Yes! Well said! I may still vote for Nader as a protest vote, as I live in a virtually uncontested "blue" state; but I really think that if the Greens are going to stand any chance of breaking the stranglehold on our electoral system that the Dems and the Republicans have, then they would be much better off focusing on local, state, and possibly house of rep. elections. Oh Gawd, it's all so depressing.

Good looking and incredibly intelligent. You've got it all.

So many people don't even understand what the media is doing most of the time, which is sad when they control so many peoples minds like they do.

What a wonderfully exhilarating and inspiring few minutes reading this has been; thank you so much! I'm patting myself on the back for not underestimating you!

Do you recall last time around, the dramatic demonstration of the ruling elites' overpowering fear of any candidate who's belief in democracy extends beyond mere rhetoric? I refer of course to the incident in which Ralph Nader was barred not only from participation in the candidates' debates but was threatened with immediate extra-legal arrest for wishing to use his legitimate personalized invitation to watch the debates on a tv monitor in a room away from where they were actually being held. I did not get a sense of how those police officers felt about their role as a private, partisan security force in that situation but we can only hope that it distressed them greatly. That having been said, to conflate fear with malice is to perpetuate and exacerbate conflict. We need to understand and address the distorted perceptions of people who think that economic stratification, environmental destruction and genocide will serve us well in the years to come.

$400 haircut, haha

It's unfortunate that, as media-connected as we are, the average voter is not at all well-informed, and usually does not even vote their values so much as they vote for a personality and an image. Our media-centric society is all about the sound byte and the 15-second video clip. Therefore Edward's hair and Dean's scream become central events in the media and in our collective psyche. Whether anyone would pay attention if elections and candidates were covered in a manner similar to that of the Newshour with Jim Lehrer or NPR news is circumspect. Most prefer to be entertained than to pay any real attention to matters they already feel are beyond their understanding. A voter who casts his or her vote as part of a strategy is at least attempting to influence a political end. We should be so lucky as to have a plurality of this type of voter in the U.S. electorate.

I have simplified this entire debate into one simple statement. I will not vote for the president of the united states in America until the "electoral college" is dismantled and we institute a truly democratic election process.

What happened with G.W is just a reassurance to me that I am right and the system is broken.