Xander Patterson of the Pacific Green Party criticizes the major party candidates, calling Al Gore “the bad” and George W. Bush “the ugly.”
Charging that American society is under the tight grip of powerful corporations, co-chair of the Pacific Green Party Xander Patterson threw his support behind what he sees as the solution: a vote for Green Party presidential candidate Ralph Nader.
Between 25 and 30 people gathered Thursday afternoon in Room 175 of the Knight Law Center to hear Patterson, who said that Nader’s presidential campaign is more about building the Green Party into a major party than putting Nader in the White House.
“You can vote your conscience and change the world,” he said. “Vote for Ralph and may all your votes come true.”
Patterson said the Green Party, founded during the 1970s out of a growing “awareness that our planet is facing a myriad of environmental problems,” focuses on another major issue aside from the environment.
A larger problem looms underneath, and Patterson claimed there is a “profound corporate control over our government, our media [and] our educational system.”
The time to confront these issues is now, Patterson said, for a “spirit of activism [has] seized the people,” and the Green Party has a superb banner to rally around: Nader.
In order for the opportunity to not be missed, Patterson tried to dispel fears that Nader votes will essentially go to Republican presidential candidate George W. Bush, saying that he didn’t think Nader’s campaign will take away from Gore’s votes.
But the votes that do come in for Nader are a huge deal for the Green Party, he said. If it can garner 5 percent of the vote this election, it can receive millions of dollars in funding for future campaigns.
And that, Patterson said, puts the Green Party on the road to major party status.
“Don’t get frozen in the headlights like a deer,” Patterson said. “Vote for Ralph. It’s the only vote that really counts for an Oregonian.”
He added that if Nader does impact the election in Bush’s favor, he could also deliver the House of Representatives to Democrats.
Nader supporter Mark Robinowitz said that “if I had to choose between Democrats in Congress and a Democrat in the White House, I’d choose Congress because that’s where laws are made.”
This year’s election, Patterson said, confronts voters with three choices: “The good” — Nader, “the bad” — Democratic presidential candidate Al Gore, and “the ugly” — Bush.
Patterson touched only briefly upon “the ugly,” calling Bush an “old kind of anti-environmentalist.” He did, however, devote much more time to the person whom he called the “new anti-environmentalist”: Gore.
Reiterating a Nader claim that Gore wrote “Earth in a Balance” to position himself as an environmentalist, Patterson outlined the shortfalls of the Clinton-Gore administration, which revolved around such issues as genetic engineering, fuel efficiency and toxic risks.
Audience member Chris Bayham, a graduate student studying community and regional planning, questioned some of the facts Patterson presented.
Warning against oversimplifying government and political actions, he said that “it’s not as black and white as you might portray it.”