A couple dozen protesters, wielding signs, stand outside the building. The only sign that made an impression upon my memory said “Ralph Nader… George Bush’s ONLY Chance”. Some of the Nader-detractors had on their pins “John Kerry 2004”. They were mixing it up with some Nader supporters waiting to come into the building, heated arguments about the nature of the two-party system and the Tweedle Dees and the Tweedle Dums.

Looking inside the windows, I saw the set-up: on the edges, the political activists were sitting down, waiting for signatures to gather to them. Evidentally, the head-counters were in full force as well, waiting for a thousand people — a thousand person gathering being one of the measures that could get Nader on the ballot.

Never happened. 700 people came.

To wit, Nader left undaunted. “The ball game, it had to be the ball game.” — referring to the NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship Game.

Remarks that would show the same disconnect from reality that the idea that he might attract a huge Republican vote does…

If true. According to someone posting at the local Anarchist/Left internet hangout, it was a joke.

… Though I’m getting contradictory information here. …

“Our support is heavily working class,” Nader’s Oregon chairman, Greg Kafoury, told the AP, “and for those people this is the biggest night of the year.”

Whichever… I’m left pondering the fate of a man who easily filled up buildings at the drop of a hat in this fare city as short as a year ago… if not here, where? If not then, when?

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