Ralph Nader has this essay in the weekend edition of Counterpunch (Dec. 19-21). The essay criticizes Scholastic Magazine’s policy of distributing sample ballots and educational material that include Democratic and Republican nominees, but exclude all others. Although Scholastic Magazine is private, its material is distributed in public schools.
Greg Gerritt Says:
December 20th, 2008 at 6:25 am
Note though that McKinney received 20% more total votes than Cobb did in 2004, with the vote total going from 119,000 to 146,000, and her overall percentage of .12 was higher than the 2004 percentage of .10, also a 20% increase. I am proud to have worked on both campaigns.
Phil Sawyer Says:
December 20th, 2008 at 9:52 am
Phil Sawyer Says:
December 20th, 2008 at 9:48 am
Gene Says:
December 19th, 2008 at 10:21 am
There’s no torch to be passed. Run if you want to run. You ought to thank Ralph and others for making that possible in face of the obstacles so thoroughly documented on this site.
Phil Sawyer adds:
What is needed is not the passing of the torch from one independent presidential candidate to another independent presidential candidate. What is necessary is the birth of a new, leftist, party of the people – or, at least, a new coalition that represents most (if not all) of the leftist parties that currently exist. I have been saying and writing that since 1974.
Phil Sawyer, California Elector for:
Eugene McCarthy for President in 1976;
Eugene McCarthy for President in 1988;
Ralph Nader for President in 2008.
As a member of another party shut out by Scholastic
Magazine I fully agree with Ralph Nader. This is not
something that would happen often as our political
views are widely different. A public company trading
on the Nasdaq Exchange it is profitable with upwards
of $2 Billion in annual sales. As a suggestion to Mr.
Nader, for the price of 100 shares he would be eligible
to speak at their corporate Annual meeting next year.
It should be interesting for Ralph to bring up this
issue at that time. More interesting would be seeing
what “excuse” the Board of Directors would use to try
and block M. Nader’s inquiry on this matter. For all
interested parties the symbol is SCHL.
I would hope that Libertarians would rally to the defense of Scholastic magazine for exercising its rights to cover or not cover whatever candidates it wants to.
Earl: Nader, like anyone else, has the right to criticize whomever he wants whenever he wants in whatever forum he chooses. Scholastic’s right to swing its metaphorical fist stops, as libertarians used to be so fond of pointing out, where our collective nose begins (i.e. the public teat). Their discrimination is objectionable but ought to be permissible as long as they’re not distributing their rag on the public dime in public schools.
As Nader points out in his article, which I assume you took the time to read, Scholastic has been infiltrating public schools for a long time. They set up charades like this to increase sales of their products to public school systems (as if they need to….this company could get by until doomsday on their Harry Potter profits alone). Fine – if they want to discriminate against minor party and independent candidates, let them exclusively visit private schools, where the cost of broadcasting, utilizing, and distributing said discrimination isn’t socialized.
Both Earl and David make some valid points. Education — be it public or private — seems to need to use mechanisms for the filtering of information. After all, since the invention of the printing press, we’ve lived in an era of ever-growing information. Scholastic magazine’s denial of third parties is just one sort of example of filtering. A syllabus or curriculum is another example of filtering in academia. For example, why do many courses in international comparative politics consider Germany to be worthy of study, but not Canada? It’s a filtering issue — a way to control information overload. Libertarians themselves use filtering techniques as well. Many libertarian candidates advocate to allow the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes. But you’d be hard-pressed to find those same libertarians advocating to allow the use of acupucture or chelation therapy, both of which are illegal in some states. Maybe Scholastic magazine’s reporters and editors simply do not know much about third parties or don’t really know how to report on them. In a similar vain, I would suspect that those libertarians who view marijuana as an important alternative in cancer therapy would be hard-pressed to explain the vital roles of acupuncture or chelation therapy in fighting cancer.
The Constitution Party and the Libertarian Party are going to end up in the dustbin of history – along with the Republican Party (which will be a ninor-sized party by the year of 2012).
When I was a child, Scholastic Magazine was assigned and covered in classrooms, just like any other textbook. I assume the same is true today. So the political issue here is control over curriculum by teachers and/or school boards and/or state departments of education and/or the federal government. Someone, somewhere has to decide which issues, opinions and facts are presented to students and which are not. We should be influencing these decisions to include more coverage of the role of small parties in American history, the effects of plurality voting, etc.
Good for Ralph! I had the good fortune to meet him in D.C. at the debate with Chuck Baldwin and talk with him for awhile. While I, of course, was with Baldwin at the event I was very impressed with Ralph Nader.
Even though I don’t agree with him in some important areas, especially concerning some of his positions that seem to be akin to western European socialism, I think he asks a lot of the right questions and points out a lot of legitimate faults in the American political and economic system. From what I know of him he seems to be a decent and honerable man who truly does care about the people, which puts him into a fairly elite status in this day and age. He deifnitely deserves his place as an American icon.
A West Virginia newspaper, “The Martinsburg Journal”, did about the same thing using only Obama and McCain choices as a fundraiser for local school supplies. The “Your Vote Counts” ballots appeared prominently (with big graphics) in the paper for at least a month before the election and asked “voters” to submit $1 per vote.
However, I think the joke was on them, because in the end, they recieved less than $100.
Scholastic Magazine has the right to put what they want in their magazine. The public has the right to to complain if they don’t like it. Even Libertarians. Libertarians will not attempt to make a law to force Scholastic Magazine to place third party candidates in their magazine.
Libertarians attempt to lobby news organization for better press coverage for the same reason.
Just because you don’t like something, doesn’t mean that there ought to be a law. You can still complain if you don’t like something.
Robert wrote: “Scholastic Magazine has the right to put what they want in their magazine.”
That really isn’t the issue. The Two Party Agenda that Scholastic Magazine is promoting is limiting and intended to shut critical thought.
Robert wrote: “The public has the right to to complain if they don’t like it.”
The use of the word “complain” carries the subtle implication of an empty or shallow grievance that needs little if any corrective action.
Do you understand the difference between education and indoctrination ?
Do you appreciate the fact that youth in a classroom setting are a captive audience ?
Are you familiar with the reactions that are visited upon Middle and High School Students by staff when they question dogma presented to them by staff ?
Now stop to consider that Scholastic Magazine is used at the Primary School Level where students are at an age so young that nearly all accept what is thrown at them because they have not yet developed the skills of critical thought.
Are you familiar with the case surrounding the use of Steinbeck’s novel The Grapes of Wrath in the Central Valley of California ?
Robert wrote: “Even Libertarians will not attempt to make a law to force Scholastic Magazine to place third party candidates in their magazine.
Libertarians attempt to lobby news organization for better press coverage for the same reason.”
Do you understand the basic mechanisms of, or should I say, Principles of Learning ?
Over the years, educational psychologists have identified several principles which seem generally applicable to the learning process. They provide additional insight into what makes people learn most effectively.
They are :
READINESS Individuals learn best when they are read to learn.
EXERCISE Thing most often repeated are best remembered.
EFFECT Learning is strengthened when accompanied by pleasant or satisfying feelings.
INTENSITY Hair raising experiences are lasting ones that are not readily forgotten.
RECENCY That which is learned last is most easily remembered
PRIMACY The state of being first often creates strong and almost unshakeable impression.
I ordered PRIMACY last because that is the principle that needs to be focused on in this instance. Go over and reread it.
If I can reach you first with the wrong information I can indoctrinate you with that misinformation. Notice in the definition of Primacy I used the phrase “almost unshakeable impressions”. I did not say it was impossible to correct miseducation but it takes far more effort to correct it than it does lay down the initial lesson. This is what drives Propaganda.
The question here is not so much whether Scholastic Magazine should include Third Party Candidates but whether should such a magazine be used as a teach aid for students particularly Primary School Age children.
Robert wrote: “Just because you don’t like something, doesn’t mean that there ought to be a law. You can still complain if you don’t like something.”
It is not a question of me or Ralph Nader or Colleen Donley not liking what Scholastic Magazine publishes that warrants remedial action. It is noting that Scholastic Magazine presents a distorted picture of the Political System to a captive audience of school age children. And in that context Scholastic Magazine is perpetrating miseducation which in most cases goes uncorrected for an entire lifetime. This is clearly an injury on society. Scholastic Magazine has the liberty to publish whatever it wants as long as it’s information is presented freely. When it is introduced into a classroom as part of a cirriculum that liberty is subverted to the principles of historic and scientific accuracy. Something which is sorely lacking in this case.
“Complaining” is a sign of weakness. And lobbying News Organizations is a futile pursuit when the entrenched power structure’s everyday operations overwhelm a handful of individuals. Libertarians should be at the point right now of doing some serious soul searching in appreciation of the fact they are no more influencial now than what they were 28 years ago.
The Libertarian Party is just another bourgeois conservative party like the Constitution Party and the Republican Party. All of them will end up in the dustbin of history.