Reflections on the 2000 election.
Nov. 9, 2000by Ralph Maughan
Is it Bush or Gore? We don't know yet. The U.S. Senate appears to remain in GOP hands narrowly. The GOP retains control of the House of Representatives. Democrats lost close races in Montana. Had the Democrats won in Montana, wolves in the Northern Rockies would suddenly have had political support and the bison slaughter would be ended. Browns carried Idaho and Wyoming overwhelmingly. Story on the Idaho elections.
What does it mean? No one can say for certain, but if Bush wins, Republicans will control Congress and the White House for the first time in 45 years. Control of Congress matters even if it is as close as 49-50 in the U.S. Senate, because the majority party gets to chair every single standing committee in Congress.
1. The bison slaughter will now continue because Judy Martz won the governor's race in Montana. Her opponent said he would immediately end it, and this time the slaughter may have federal backing from a Bush Secretary of Interior. That may well be retiring Montana governor Marc Racicot, who almost single-handedly has kept the controversy going.
2. There may be no federal political support for expanding the wolf restoration, and a continuation of no state support in Idaho, Montana, or Wyoming. Let's hope the wolves will survive for the next four years. After a few more months, this wolf report may have to stop reporting any positions of wolves, lest they be gunned down by the government or locals who know they will not be prosecuted.
3. Snowmobiles will probably continue in the national parks.
4. Under Bush, oilman Dick Cheney knows where the oil and gas in the Rocky Mountains is likely to occur. We can expect the Dept. of Interior to assault the wildlands along the Idaho/Wyoming border and the Rocky Mountain Front in Montana, devastating the wilderness and grizzly bear populations. He was for oil first when he the lone Wyoming U.S. Representative.
5. There may be a subtle effort to privatize the public lands. This happened in the last Bush Administration with attempts to grant ranchers various "rights" where in the past they had been privileges. An open and overt effort to privatize would be rejected in Congress.
6. It is clear that Nader voters made the difference in the president's race. Without Nader, Gore would have won by 1 or 2 per cent. Gore would have easily won Florida were Nader's name not on the ballot. Bill Clinton is facing many GOP anti-environmental riders in the Lame Duck session of Congress. Will he fight them when Nader voters cost the election? Let's hope he understands that most environmentalists gave Al Gore strong support.
7. Ralph Nader did not get 5% of the vote nationwide, and will not qualify for federal funding in 2004. May he now retire and we will hear no more of his views. By saying there was no difference between Bush and Gore he was just as dishonest as anything Bush or Gore said.
For history buffs, Nader is like the "Dump the Hump" anti-war voters in 1968 who gave us Richard Nixon and six more years of war by refusing to back Democrat Hubert Humphrey. Humphrey lost to Nixon by 1% of the popular vote.
There is no room for a Green Party in the United States due to an electoral system where third parties only hurt and never help. If a third party is to have a beneficial effect, the United States needs constitutional amendments providing for proportional representation and the election of the President by a Congress chosen by proportion of the vote. It is not the views of the Greens that are necessarily wrong, it is their tactics. The Nader-style campaign is built for a country like Italy or Germany, not a country with a plurality or majority-winner-takes all system of voting.