Swingers I was going to work the phones in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Minnesota, and Iowa, but I didn’t have the time or the long distance plan. And with the recorded voice of Ed Koch assaulting me several days ago in the privacy of my own home, it will be a long time before I even go near a phone. Forget the door-to-door. With the assault weapons ban lifted, that’s a great way to get shot. My solution at the eleventh hour in ’04 is to go after just one swing voter—Ralph Nader. You certainly don’t look it, Ralph, but you are the ultimate swinger. What you hold in your hands is perhaps enough independent, relatively clear thinking individuals to neutralize every semi-literate armchair war enthusiast, mall-crazed security mom, trigger-happy alcoholic absentee dad, delusional chickenhawk neocon, anorexic Ann Coulter groupie, and hypocritical homophobic bloodthirsty Jesus freak in the country. You, my friend, have the ability to put your initials on a political atom bomb and drop it on the battleground states. No need to fall on your sword—just throw in the towel. That towel will begin to mop up the mess George W. Bush has made of our economy, military, and global reputation. Just do it. Get on C-SPAN right now in a crumpled suit and say you screwed up. That simple act will garner a bounty of respect in an era where an admission of error is harder to get than a flu vaccine. Yes, I know it’s not as easy as that. Some of Nader’s Raiders are masturbators. Some will pull the Nader lever no matter what you say this Election Day morning. Others will stay home and hug a tree. But if even half cast a practical vote against a bleak future of sacrificing small town and inner city youth on the altar of energy dependence and obscene corporate profits for the politically connected, you and your swingers should be more than enough to make the CEO of Diebold soil himself. And please, don’t even think of telling me your moribund candidacy pulled equally from Republicans and Democrats. The number of voters you release who will run back to Bush is like the number of Nazi prisoners who ran back to Stalin. Perhaps after those civic-minded Republicans got you on the ballot in a dozen states, you don’t want to bite the hand that feeds you. Don’t worry, Ralph—it’s okay to turn against your pimp. But if you insist on playing 12-year-old Jodie Foster, I might be forced to play Robert De Niro and take out Harvey Keitel. What you have is a jar of change with the biggest rainy day in American memory now upon us. Cash out. Don’t get me wrong, Ralph—I like you. And I like your voters. I used to be one of your voters. Too bad the Ralph Nader candidacy didn’t come with a money back guarantee. Sure, I console myself now and again by recalling that I don’t live in a state where your votes would have made a difference last time around, the same way the guys in the Utah executioners squad don’t all fire real bullets. But technicalities aside, I pulled the trigger. Yet just like George W. Bush, I’ve matured and mellowed since my wild and reckless mid-to-late-thirties. And now, I’d like to stop feeling personally responsible every time a pound of mercury gets dumped into a public waterway. I’d like to stop feeling culpable every time a roadside bomb goes off in Tikrit. I’d like to take this year’s half-trillion dollar federal debt and cut it up like a credit card. I’d like to stop feeling like some sort of middleman for Dick Cheney and Haliburton. Only you can free me, Mr. Nader. And so, to quote the greatest seeker of freedom in human history, let my people go! Click here to rant back. |