Fwd: ASGP News Circulator - Week Ending September 11

[Dean Myerson <greenstuff@deanmyerson.org>]

>
>Association of State Green Parties (ASGP) News Circulator
>Week Ending September 11, 2000
>
>News Summary:
>
>*  New York Greens Lose Fight to Place Green Party Candidates on Voting
>Machines for Primaries;
>*  Louisiana Green Party Members Barred from Gore Rally;
>*  Medea Benjamin, CA Green Party Senate Candidate, Releases National
>Forest Plans;
>*  A Real Debate Would Include Nader: An Editorial by David Cobb of the
>Texas Green Party;
>*  Friends of the Earth Turns Tail and Endorses Gore;
>*  Mississippi Nader Backers Encourage Residents to Vote Nader;
>*  Nader Blasts DEA Plan to Link Industrial Hemp and Heroin;
>*  Nader Criticizes Friends of the Earth Endorsement.
>
>
>September 7, 2000, Thursday, BC cycle
>
>SECTION: State and Regional
>
>LENGTH: 462 words
>
>HEADLINE: Green Party loses attempt to force its way onto voting
>machines
>
>BYLINE: By LARRY NEUMEISTER, Associated Press Writer
>
>DATELINE: NEW YORK
>
>BODY:
>    A judge refused to force the city to put Green Party candidates on
>voting machine ballots for Tuesday's
>primary election, saying the city was doing enough by promising to try
>to count the party's paper ballots
>within 48 hours of the polls closing.
>
>U.S. District Judge Gerard E. Lynch heard arguments Thursday from both
>sides before concluding that
>the Green Party was not entitled to force changes that could postpone
>the primary.
>
>In a lawsuit filed two days earlier, the Green Party accused the New
>York City Board of Elections of
>massively undercounting its votes in previous years. It sought to be
>placed on the voting machine ballots.
>Green candidates were left off to save space on the old-fashioned
>machines.
>
>The Green Party Senate primary candidates include Al Lewis, who played
>Grandpa on "The Munsters;"
>Mark Dunau, a farmer from Hancock, N.Y.; and Ron Dugger of Manhattan, a
>former newspaper publisher.
>
>
>Dugger and Dunau pleaded with Lynch Thursday to force the city to count
>Green Party votes within 30
>hours, saying they would lose media coverage otherwise.
>
>"After 48 hours, we're dead," Dunau told Lynch.
>
>But the judge said he was unconvinced that the Green Party could prove
>the kind of discrimination
>necessary for a federal court to find that its Constitutional rights
>were being violated.
>
>He said decisions about complaints regarding the time, place and manner
>of elections were better left to
>state courts.
>
>The ruling pleased Daniel DeFrancesco, executive director of the city
>Board of Elections, who said he
>would try to report the results within 48 hours.
>
>"I'm a pretty fair guy and honest guy. Whatever we can do, we try to
>do," he said.
>
>Raymond J. Dowd, a lawyer for the Green Party, said he was pleased that
>the lawsuit had at least gotten
>the city to shorten the time it would report Green Party results from a
>week to two days.
>
>"The Board of Election walked in saying one thing and they walked out
>saying another," he said.
>
>City lawyer Marilyn Richter said the city had offered to accommodate the
>Green Party in various ways but
>all of its ideas were rejected.
>
>"They don't want any of this," she said. "They want to be treated
>exactly like the Democrats and
>Republicans."
>
>The judge said the Green Party "may be entitled to be treated like
>Democrats and Republicans in some
>respects."
>
>He urged the city to count the Green Party ballots as quickly as
>possible, noting that there were only
>1,640 people registered to vote in the primary for Green Party
>candidates.
>
>Dugger said he believed Green candidates could win in the general
>election, but emphasized the party
>was also looking to the future.
>
>"We're building a long-term movement," he said, "a permanent rebellion
>against the two-party monopoly."
>
>
>
>September 8, 2000, Friday, BC cycle
>
>SECTION: State and Regional; Political News
>
>LENGTH: 310 words
>
>HEADLINE: Green Party angry over treatment at Gore rally
>
>DATELINE: NEW ORLEANS
>
>BODY:
>    The Louisiana Green Party is crying foul because a top member was
>barred access to a French
>Quarter campaign rally for Al Gore.
>
>Gore campaign officials say they regularly restrict opponents to
>designated areas so as not to sour the
>event for those who want to hear what the Democratic nominee for
>president has to say.
>
>Tonya Jordan, who is the Louisiana campaign coordinator for Green Party
>candidate Ralph Nader, was
>wearing a "vote Nader" sticker on the back of her shirt and a pin that
>read "Billionaires for Bush and
>Gore" as she tried to enter Jackson Square for the rally Thursday night.
>
>Upon being stopped at a security barricade, she argued vehemently that
>she should be allowed in
>because event tickets - which she had - stated only that rally
>participants not bring purses, bags or signs
>into the area.
>
>She was told her shirt constituted a sign and that she could be kept out
>since the rally was for Gore, says
>Jason Neville, a Green Party secretary in New Orleans who witnessed the
>incident.
>
>As she argued, Jordan was arrested and charged with resisting arrest and
>crossing a police barricade.
>
>"I was shocked by the suppression of free speech I witnessed," Neville
>said.
>
>The Gore event was on public property. Ellen Mellody, a spokeswoman for
>the Gore campaign, said the
>campaign obtained a permit for the rally.
>
>Mellody said she was not sure why police arrested Jordan, but added that
>protesters generally are
>diverted to designated areas along the perimeter of rally sites.
>
>"We provided a designated area for other opinions to be voiced so it's
>not disruptive for those who are
>there to hear about issues Al Gore is fighting for," Mellody said.
>
>Neville said other Green Party members were able to get near the stage
>by hiding their literature as they
>entered. They then began handing it out once they were safely in.
>
>
>
>Copyright 2000 U.S. Newswire, Inc.
>                                        U.S. Newswire
>
>                                   September 5, 2000, Tuesday
>
>SECTION: STATE DESK
>
>LENGTH: 571 words
>
>HEADLINE: Green Party Senate Candidate Announces New Forest Platform and
>Job Plan
>
>DATELINE: NEVADA City, Nev., Sept. 5
>
>BODY:
>Medea Benjamin, Green Party Candidate for US Senate in California, today
>
>released her detailed plan for resolving the issues of logging on
>National
>Forestlands, supporting Forest Stewardship Council certification for the
>
>state's private lands, and creating permanent, high-wage jobs in the
>non-tree paper and pulp industries. She speaks today at a noon rally  at
>
>the steps of the County Board of Supervisors (950 Maidu St, Rood Center)
>in
>Nevada City, where she will speak against Sierra Pacific Industries
>(SPI),
>the largest recipient of subsidized public lumber. SPI's logging plans
>are
>being critiqued that afternoon (1:30 p.m.) in front of Nevada County's
>Board of Supervisors.
>    "According to GAO studies and numerous environmental watchdog
>agencies, our Forest Service is essentially subsidizing the largest
>logging
>corporations in the U.S. to cut old-growth and other high-value forest
>groves on our public lands through the National Forest timber sale
>program," said Benjamin, a leader in the 1999 Seattle WTO protests that
>brought labor and environmentalists together. "Operations like Sierra
>Pacific Industries shouldn't have been able to grow fat for years off
>the
>subsidized public timber that the US Forest Service consistently
>provides
>them, at far below market rates. I support the numerous studies that
>show
>that our National Forests are worth far more standing tall as unique
>ecosystems than laying flat as 2x4's."
>    Medea Benjamin's opponent in the US Senate race, Senator Dianne
>Feinstein, supports continued logging on National Forest lands and is a
>leading supporter of the controversial Quincy Library Group process.
>According to the DC-based American Lands Alliance, Sierra Pacific
>Industries has been the single largest beneficiary of National Forest
>timber sales from California this century and is currently maneuvering
>the
>Quincy Library Group process to vastly increase the rate of logging on
>the
>Lassen and Klamath National Forests. Additionally, Senator Feinstein was
>
>the leading architect of the deal for the Headwaters Forest in Humboldt
>County, which enraged environmentalists by preserving only two of the
>forest's six ancient redwood groves at an astronomical cost of over $360
>
>million in public money.
>    "California has one of the highest rates of consumption of wood
>products in the world, as well as some of the most magnificent,
>threatened
>forests on Earth," said Benjamin. "We must act appropriately and start
>using the vast body of knowledge our government has about non-wood
>alternatives -- agricultural residues, hemp, kenaf and flax, to name
>just a
>few -- to build a new, sustainable industry in California. Then we can
>preserve the watershed, recreational, ecological and spiritual values of
>
>California's forests while still meeting all of our society's need for
>building materials and paper products."
>    In a Washington DC press conference today (6:30 a.m. PST), in the
>National Press Club's West Wing, Ralph Nader will denounce the DEA's
>plan
>to ban hemp food products. Nader will also join with Joe American Horse,
>a
>tribal member of the Pine Ridge Lakota (Sioux) Reservation, to denounce
>the
>recent DEA raid on Lakota territory, where armed federal agents recently
>
>raided an industrial-grade hemp
>
>
>
>Copyright 2000 The Houston Chronicle Publishing Company
>                                     The Houston Chronicle
>
>                                        View Related Topics
>
>                          September 10, 2000, Sunday 2 STAR EDITION
>
>SECTION: OUTLOOK; Pg. 5
>
>LENGTH: 1058 words
>
>HEADLINE: A real debate would include Nader
>
>BYLINE: DAVID COBB; Cobb is secretary of the Green Party of Texas.
>
>BODY:
>    CALL it the "American Principle," a basic tenet shared by baseball,
>business and apple-pie bake-offs:
>Fair, open, healthy competition promotes excellence. So why would
>Americans sit still for presidential
>debates that are arbitrarily restricted - Soviet-style - to the two
>parties that control the Commission on
>Presidential Debates? Most of us don't, actually. Some two-thirds of
>those polled say they want Green
>Party presidential candidate Ralph Nader included in this fall's
>televised debates. They may or may not
>decide to vote for Nader, but they at least want to hear what he has to
>say. That's the American way. But
>it's not the Commission on Presidential Debates way. The commission,
>founded by Republican and
>Democratic party officials and funded by beer and tobacco corporations,
>has erected a barrier to keep
>out third-party candidates, even candidates of Nader's stature. It's not
>enough to have a 35-year record of
>public advocacy and achievement; to be running a serious campaign and to
>have fought your way onto
>the ballot in almost every state. It's not enough to be drawing larger
>campaign crowds than either Gov.
>George W. Bush or Vice President Al Gore. In Portland, Ore., recently
>10,500 people paid $ 7 each to
>hear Nader speak. No, to be heard on our public airwaves, the CPD has
>decreed that Nader (and the
>Reform Party candidate Pat Buchanan) would have to be scoring 15 percent
>in five major polls. Not 15
>percent saying they want Nader in the debates, mind you, but 15 percent
>saying they'd definitely vote for
>Nader today - before they've even had a chance to hear his views in
>debates or other media forums. This
>Catch-22 - you can't get media attention without good poll numbers and
>you can't get good poll numbers
>without media attention - is deliberately deployed by the CPD, a fact
>that raises important questions for
>any believer in the democratic process: What's the purpose of debates?
>Another canned campaign event
>for the Big Two, like their conventions? Or a wide-ranging, robust
>discussion of issues? Two-thirds of
>Americans vote for real discussion - and Nader's inclusion. Who elected
>the CPD to set the rules?
>Nobody. This private corporation seized control of the debates after the
>nonpartisan League of Women
>Voters had the audacity to let independent John Anderson debate in 1980.
>But most news media are
>accomplices in the CPD's charade: TV networks could refuse to carry
>rigged debates; they could host
>their own debates or they could televise fair debates organized by
>civic, labor or educational groups.
>Newspapers could refuse to shut out third-party candidates or stop
>labeling them "spoilers," as if
>major-party candidates were automatically entitled to anyone's vote.
>Where did the 15 percent rule come
>from, the thin air of high-level politics? Precedent and logic call for
>a different standard, as proposed by
>the nonpartisan Citizens' Task Force on Fair Debates and by U.S. Rep.
>Jesse Jackson Jr., D-Ill.
>Jackson's congressional resolution urges the inclusion of all candidates
>who score at least 5 percent (the
>threshold for federal campaign funding) in national polls or whom more
>than 50 percent of people polled
>want included in the debates. Who says third-party candidates have no
>chance of winning, and therefore
>should be excluded? That argument was body-slammed once and for all when
>Jesse Ventura, polling
>below 10 percent before he was allowed to debate, went on to become
>governor of Minnesota. So much
>for "spoilers." Besides, there are different ways of "winning" an
>election (or a debate). Consider that
>virtually every step forward our society has taken was originally
>proposed by a third party: the abolition of
>slavery, women's right to vote, the Social Security Administration, a
>minimum wage, the 40-hour
>workweek, pure food and drug laws, worker-protection laws and abolition
>of child labor. Nader and the
>Green Party can "win" in this election if their voices and their vote
>totals create a political climate that
>gives birth to universal health care, a living wage, fair trade policies
>with labor and environmental
>safeguards and full publicly-funded elections that would eliminate the
>corrosive effect of big money in
>politics. What price do we pay for exclusionary debates? Millions who
>might be energized by fresh ideas
>instead return to voter coma. With more than half of all eligible voters
>sitting out elections, it's instructive to
>recall that when Ross Perot was included in the debates in 1992, an
>average of 90 million people
>watched; when he was excluded four years later, more than half of them
>tuned out again. Besides being
>dull and boring, debates limited to Bush and Gore would mean no serious
>discussion of important issues
>the two basically agree on: World Trade Organization/North American Free
>Trade Agreement/World
>Bank, trade with China, continuation of the death penalty, corporate
>welfare, military spending and the
>drug war. The only candidate who refuses corporate contributions (Nader)
>would not be there to talk
>about real campaign-finance reform. Central issues of Nader's campaign,
>and of many people's lives,
>would get short shrift: universal health-care, environmental and
>economic justice, the concentration of
>corporate power over governmental and private decisions. A living
>democracy depends on informed
>voters. When voters are denied a chance to see which candidates
>represent their interests, democracy is
>subverted, and we all pay. That includes those voters already committed
>to Bush or Gore, whose deeper
>commitment must be to fair play and democracy. What recourse do we have?
>We have the power of
>citizens. We can demand change, and work for it. We can challenge the
>news media to reject the CPD's
>debates and set up their own. We can demand that the CPD end its lockout
>of third-party candidates.
>Those who are polled can say they'll vote for Nader, just to help him
>get 15 percent. Some younger
>people, feeling excluded, will take to the streets. All of us can vote
>our disapproval of the CPD's blend of
>politics, with the TV remote beginning Oct. 3 and at the ballot box Nov.
>7. Closed "debates" are part of a
>corporate-funded headlock on democracy. Nader is determined to break
>that headlock. The powers of
>the CPD want him gagged. A free and fair people say: Let the man speak
>and we'll judge for ourselves.
>
>
>
>September 5, 2000, Tuesday, BC cycle
>
>SECTION: State and Regional
>
>LENGTH: 760 words
>
>HEADLINE: Friends of Earth spurn Green Party, support Gore for president
>
>BYLINE: By CRISTINE GONZALEZ, Associated Press Writer
>
>DATELINE: PORTLAND, Ore.
>
>BODY:
>    Al Gore landed the endorsement of the most liberal environmental
>group in the nation Tuesday, and
>analysts said it will help the vice president in this battleground
>region.
>
>Friends of the Earth, based in Washington, D.C., came to Oregon to
>announce its support for the
>Democratic presidential candidate, saying an endorsement of the Green
>Party's Ralph Nader would only
>help Texas Gov. George W. Bush get elected.
>
>"While Nader has a platform with which we are largely in agreement, the
>fact is third parties don't win
>presidential elections," Brent Blackwelder, president of the
>organization, said at a news conference. "So
>if you are concerned with these issues ... you've got to be putting your
>money on one of the front-runners."
>
>Political analysts said the endorsement boosts Gore's image as an
>environmentalist, which has been
>tarnished among some conservation groups.
>
>Making the announcement in Portland not only helps Gore's campaign in
>the green-conscious Pacific
>Northwest, which remains up for grabs, but could also bring national
>attention to issues important to the
>region.
>
>"This endorsement becomes very important for Al Gore, because his good
>environmental credentials
>have been muddied in the past couple of years," said Jim Moore, a
>political science professor at
>University of Portland. "Friends of the Earth has become a lot more
>radicalized, so its endorsement is
>what 'true' environmentalists look for."
>
>That kind of pull could make a difference in Oregon and Washington where
>environmental issues such as
>land conservation, salmon recovery and pollution control take center
>stage.
>
>Oregon and Washington have voted for a Democrat the last three
>presidential elections. This year,
>however, it's a toss-up between Gore and Bush, with Nader getting enough
>support to hurt Gore.
>
>Neither state is populous enough to carry much weight in the electoral
>college. Still, Oregon's seven
>electoral votes and Washington's 11 make a difference, because they are
>among those "swing" states
>that could tip the balance of the election. A candidate needs 270
>electoral votes to win.
>
>In the past, the region had a strong leader in Sen. Mark Hatfield, who
>could stand up for the issues
>important to his constituents, Moore said. But over the past five years,
>the region's most senior
>congressmen have retired, resigned or been defeated.
>
>"Oregon and Washington now have become symbols for the environment in
>this election," Moore said.
>"By playing a symbolic role, people will know about these issues; we'll
>be back on the map."
>
>Oregon Gov. John Kitzhaber strongly supported the organization's
>decision to endorse Gore, despite his
>cool relations in the past with the vice president and President
>Clinton.
>
>"There is no other course of action for friends concerned with the
>environment," Kitzhaber said in a
>forceful speech Tuesday. "The vice president will do right by the
>Northwest."
>
>The maverick governor surprised fellow Democrats during the primaries by
>becoming the only governor
>to endorse Bill Bradley for president. He was the only one of the
>nation's 18 Democratic governors who
>didn't attend the convention in Los Angeles.
>
>Friends of the Earth also endorsed Bill Bradley in the Democratic
>primaries. The organization had been
>agonizing over whether to support Nader. It has criticized Gore and the
>Clinton administration on a
>number of issues, including their failure to do enough to slow global
>warming.
>
>The organization is not backing off its criticisms, Blackwelder said.
>But its political action committee felt
>that a Republican ticket would plunge "us into the dark ages for the
>environment."
>
>"You never in any election have a candidate that reflects everything you
>want so you have to look at your
>choices and make a decision," Blackwelder said. Between Gore and Bush,
>"there is a Grand Canyon of
>difference."
>
>Based on the committee's criteria for an endorsement, he said Gore and
>his running mate, Sen. Joe
>Lieberman, fared better than Bush and Dick Cheney. The committee
>considered the candidates'
>knowledge and awareness of environmental issues, their choices for
>running mates, and their positions
>on key environmental policy, among other matters.
>
>Blackwelder and other members of the group will be traveling to swing
>states where Nader is popular,
>including the Northwest, New Mexico and Michigan, to seek votes for
>Gore.
>
>Gore also has endorsements from the League of Conservation Voters and
>the Sierra Club, the other
>national environmental groups that publicly support national candidates.
>
>
>
>
>
>September 6, 2000, Wednesday, BC cycle
>
>SECTION: State and Regional
>
>LENGTH: 336 words
>
>HEADLINE: Nader backers say he won't play spoiler in Mississippi race
>
>BYLINE: By GINA HOLLAND, Associated Press Writer
>
>DATELINE: JACKSON, Miss.
>
>BODY:
>    College secretary Tritta Neveleff is making a statement in this
>presidential election, even though she
>doesn't expect her candidate to win Mississippi.
>
>The Ralph Nader supporter said a large turnout for the Green Party
>candidate would be a symbolic
>victory.
>
>"He's not trying to play spoiler, but he can get the Democrats scared.
>If they don't change .. they're going
>to lose their people," said Neveleff, one of about 20 people at a
>Tuesday Nader rally at the Mississippi
>Capitol.
>
>Neveleff said neither Democrats nor Republicans are thoroughly
>addressing issues she's interested in,
>like the environment.
>
>"People say things are great. Things are not great. They stink," said
>Neveleff, of Raymond.
>
>Nader backs fair trade, strong unions and universal health care. The
>consumer activist has been
>registering around 5 percent in national polls. In some battleground
>states, Nader could hurt Al Gore by
>drawing traditionally Democratic voters.
>
>Mississippi is expected to be carried by Republican George W. Bush. The
>last Democrat to win the state
>in a presidential race was Jimmy Carter in 1976.
>
>Landon W. Huey, head of the Jackson chapter of the Green Party, said he
>is recruiting votes among his
>Democratic friends, telling them "a vote for Gore would be a wasted
>vote, a vote for Nader sends a
>message."
>
>Keith Wright, a University of Mississippi student and Nader campaigner,
>said because the Bush-Gore
>race is not as close in this state "anyone who really cares about the
>environment or social issues has an
>opportunity to cast a guilt-free vote for Nader."
>
>Nader will be listed on the Nov. 7 ballot as an independent.
>
>Mississippi State political scientist Steve Shaffer said independent and
>third party candidates rarely do
>well in the state, including Ross Perot in 1992.
>
>"Mississippi goes with Democrats or Republicans," Shaffer said Tuesday.
>"It's hard enough for the
>average citizen to keep up with two candidates."
>
>
>
>
>Copyright 2000 The Commercial Appeal
>                               The Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
>
>                         September 6, 2000, WEDNESDAY, FINAL EDITION
>
>SECTION: NEWS, Pg. A4
>
>LENGTH: 425 words
>
>HEADLINE: NADER BLASTS DEA PLAN TO LINK HEMP, HEROIN;
>U.S. FARMERS ALSO LOBBYING TO GROW POT'S COUSIN
>
>BYLINE: Lance Gay Scripps Howard News Service
>
>DATELINE: WASHINGTON
>
>BODY:
>
>Under pressure from the White House drug czar, the Drug Enforcement
>Administration is planning to classify
>industrial-use hemp among the most serious narcotic drugs, such as
>heroin and cocaine.
>Green Party presidential nominee Ralph Nader disclosed the plan Monday
>and criticized government efforts to crack
>down on farmers who want to grow industrial-use hemp for use in food,
>cosmetics, textiles and paper products.
>Hemp cannot be grown commercially in the U.S. because it belongs to the
>same family as marijuana, although Nader
>pointed out that the levels of hallucinogenic THC are far lower in hemp
>than in marijuana.
>"Industrialized hemp is not a drug," Nader said. "Smoking it will give
>you a headache, not a high."
>Congress sought to discourage growing marijuana and hemp under the
>Marijuana Tax Act of 1937, which imposed stiff
>taxes on production. But the United States allows $ 200 million worth of
>imports of hemp food and fiber products each
>year mainly from Canada and China, and U.S. farmers want access to that
>market.
>Jeffery Gain, a member of the North American Industrial Hemp Council and
>president of the Blue Ridge Co. in Illinois,
>said allowing farmers to grow industrial hemp would help preserve small
>farms and provide local economies with more
>jobs to process hemp into a variety of products.
>"The crop is good for the environment, and it's good for the economy,"
>Gain said.
>Nader said hemp crops would yield farmers from $ 308 to $ 410 an acre,
>compared with the $ 103 to $ 137 per acre
>gained from growing the seed that's processed into canola oil.
>White House drug czar Barry McCaffrey wants to outlaw any hemp growing,
>contending it sends the wrong message
>about drug abuse to permit legal sales of any form of marijuana.
>He also has argued that hemp-based foods could distort drug-testing
>programs. Hemp seeds are used in nut bars sold at
>health stores.
>"The DEA's intrusion into the realm of agriculture is preventing
>American farmers from growing a crop that has the
>potential to help address the global depletion of forest resources, the
>dependency on foreign oil, the harmful effects of
>petrochemicals, the excessive use of pesticides for fiber crops, and the
>economic depression of farming communities,"
>Nader said.
>State legislatures in California, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Kentucky,
>Maryland, Minnesota and Montana have passed
>pro-hemp legislation. Colorado, Iowa, Nebraska, New Hampshire, Oregon,
>Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Dakota
>and Tennessee are considering measures.
>
>
>
>
>Copyright 2000 The National Journal Group, Inc.
>                                          Greenwire
>
>                                       September 8, 2000
>
>SECTION: POLITICS & SOCIETY
>
>LENGTH: 144 words
>
>HEADLINE: CAMPAIGN 2000: NADER CRITICIZES FRIENDS OF THE EARTH;
>ENDORSEMENT
>
>BODY:
>    Green Party candidate Ralph Nader said this week's decision
>by Friends of the Earth to endorse Al Gore (D) over him will
>hurt the environmental group.
>
>Nader: "I think of literally thousands of environmental
>activists working in the trenches who looked up to Friends of
>the Earth and who are going to be disappointed. ... They won't
>forget."
>
>Friends of the Earth President Brent Blackwelder said the
>group considered endorsing Nader, but concluded the third party
>candidate did not have a realistic chance of winning the general
>election. Nader, who said he had considered Blackwelder someone
>he would have wanted to head the U.S. EPA, added, "It's an
>extremely sad day" (Jeff Mapes, Portland Oregonian, Sept. 6).
>The latest poll on NationalJournal.com's Poll Track shows
>Nader's support at 4 percent among registered voters nationwide.
>-- DIL
>
>
>
>

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