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| An Open Love Letter To Ralph Nader |
| by chris robison |
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| Ka-blam! |
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| A shotgun-like blast echoed through the office and startled me out of a catnap I was taking at my desk. Convinced that one of my fellow temps had cracked and gone on a shooting spree I immediately dove for safety under my desk. |
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| Ka-blam! Ka-blam! |
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| Two more shots rang out in quick succession, both much closer then the first had been. As I cowered under my desk I saw a pair of high heels walk toward my desk and then abruptly stop in front of it. I started making deals with God as well as an interesting stain on the floor. Several agonizing seconds passed and then... |
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| She sneezed. |
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| The sounds I had mistaken for shotgun blasts were in actuality sneezes from a very sick temp named Shelly. Once she walked past I scurried out from beneath my desk and watched in morbid fascination as she tried to make her way down the hall toward the restrooms. I write, �tried� because every few feet this diminutive five-foot tall and ninety-pound mother of two`s face exploded with such force that it sent her reeling helplessly from one side of the aisle to the next. I fully expected to see a fist full of teeth explode from her mouth and lodge themselves into a wall in front of her. |
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| It was while in the midst of a particularly long sneezing jag that Shelly accidentally reeled around and sneezed on the back of one unfortunate full-time employee`s head. It looked as if someone had washed her hair with lumpy oatmeal. |
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| �Damn temps!� the girl with snotty hair screamed. �Why the hell don`t you just go home instead of coming her and spreading your damn germs all over the place!?!� |
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| Several other full-time employees within earshot of the shouting started clapping in support of their snot covered co-worker. The tension between the full-time employees and the temps had been building for some time. During the past several months there was always at least one or two coughing, wheezing or otherwise flu-ridden temps staggering around the office and the full-timers were, no pun intended, getting sick of it. They started calling the sick temps �Germ-inators� and making grand displays of wiping off doorknobs and bathroom faucets with disinfectants. |
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| Shelly apologized as best anyone can apologize to someone they`ve just sneezed all over, but to no avail. The snot haired girl would not be denied and demanded that Shelly go home and not return until she was �disease free.� |
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| Shelly is a temp and thanks to the slave like wage structure that all temps operate under she only makes $8.50 an hour, performing a job that would pay $13.50 if she were to work for the company directly. Ever since the company discovered the cost-effectiveness of employing disposable workers Shelly`s position has been continuously occupied by temps for the last four years, despite endless promises by management to make her position permanent �soon.� As a temp Shelly doesn`t get sick pay or any paid time off whatsoever. If she doesn`t work, no matter the reason, she doesn`t get any money. That`s why she, like all the temps, work when they are sick. They have absolutely no health insurance, no job security, and make only enough to keep from starving to death and to pay a few bills. |
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| The full time girl made such a fuss over Shelly`s errant sneeze that the boss made her go home for the day. I walked over to her desk to say goodbye as she was grabbing her coat. She was on the verge of tears. |
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| �I feel like such an idiot,� she said. �I was really counting on making some overtime this week. Now I won`t even get a full check.� |
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| �Things will work out,� I said. �Hey! Just think how great things are gonna be once Ralph Nader wins in November. He won`t let Corporate America treat us like this anymore, right?� |
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| She didn`t say anything, merely smiled. It was an exhausted smiled, a defeated smile. She had heard my rant about Green Party presidential nominee Ralph Nader a hundred times. Like most Americans she doesn`t follow the presidential campaigns or the debates. Like most she`s heard it all before and knows that when it`s all said and done nothing will change. Like most of America she stopped believing in heroes long ago. |
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| It`s easy to believe that there are no more heroes, but let me tell you a little bit about a man named Ralph Nader. |
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| For the past 30 years Nader has been waging war with the powers that be to make our lives better and safer. His accomplishments have become part of the fabric of American public life. You know that clause on plane tickets that says that if you're bumped, the airline has to reimburse you and put you up for the night? Nader got bumped from an overbooked flight and got angry, and that's why you get treated fairly now. Remember the days before seat belts and air bags? Nader wrote an article for the Nation in 1959 titled "The Safe Car You Can't Buy" and ranted as early as 1975 to Congress that all auto manufacturers should have to install air bags in their cars. People said Nader was a nut. Now car companies advertise that their air bags are the best. |
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| Nader has arguably done more to improve our quality of life then any politician ever has. This is especially true when contrasted against Bush and Gore. They squabble over which campaign finance loopholes should be closed; he wants elections to be publicly financed. They bicker over Medicare reform and prescription drug benefits; he demands universal healthcare. They posture over which can better continue to "grow" the economy; he thinks we should immediately pull out of NAFTA and the WTO. |
| He's opposed to much of what they're both for: the death penalty; even limited nuclear weapons use; bolstering the military. (Contrasted with their chest thumping, his call for a �lean military� sounds likes heresy.) He opposes commercial logging on public lands, and doesn't like the current minimum wage; he prefers a "living" wage that grows along with the economy. He's unabashed and specific on his issues. |
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| He is truly a great American, single-handedly causing safety reform in the auto industry, helping blow the whistle on hundreds of cases of corporate and governmental corruption, and launching Public Citizen, 150,000-strong, the mother of all nonprofit watchdogs. Gore and Bush should fear having him in the debates: The comparison would be painful to both. |
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| As a temp and a member of the disposable wage slave work force my vote this November will be for Ralph Nader. His agenda of the nation, painstakingly detailed in his website www.votenader.org, is one that is strikingly different then the ones outlined by either of the major candidates. I may not agree with all his positions, but I agree with most of them. More importantly, I know I can trust him. Unlike ever other politician that`s bought and paid for in Washington, Nader has earned the respect of the workingmen and women of this country through 30 years of tireless service. He isn`t in this race for the power or the glory or the money. He`s doing it for the same reason he`s done everything else in his life: he wants to try and make things better. He knows the odds of winning are a million to one, but he`s used to having the odds stacked against him. Once he was asked why he kept going after big companies when he knew that he could never defeat their army of lawyers. |
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| �The only real failure,� he replied, �is the cowardice of never having tried.� |
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| That is what I tell people when I hear that a vote for Nader is a waste because it`s so unlikely that a third party candidate could ever hope to prevail against Gore or Bush. If the outcome of every battle were assured, where then would valor lie? |
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| I urge everyone, college students especially, to visit his website and learn about his stance on the issues. You have an unprecedented opportunity to help create the world you will be graduating into. Either a world where corporations continue to flee across the border under NAFTA and temp agencies remain the largest employers in the country, or a world of real opportunities, real possibilities and a real future. |
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