It's just amazing to hear and read people who call themselves liberals scream bloody murder when an actual liberal runs for the presidency. You'd think the fact that Ralph Nader has done more for American workers and consumers than anyone alive would give him a certain credibility among, well, everyone, but definitely among liberals, but apparently not. He's made our lives far safer than they were before he came on the scene, but when he asks us for something as humble as our votes, liberals go berserk. It's disgraceful.

Here's the deal: As we all know, politics has been steadily moving to the right for many years. The Democratic Party has moved right along with it. The Democratic Party today bears scant resemblance to the Democratic Party of FDR and LBJ. You know, the one that brought us Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare, Civil Rights, progressive taxation and support for unions. And that's no surprise, is it? Every election year liberals let everyone within shouting distance know that they're voting for the Democratic candidate irrespective of his/her actual politics. "Take us for granted," liberals cry. "Run anyone you want regardless of how conservative, regardless of how at odds his/her record is with my values. I'll vote for him/her anyway." All that does is send a loud clear message to Democratic candidates that they can move as far to the right as they want and liberals will come with them. Play the game of politics that way my friends and you lose every time and frankly deserve to.

And by the way, the evangelical right wing, on which you are so fond of looking down, is far smarter than you are. They know that if they withhold their votes, money and activism from candidates who don't toe the line, they'll get more power next time. And they do. Liberals would love to have the stroke with Dems that the religious right has with Reps, but we don't because we flunked Politics 101. Use your power or lose it.

Ralph Nader gives liberals the opportunity to show Democrats that you need to honor our values, promote our issues and conform to our principles or you don't get our votes. Yes, if we spurn Democrats this year it'll result in McCain being president, but we need a longer vision than the next four years. Until we become willing to accept the consequences of voting our princples, we can't be surprised or angry when those principles vanish from the public debate as they have.

In two sentences you (a) compare Ralph Nader to Hitler and (b) state that he has not made a significant difference in American life. Do you know anything?

To put it mildly, Ralph Nader has done more for average Americans than the four candidates for president combined. A lot more. That may not make you want to vote for him, but please think, just a little bit.

I don't know if you read my earlier post, but here's the salient point again.

I'm a liberal. For the first 25 years of my voting life I voted Democrat. But I'm a liberal first and, with the ascension of the DLC, I had to break ranks with the Democratic party.

As I said in my previous post, politics in this country have been moving to the right for a long time now. One of the main reasons for that movement is that liberals make no demands on Democratic candidates. The Democratic Party knows this. It's precisely what allowed Clinton to run as a triangulator. He knew he could take liberal votes for granted, so he ran a tough on crime, tough on national security campaign. (And by the way, that strategy has always failed. Clinton never got a majority of votes and during his tenure in office, Dems lost their majorities in the House, Senate and of governorships.) As long as liberals offer Democrats their votes, money and activism and demand nothing in return, we give them no possible reason to do anything for us. Why would they? So politics moves ever rightward and Democrats somehow conclude that Ralph Nader is at fault. He's not; people who claim to be liberals but who vote for any and every Democrat on the ticket regardless of their politics are.

My position is pragmatic. Liberals need to force Democrats to govern in a more liberal way. If we don't, who will?

Again, the Christian Right is far smarter than liberals. They know that, by withholding their votes, money and activism, the Republican candidate may lose this time, but next time they'll get their issues paid attention to. That's why they have more stroke with the Reps than liberals do with the Dems.

Maybe that's the way you like it, but count me out. Any time the Dems start paying attention to liberal issues, they can have me back, but not until then.