Ralph Nader Quotes (1934-)

“Today the large organization is lord and master, and most of its employees have been desensitized much as were the medieval peasants who never knew they were serfs.”

“Hasn't that been the norm with such crowd-getters as Fahrenheit 9/11 or Sicko by Michael Moore? They seem to only produce interesting memories, leaving mostly just footprints in the sand.”

“Producing features on a diverse range of civic and political activities is far below NPR's and PBS's funder-friendly range of entertaining programs. On weekends, to counter the commercial vapidity and the ditto-head Sunday interview shows, PBS and NPR are just not there. They simply do not look for, or listen to, the rumble of people who are on the ground, acting with conscience, organizing to break through power. Meanwhile, smaller programs-such as Democracy Now with Amy Goodman-are picking up the slack of these larger outlets, despite their comparably modest budgets and staff size.”

“America's business leaders said NO to the idea of revolting against the British monarchy. ...In later decades, commercialists... consistently said NO to efforts to end child labor... to starting labor unions... to the regulation of railroad and banking abuses... to the 40-hour work week and progressive taxation... to antitrust laws and the regulatory agencies... to a woman's right to vote (they feared the women's vote against exploiting child labor and cheating consumers), and NO to the minimum wage, Social Security, universal healthcare, and to... protect the environment, empower consumers, reduce government secrecy, protect ethical whistleblowers, and... to reduce commercial fraud on the government as with Medicare and military contracts.”

“Many Senate Democrats are throwing in the towel on the nomination of William Barr for Trump’s attorney general. One would think that Senate Democrats would be appalled at Barr’s long-time unyielding conduct and writings asserting that the President can start any wars he wants even if Congress votes against it! An example of this is the constitutionally undeclared criminal invasion of Iraq by George W. Bush. Barr was also George H.W. Bush’s Attorney General and has been a long-time defender of executive branch lawlessness. One would think that Barr’s insupportable drive for more corporate prisons and more mass incarceration would upset these Senators... Expect the further decay of a Department of Injustice, shielding a chronically lawless President and turning the rule of law on its head.”

“Howard Zinn said: "Small acts, when multiplied by millions of people, can quietly become a power no government can suppress, a power that can transform the world."”

“McKibben understands that a central goal of movement leadership is to create more leaders, not more followers.”

“There's only one thing different about Barack Obama when it comes to being a Democratic presidential candidate. He's half African-American.”

“Roger Smith’s tenure was one of the darkest in General Motors’ history, for customers, workers and for residents of G.M.’s factory towns.”

“Mike Pompeo is Secretary of State, a total warmonger, and... bigot against Arabs and Muslims, based on his own assertions when he was a member of Congress, and after that.”

“Hasn't that been the norm with such crowd-getters as Fahrenheit 9/11 or Sicko by Michael Moore? They seem to only produce interesting memories, leaving mostly just footprints in the sand.”

“Were Shakespeare around to write a play about our times, perhaps his opening line to the Plutocracy would be "Get thee to the Oligarchy. Blend yourselves together and thou shalt rule invincible forever after."”

“Bendib is an equal-opportunity skewer. The more a subject or victim is ignored by the mass media, the more he infuriates, informs, and intensifies the reader's attention. Cartoons need to jolt. Bendib obliges page after page.”

“A legendary activist, Dolores Huerta has a long history of fighting for social change, workers' rights, and civil justice. Unlike many other awardees, she was rightfully awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2011, among many other recognitions.”

“Bill Clinton is generally viewed as one smart politician, having been twice elected the President, helped by lackluster Robert Dole, having survived the Lewinsky sex scandal, lying under oath about sex, and impeachment. When it is all about himself, he is cunningly smart.”

“"If you can pay for fancy lawyers, the law won't get you." This folk understanding was reiterated recently by Matt Taibbi in Rolling Stone when he wrote, "Americans have long understood that the rich get good lawyers and get off, while the poor suck eggs and do time... An arrestable class and an unarrestable class."”

“the people's right to have their day in court is being foreclosed. Corporate victories in federal and state elections work hand in hand with this mission by assuring the nomination of more commercially-responsive judges such as Chief Justice Roberts, and Justices Scalia and Alito, with the same being true in many states.”

“Ralph Nader's Breaking Through Power is a brilliant analysis of corporate power and the popular mechanisms that can be used to wrest back our democracy”

“I agree with Ralph Nader that we need to repeal NAFTA and all of those so-called free trade agreements, but they are — they don’t constitute fair trade. And with respect to Colombia, I can say that not only have I been to Colombia, I have seen the devastation of the militarization of our policy, particularly with Colombia, and the displacement particularly of the Afro-Colombian communities across that country.”

“I'm voting for Ralph Nader -- even though I think he's an asshole on abortion and issues of sexual politics generally -- in the hope that the Green Party will get 5 percent of the vote...We have to break through the current end-of-history, "no real change can ever happen" mentality on every front, and the best way to do that on Tuesday is to vote for Ralph Nader.”

“Imagine how the last presidential campaign would have turned out if instead of the marketing circus that we were treated to, we were just given a weekly round table discussion between Bush, Gore, and Nader for a couple months running up to the election. No staged rallies, no TV images with flags flowing in the sunset, no pollsters. No marketing. Bush would have been luck to get two percent.”

“There was a third-party candidate, Ralph Nader, whose national reputation came from decades of persistent criticism of corporate control of the economy. His program was sharply different from the two major candidates, emphasizing health care, education, and the environment. But he was shut out of the nationally televised debates during the campaign, and, without the support of big business, he had to raise money from the small contributions of people who believed in his program.”