In the Public Interest

By Ralph Nader Dr. Barry Commoner, equipped with a Harvard PhD in cellular biology, used his knowledge of biology, ecosystems, nuclear radiation, public communication, networking scientists, political campaigning, and community organizing to become the greatest environmentalist in the 20th century. He died on September 30 at the age of 95, deeply involved in challenging conventional…

The three upcoming so-called presidential debates (actually parallel interviews) between Obama and Romney show the pathetic mainstream campaign press for what it is – a mass of dittoheads desperately awaiting gaffes or some visual irregularity by any of the candidates. The press certainly does not demand elementary material from the candidates such as the secret…

By Ralph Nader Here is an open letter that Barack Obama should write to Mitt Romney – pronto! Dear Mr. Romney: Not a day goes by without you blaming me for every slumping or stagnant economic indicator. Unemployment, increases in the number of food stamp recipients, government borrowing, and spending, home foreclosures, economic uncertainty for…

By Ralph Nader There was something missing from the release of a tape showing Mitt Romney pandering to fat cats in Boca Raton, Florida with these very inflammatory words: “There are 47 percent who are with him, (Obama) who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a…

By Ralph Nader The Republican and Democratic Conventions are mercifully over but their corrosive impacts on our democracy persist. First, did you know that taxpayers helped fund these conventions at a level of $100 million for logistics and police sequestrations of demonstrators in Tampa and Charlotte and an additional $18.2 million each for general convention…

By Ralph Nader What if two thousand U.S. soldiers were losing their lives every week in Afghanistan? Would the peddlers of the electoral politics of trivia, distraction and avoidance take notice? Of course. Every week, two thousand Americans, or about 100,000 men, women and children a year, die from mostly preventable hospital-borne infections in the…

“Why should I listen to anything Harry Kelber says?” exclaimed a visibly indignant Richard Trumka, president of the AFL-CIO. Maybe because Kelber, 98 years young, has been honestly fighting for labor rights as a worker, union organizer, pamphleteer, author, professor and overall hairshirt of the moribund organized labor movement for 78 years–or 15 years before…

By Ralph Nader The media coverage of the Presidential campaigns is a dreary repetition of past coverage. Stuck in a rut and garnished by press cynicism and boredom, media groupthink becomes more ossified every four years. This massive mental motion-sickness confines reporters, editors and producers to the following all too predictable patterns: 1. They follow…

By Ralph Nader The cruel impoverishment of the debate among the presidential and congressional candidates took a gigantic leap into the pits with Mitt Romney’s selection of 42-year-old Rep. Paul Ryan from the deindustrialized town of Janesville, Wisconsin. Ryan is invariably described by reporters as “an intellectual leader of the conservative movement” and by fellow…

By Ralph Nader Calling Obama, Pelosi, Reid and the rest of the Democratic Party, elected officials, political operatives and labor’s leader Richard Trumka. Thirty million American workers want and need a federal minimum wage of $10 per hour which is slightly less than their predecessors got in 1968 – yes 1968 – adjusted for inflation.…