEA to take hemp off the scheduled drug list.

Nader concluded his acceptance speech by calling on young people and
senior citizens to get involved in the campaign, and by expressing his
hope that thousands of Green candidates will run in state and local
elections in the coming years.

"Who among you will say that the people of this world will plan the
future of his world, not the corporations and their corrupt
governments?" Nader asked.

Following the convention, Nader headed to California to continue
campaigning. He is currently on the ballot in 20 states, including
Colorado, and plans to be on the ballot in at least 48 states in the
November election.