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Conspiracy Nation -- Vol. 7 Num. 53

("Quid coniuratio est?")


RALPH NADER -- 03/24/96


Ralph Nader appeared on Meet The Press (a.k.a. "Meet The Depressed") on March 24, 1996, and was interviewed by Tim Russert.

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TIM RUSSERT:
One of the things I've read that you are most concerned and upset, about President Clinton, is that he signed a bill to raise the speed limit from 55 mph. Why?

RALPH NADER:
Because his own Department of Transportation told him, months earlier, that that would kill 6500 Americans, seriously injure 20,000 more Americans, every year, $20 billion of health care costs, all kinds of wage loss, and higher auto insurance rates. And yet, Secretary Pena and Dr. Martinez of the Auto Safety Agency did not stand up. They actually supported their own demolition of the most successful trauma prevention program in American history, on the highways. (And I'm sorry that your former employer, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, who was very strong on auto safety, didn't take a strong stand against that presidential deal in the U.S. Senate.)

TIM RUSSERT:
Why do you think President Clinton signed that bill?

RALPH NADER:
I think first of all he wanted the highway construction part of it. But that would've bounced right back to him from the Congress, had he vetoed the bill. And I think second, he just is indifferent to the consequences! But what happens when speeds go up to 65 (and in reality, 75 miles per hour), with the Mexican trucks coming in? With our big trucks not having adequate brakes? He just was indifferent to it! I couldn't even get 5 minutes to convey this to him! (And I don't usually ask to see him or meet him!) But this was a real case of life and death in America. And to actually dismantle a program that's been effective for 20 years, was a calamity.

TIM RUSSERT:
I was reading the platform of the Green Party. And it is very liberal, I would say. (Or "progressive" -- whatever term you want to use.) Will you support, and run on, that platform?

RALPH NADER:
I'm not running on that platform. And they know it. I'm running on my platform, of building democracy. And some of my platform and theirs overlaps: sustainable economic growth; labor rights; consumer protection; civil rights; civil liberties. But I'm not a Green Party member! But I think the Green Party has the greatest opportunity, whether in Maine, Colorado, New Mexico, New York, Pennsylvania, California, Alaska -- all over -- to be the emerging "progressive" alternative; to push the other parties into recognizing that the function (as Thomas Jefferson once put it) of representative government is to "counteract the excesses of the monied interests." And you know, when the wealth of 1 percent of the American people -- the top 1 percent -- is equal to the 90 percent at the bottom; when there's so much wealth and power in so few hands; the country gets in trouble! The country gets in serious trouble, historically. We need a correction movement here.

We have, you know, all these Cable TV channels. Why isn't there one for Labor? Why isn't there one for citizen activity, so we can learn from one another? Instead of this morbid plastering of depravity and sickness and violations and criminal behavior that you see only on TV?

TIM RUSSERT:
So when the Green Party says they would not allow animals to be used at racetracks or rodeos or circuses, that's not the kind of issue you're gonna get involved with.

RALPH NADER:
Precisely. I think politicians are expected to take a position on everything under the sun, whether they know anything about it or not. I'm taking two positions: on the areas of consumer, auto safety, environment, that I've worked on and know something about; and on building democracy -- that's gonna be made extremely concrete, in terms of the facilities that make it easy for people to band together, whether as consumers, workers, tax- payers, shareholders, or voter-citizens.

TIM RUSSERT:
When Green Party pushes the issue of same sex marriages, is that an issue you're gonna care about?

RALPH NADER:
That's not an issue I'm gonna speak about. That's... If that's their issue, they're free to advocate it.

The key thing is, we're rising to a more Constitutional level of re-building our democracy.

TIM RUSSERT:
How about a balanced budget? Is Ralph Nader in favor of a balanced budget?

RALPH NADER:
I'm very frugal. But I wouldn't balance it the way John Kasich did. You notice he "wants to cut corporate welfare" -- but he kept quiet about it earlier in the program! [laughs]

TIM RUSSERT:
How would Ralph Nader balance the budget?

RALPH NADER:
I would, first of all, bring the boys back from Europe and East Asia and let these countries (in alliance, perhaps, with the United States) defend themselves. That's a hundred billion dollars right there, in direct and indirect backup expenses. I'd eliminate over $150 billion of corporate welfare. I'd make the government more assiduous in collecting its debts and its royalties from free research and development in the drug area, that they give away to the drug companies, (that the tax-payers pay for), and the resources out of federal lands. And we'd have a surplus! A surplus. That's just for beginners.

Trouble is that "cutting the budget" is aimed at poor people! It's aimed at defenseless people! It's aimed at people who can't fight back. It's not aimed at the fat cat corporate welfare -- "Aid to Dependent Corporations", so to speak -- who are raking off the middle class tax dollars here in Washington in the tens of billions of dollars! Subsidies, bail-outs, give-aways. The S&L bailout was $500 billion dollars, in interest and principal, over the next 20 years! Can you imagine what that would buy, in terms of public works and job creation!?

TIM RUSSERT:
Does Ralph Nader sound like Pat Buchanan on some issues?

RALPH NADER:
Well on some issues, like NAFTA and GATT, Pat Buchanan sounds like a global trade coalition of unions, elderly, church groups, consumer groups, who thought that NAFTA and GATT were mainly about governance -- not so much free trade. (There's a lot of monopolization of the intellectual property in NAFTA and GATT.) They're about the supremacy of trade over the health and safety standards of our country, and giving our country only one vote (along with Saint Kitts) in the World Trade Organization -- with no veto -- and having secret tribunals and "harmonization mandates" that will prevent us from being first, as we were with air bags and other health and safety features. Very, very autocratic systems of government in NAFTA and GATT. Particularly GATT.

TIM RUSSERT:
Final question, Mr. Nader: So when it comes to consumers, you don't see any difference between Bill Clinton and Bob Dole.

RALPH NADER:
There is a difference, but it's not sufficient for a two-party duopoly to offer America. The choices are far too narrow, and they're moving into the laps of the major corporations more and more. We've gotta have more competition and a broader democracy agenda that enlists the energies of the American people -- not just as bystanders, trotting themselves out to the election, but as deeply involved, committed people, from the grass roots up to Washington.


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