August 4, 2000. Copyright 2000. Graphic News. All rights reserved.

RALPH NADER PROFILE

LONDON, August 4, Graphic News: CONSUMER advocate Ralph Nader is the presidential candidate of the American Green Party. He was nominated on June 25 on a platform of protecting the environment and giving more power to working people.
While given no realistic chance of making it to the White House, he is seen as potentially luring Democrats away from Vice President Al GoreÕs bid for the presidency and throwing the election to Republican George W. Bush.
Nader -- who cut his teeth fighting the automobile industry for improved safety -- suggested Green Party values might play well across the political spectrum.
He railed against big banks, the weapons industry, timber companies, the coal industry and corporations that are turning children into television Ògazers and spectators.Ó
ÒLet us not in this campaign prejudge any voters, for Green values are majoritarian values,Ó he said.
Nader argued his campaign offers much to conservatives.
ÒThey get upset about corruption and waste. They certainly donÕt like loss of sovereignty with WTO (World Trade Organisation), for example, and NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement),Ó he said.
As president, he would ensure that trade pacts such as NAFTA would be renegotiated so that environmental, labour or consumer issues were under separate treaties, he said.
Nader said illegal drug use should be viewed in terms of health, noting that calls for decriminalizing drugs come from the left and the right.
In national polls he is running at 6 percent, but his support is at or near 10 percent in Connecticut, New York and California and 8 percent in Pennsylvania. Nader fares less well in Florida and Texas, where he predicted he would give the Democratic Party Òa jolt.Ó
The 66-year-old bachelor has a war chest of $900,000, expects another $300,000 and has a target of $5 million.
/ENDS
Source: Reuters