Nader On The Issues

There has been a lot of Nader bashing among Democrats especially. But almost all of it is based on the strategic implications of Nader and Kerry both running as left of center candidates against Bush. There has been little attempt by the Democratic Party leaders to say why Nader is wrong on the issues. Here is an examination of some of Nader’s positions on important issues (I got the quotations from Nader’s website in the “Funny” section of the links to the right):

Trade: “NAFTA and the WTO makes commercial trade supreme over environmental, labor, and consumer standards and need to be replaced with open agreements that pull-up rather than pull down these standards. These forms of secret autocratic governance and their detailed rules are corporate-managed trade that puts short-term corporate profits as the priority. While global trade is a fact of life, trade policies must be open, democratic and not strip-mine environmental, social and labor standards. These latter standards should have their own international pull up treaties.”

Nader argues that NAFTA and the WTO “pull down” labor, environmental and consumer protection standards. This is the usual “race to the bottom” argument against free trade agreements. However, there is NO EVIDENCE that free trade results in a race to the bottom. In fact the evidence from the European integration experience is strongly in the opposite direction. Furthermore, Mexican trade unions have grown since the passage of NAFTA. Since NAFTA, Mexico has had its first freely contested elections and the semi-dictatorial and massively corrupt Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) lost the election. It seems to me that the prospects for improved labor, environmental and consumer protection in Mexico are far better since NAFTA than they ever were before it. While I won't claim here that NAFTA caused these improved prospects (however I stand by my ealier posting arguing that economic diversity is a neccessary condition for democracy), I will say that this is evidence that NAFTA has not resulted in worsened conditions in Mexico.

Individual Status for Corporations: “A national debate is needed regarding the necessity to reverse the dicta in the 1886 Supreme Court Case of Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad that first awarded the corporation constitutional status as a person and in subsequent decision. Corporations are not human beings, they do not vote; they are artificial entities which should be subordinated to the rights of human beings There can be no equal justice under the law if General Motors or Exxon has all the rights of humans plus all the privileges and immunities to concentrate enormous power and escape responsibility in ways unavailable to the wealthiest of real people.”

Obviously, Nader is upset that corporations have disproportionate influence on American life. I must say I sympathize somewhat. However, what would his proposed solution do? Would removing the individual standing of corporations before courts help the situation or make it worse? Imagine a world in which Corporations have no standing as individuals in court. Would you be able to sue that corporation in court if it harmed you in any way? Or would you be required to prove that some individual within that corporation had harmed you? What implications would that have for the amount of damages victims of corporate negligence could get? Would Nader create a world with no more deep pockets? Also, what about the rights of corporations in a democratic society? If corporations have no individual standing in court, what protection would they have against the power of the state? Could a right wing government swoop in and harass Ben and Jerry’s because they are a progressive company? Could government authority ride roughshod over any corporation (or other collective organization) that engaged in unpopular of politically incorrect activities?

Summary: These are just two issues but they are important ones as they get to the core of Nader’s platform. I argue that there are serious, policy based reasons not to vote for Nader. He has demonstrably false assumptions about the relationship between trade and progressive politics. He has a poorly thought out view of civil liberties in the USA. We already have a President with a poor understanding of the world and a tendency to support statist solutions. Nader would be just like Bush but exchanging Post-modern leftist orthodoxy for Religious zealotry.