Friday, Aug. 25, 6:30 pm It's well past rush
hour, but the No. 1 Greeley bus is bogged down in traffic
creeping into the transit center near the Rose Quarter, inching
forward as boisterous pedestrians block the way.
"Is it a rock concert?" one rider asks.No, replies another,
this is for Ralph Nader.
A few blocks over, along Northeast Broadway, a man wearing
a Siamese-twin puppet with the heads of Al Gore and George
W. Bush saunters toward the Memorial Coliseum, where the
Green Party presidential candidate is due to speak. A companion
holds a sign that says, "The corporations have their presidential
candidates. Do you?"
The rally is an audacious move. To make the rent and avoid
public humiliation, organizers need 5,000 people. Instead
of lining up big-name musical acts to lure a crowd, they're
counting on Nader to be the big draw.
And draw he does. The lines of people ready to pay $7 to
see Nader stream through the Rose Quarter. The tie-dyed
crowd is out in force, but there are also young hipsters
in their Buddy Holly specs, graying retirees in polyester
and families decked out in Land's End and Baby Gap.
"Do you know any other politician who can do this?" asks
organizer Greg Kafoury. "Charge admission and fill the house?
We invite Bush and Gore to try."
If Al Gore isn't worried, he ought to be.
Even if Ralph Nader proves to be nothing more than an interesting
diversion in the presidential sweepstakes, Friday night's
third-party party showed that his candidacy has taken on
a heightened importance. In his first post-WTO election,
his bid for the White House is giving progressives an opportunity
to channel the activism seen in Seattle into the mainstream
political debate. Until now, the Green Party has mostly
been seen as court jester. In Oregon, at least, that's changing.
7:15 pm
People continue to stream into the Coliseum as the speechifying
starts.
Ivan Maluski of Cascadia Forest Alliance is more accustomed
to speaking to groups of sympathetic activists at a timber
protest training camp in the woods than to thousands of
strangers inside a sports arena. Yet his voice roars through
the Coliseum, challenging Al Gore to show his environmental
credentials and do what Ralph Nader has done--demand an
end to commercial logging on federal lands.
"It is time to put the earth first and profits last," Maluski
says, getting the first standing ovation of the night.
Maluski is followed by his comrade Donald Fontenot, who
also brings cheers when he promises that young activists
who have taken to the trees on Mount Hood will not come
down until every ancient tree is saved.
7:30 pm
Kafoury, who is acting as MC for the evening, is ecstatic.
"Tonight," he says, "we have chosen our own fate."
In the past 30 years, Kafoury has seen his share of dramatic
moments, and he was in his element with his name in lights
on the electronic scoreboard that hung above the capacity
crowd.
A trial lawyer who delights in taking on big business,
Kafoury spent much of the '90s working to shut down Trojan
Nuclear Power Plant and won a $2 million lawsuit against
Fred Meyer to give petitioners the right to circulate ballot
measures on its property. He's an outspoken opponent of
the state lottery, and most recently, as ledge-sitter Tre
Arrow's attorney, he used a trespassing case to challenge
federal timber policy.
Along the way, Kafoury has become a sometimes loved, sometimes
reviled Portland character--a wild-haired, hard-partying,
self-righteous liberal with an unlimited supply of million-dollar
quips.
Friday night belonged to Kafoury and his law partner, Mark
McDougal, as much as it did to Nader. After all, they provided
the cojones to pull it off.
Earlier this summer, at a barbecue with Nader supporters
where Green Party member Laird Hastay threw out the idea
of renting the Coliseum for Nader's next appearance, the
two lawyers essentially shut down their practices to pull
off the biggest stunt in Pacific Green Party history. They
moved so quickly that McDougal's wife and parents had to
write the checks for the newspaper ads because there wasn't
time to get money from the national campaign.
McDougal, 36, says he had no choice. He fears the growing
influence that corporations have in politics and sees the
Nader campaign as a way to educate and motivate people.
But to do so, he says, they had to use Nader's Portland
visit to make a dramatic statement.
"We had to step up and do something," he says. "Option
B was to not pay enough attention and regret it. I wasn't
willing to wake up the morning after the event and say I
wish we had done more."
7:40 pm
Kafoury is relishing his role as ringmaster.
Nader has lots of friends in Portland, including former
state Rep. Tom Novick, who met Nader during his days with
Nader's Public Interest Research Group, and businessman
Ken Lewis.
But Kafoury is the ultimate Nader groupie. His respect
for Nader is too large to be contained in pronouns. He calls
him the "great man" and in the past few weeks has often
repeated for the media the story of the first time he met
Nader in 1973 in San Francisco, where the young Kafoury
was going to law school
at Hastings.
By then, Nader's 1965 exposé on General Motors was
ingrained in popular culture, and the crusading consumer
activist had become a hero of the kind that is difficult
to imagine in these cynical times. Nader's message appealed
to the young Kafoury, and after the speech he approached
the "great man" and asked him for a job.
"I asked him if he had room in his operation for a nice
Lebanese boy," says Kafoury.
Kafoury ended up on a different career track, but over
the next 27 years their paths crossed frequently as both
men pursued lives of public activism.
Nader came to Oregon to stump for the campaign to close
Trojan Nuclear Power plant several times. In 1992, Kafoury
went to New Hampshire to work on Nader's first write-in
campaign during the primary. In 1996, when Nader last ran
for president, Kafoury and McDougal organized a Benson High
School rally, which was so crowded they had to turn people
away at the door.
"We're in an age when the children have no heroes," Kafoury
asserts. "Nader is the true American hero, and he has been
for decades."
7:45 pm
The Pacific Green Party's candidates begin to speak. First
is Whitney Smith, running for the state senate in North
Portland against former state Rep. Margaret Carter. Smith
is followed by timber protester Tre Arrow, who is running
against incumbent Democratic Rep. Earl Blumenauer in the
3rd Congressional District. Arrow is a bopping Tigger on
the stage as the crowd cheers approval for his act of rebellion
against the Forest Service.
He also calls for the end of public logging and blows kisses
at the audience. The Democratic National Convention this
ain't.
Since the Pacific Green Party formed in Oregon nine years
ago, it has had little impact on Oregon politics. Part of
it is the Greens' own fault. They have made themselves easy
to dismiss as single-issue fanatics.
The Greens have repeatedly put up candidates like Arrow--politically
naive environmental activists who run hopeless campaigns
against candidates who agree with them on 95 percent of
the issues.
Nader's tepid bid for president in 1996 didn't spur any
change in that blueprint for failure. The state party fielded
five federal and state candidates, all of whom were ignored
by the media and shunned by voters.
But in 2000, thanks to Nader and some residual energy from
the Battle in Seattle, the Greens are getting a second look.
In some ways Kafoury and McDougal had to drag the party
along with them. Nader's national strategists were leery
of the rally plans, but finally agreed.
Kafoury says Nader's advisers feared possible humiliation
should he fail to get a good showing.
Some local Greens were even more skittish.
The Coliseum plan scared the hemp pants off of some of
the party members, according to Deborah Howes, one of Oregon's
two delegates to the national Green Party and co-chair of
the state's Nader for President steering committee.
Renting the Memorial Coliseum on a faint hope that they
could recoup the money was a huge risk for people who live
simply so that others may simply live. The nearly $30,000
rental price for the Coliseum, plus additional advertising
costs, is more than most party members make in a year.
In addition, Greens do everything by consensus. That's
very validating, but can also be infuriating in the rapid
pace of a presidential campaign.
"The Greens are having to grow up in a hurry," Kafoury
says. "All of a sudden they're in the big leagues. They
are used to dealing with things with a much more relaxed
pace with much more of a long-term vision, rather than a
90-day campaign."
At a training meeting the week before the rally, the merging
of the conflicting styles was evident. The meeting opened
with a performance by a folk singer, which Kafoury and McDougal
listened to with apparent interest. But when Steve Amy,
a long-time Pacific Green Party member and volunteer coordinator
for the campaign, started asking people to work the rally,
McDougal abruptly interrupted him, clearly impatient.
"We need 12 people to step up right now and sacrifice themselves
for Ralph," he said, his voice rising in passion. He pressed
the crowd until he had his disciples.
McDougal and Kafoury's style hasn't always gone over well
with the Greens.
"When they get upset," says Howes, "they yell. I've had
to let them know that is not acceptable. They've learned
how to at least temper that a little bit, and we have learned
that we have to get to things quicker."
7:55 pm
A gnomish man rises to a standing ovation. He is the Pacific
Green Party candidate for secretary of state. It is impossible
to imagine his opponents, Bill Bradbury and Lynn Snodgrass,
getting the same response from more than 10,500 fans. He
emphasizes what he would do as the auditor and steward of
state lands and vows to fight for campaign-finance reform.
Lloyd Marbet is Oregon's version of Ralph Nader. He has
spent his lifetime as an anti-nuclear activist, environmentalist
and rabid advocate for the state ballot initiative process.
He lives in a trailer in Boring with outdoor plumbing. Even
his critics admire his integrity, dedication and tenacity.
Given his knowledge of the elections process and the state's
natural resources, Marbet gives Greens something they've
never had before: a high-profile candidate who is qualified
for the job he's seeking.
Like Nader, he's got enough potential appeal that some
see him as a spoiler in the race between Bradbury and his
Republican challenger. With polls showing the race close,
Bradbury has indicated he's concerned that Marbet will pull
votes away from him.
8:45 pm
Nader finally enters, spindly arms raised wide as the crowd
roars to its feet. You can feel the love. Gore's strategists
must be going crazy trying to figure out why a nerdy, gray-suit-wearing
hyper-brained intellectual gets a rock-star welcome from
grandmothers and college activists alike, while their candidate
has to convince voters he's human.
To anyone watching the crowd Friday night, the difference
is obvious. These people trust the man at the podium.
Judy Embler, a 58-year-old financial analyst, is an active
longtime Democrat. She heard Nader speak in May at the Unitarian
Church, and it changed her political life. She went Green
because of what she calls Nader's honor
and integrity.
"He believes what he says, and it's not rhetoric," Embler
says. "Al Gore and George Bush are both market-strategy
driven, where they are told to wear this colored shirt and
wave in that fashion. It's all just psychological strategizing."
Although it was full of biting humor, Nader's 12-point
speech went on slightly too long. People started sneaking
out after about an hour--but not many. Still, they cheered
his plans on campaign-finance reform, ending poverty, taxing
polluters and changing the educational system so that children
are taught to be citizens rather than consumers.
It's basically the same message he delivered four years
ago, but in 1996, Nader's candidacy was an interesting diversion
to a campaign story whose ending was known long before the
polls closed. Democrats wanting to send a message to their
party--particularly West Coast voters--could safely vote
for Nader without worrying about putting Bob Dole in the
White House.
U.S. Rep. Peter DeFazio knows the stakes have changed.
Four years ago, the Springfield Democrat gave his tacit
support to Nader's campaign by saying he would never dissuade
anyone from voting their heart.
DeFazio says he still believes that, but he makes it clear
that in 2000, things are different. He does not want Nader's
campaign to cost Gore Oregon's seven electoral votes.
"Last time, voting for Ralph could be a statement of objecting,"
DeFazio says. "This time I expect a very close race between
Gore and Bush, and I think people should weigh that very
carefully before they cast a vote for Ralph Nader."
Portland pollster Tim Hibbitts says a vote for Nader isn't
necessarily a vote for Bush. Although Nader polled 7 percent
of the Oregon vote in April, Hibbitts says half of his supporters
said they wouldn't vote for Bush or Gore even if Nader weren't
a choice. "Those are the same people who filled Memorial
Coliseum," he says. "They're disgusted with both candidates."
Addressing the crowd Friday night, Nader made it clear
that he wants those disenchanted voters. "I have done the
math," he said. "If each of you recruits 40 people, we can
win in Oregon."
While the official Gore strategy seems to be to ignore
Nader, the vice president last week was dusting off his
populist rhetoric, talking about how he will work for the
people, not the powerful--a clear appeal to the anti-corporate
crowd of the sort at the Nader rally.
Locally, Democrats aren't panicked, but they are irritated
enough that they are willing to discredit Nader. Last week,
three prominent Democrats, including Neel Pender, chair
of the state committee, reminded WW that Nader cut
a radio commercial against last May's Measure 79, which
would have made it more difficult to change the Oregon Constitution
with ballot measures. All three said the spot was paid for
by Bill Sizemore--though neither they nor Sizemore could
provide any records to support or dispute the contention.
10 pm
Marcella Robin leaves Memorial Coliseum, jazzed by what
she saw there. She is Pender's worst nightmare: a registered
Democrat who plans to change her party affiliation to Green
and is even thinking about working for the Nader campaign.
Like most people coming out of the rally, she says she is
weary of corporate control over the major parties.
Still, it was not an easy choice for the 37-year-old nanny.
She says she has little patience for hippies and woo-woo
talk about spirituality. She was particularly discomfited
by vice presidential candidate Winona LaDuke's speech. "When
she's talking about Mother Earth, I'm thinking, 'Please
don't.' This kind of stuff isn't translating for me yet,"
she says. "The cringe factor is pretty high for me."
But, she says, she's willing to ignore some of the trappings
of the Green Party and embrace its substance. If it takes
putting George W. in the White House to push Democrats to
the left, so be it.
That's what McDougal wants to hear. In a way, Nader's backers
are using this battle to plan for the next one. In 2004,
McDougal says, there will be no Green Party. The unions
will finally turn away from the Democrats to create the
oft-spoken-of Blue-Green Party.
"The question is," he says, "How do you fight the corporations
effectively? This is one way."
We'll see. Even in a state where 20 percent of the voters
are registered independent, the two major parties have such
a practical and psychological headlock on the electorate
that progressives feel trapped into voting with the Democrats.
Robin, for one, thinks there is hope for the Green Party.
"My feeling about the whole Green Party and this official
run of Nader's is that the Green Party is like a child and
needs to be raised up and nurtured so that people think
of it as a real alternative and not just some tree-hugging,
glycerin-soap-using group. It's not there yet, and it won't
be Nader, but it could happen someday."
Political pundit Bill Lunch says people like Robin will
settle down come October. He says since the 1930s, far-left
candidates like Nader--who's polling between 3 percent and
5 percent nationally--receive initial rushes of support,
then drop back down to 1 percent, which is about the level
of their hard-core believers.
"Ralph Nader is an interesting diversion," he says, " and
nothing more."
Maybe. Even probably. But, coming out of the Coliseum Friday
night, as people climbed back into their charted buses from
Corvallis and pointed their caravans back to Spokane, it
was hard to believe that something hadn't changed.
Howes says that since the rally, the phones in the Pacific
Green Party office have not stopped ringing. "Everyone I've
talked to, whether they came for the first time on Friday,
or whether they've been involved for a while, is working
on getting their 40 people. We all feel we can do it."
Kafoury puts it even more strongly. "I think they lost
their inferiority complex. These are people who have spent
their lives in tiny backwater politics where getting a trivial
percentage of the vote was to many of them a measure of
their virtue," he says. "What Nader has shown is that you
can have all the integrity in the world and be triumphant.
That's a message they didn't know. Now they do."
Marbet says the excitement from last weekend's Nader rally
has spilled over to his secretary of state campaign. Since
Friday, he says, he has received dozens of calls and emails
from people who tell him they want to support his campaign.
"I think this is going to become something greater than
any of us thought it would be," he says. "This has changed
people who had never paid attention to the Greens before."
People like Judy Embler.
"I'd thought the Green Party was a bunch of Earth Firsters!
I was very surprised to learn that they were more mainstream
than I thought," Embler says. "I really thought they focused
only on environmental issues and were very focused on that
work. I heard a very strong articulation that all of the
issues are intertwined and that Nader understands that."
It's a message that others may soon hear.
The day after the rally, Nader hired Kafoury and McDougal
to set up similar rallies in a dozen cities around the country.
Next stop, says Kafoury: Madison Square Garden, Sept. 22.
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