Conniff wrong about Greens.

What the hell is this mantra Ruth Conniff keeps repeating about us Greens running against the Democrats ("Greens at a Crossroads," August issue)? Last time I noticed there will be two major party candidates in the general election, not just the Democrat. Bush and Kerry are both odious, but Bush reeks a little bit more. We are running against both of them, to further the cause of our party and the progressive ideals that both major parties have abandoned.

George Vye

via e-mail

It's amazing how Ruth Conniff manages time and time again to miss the main point of any important topic, and take the elitist view of things. The latest example of this was her condescending view that the travesty of the Green convention was a "growing pain."

First, let's acknowledge that the Greens are hardly "new." The sad story of the Green Party is that David Cobb's nomination was made possible by the fact that the Greens, who claim the mantle of "grassroots democracy," have few or no democratic mechanisms in place for the election of officers and nomination of candidates.

Instead, the Greens rely on state conventions, where many attendees have to pay an entrance fee to participate.

Furthermore, the Greens' system was virtually a carbon copy of the U.S. electoral system.

Consequently, it was only a matter of Cobb going to small states with virtually no Green registered base and convincing a handful of members of the central committee to vote for him. Thus, Cobb would get four delegate votes in Alabama or North Carolina, which literally have a handful of registered Greens, while California, which has over a million registered Greens (the majority of them voting for Peter Camejo), gets only nine votes. Very curious, indeed. Perhaps the Greens should change their name to the party of grassroots hypocrisy instead.

Another point Conniff missed entirely was the delay of the Green Party convention until June, making it too late for Nader to mount the fundraising and activist effort to get the Green Party back on the ballot in 2004. This decision to delay the convention was another backroom decision by a handful of self-appointed Green activists, in large part to hamper Nader's effectiveness.

Instead of being a political force, the Green Party has become a political farce with the nomination of Cobb.

With no democratic mechanisms in place, unable to distinguish themselves as more than a splinter of the Democratic Party, and only one elected Green to statewide office, the Green Party has little or nothing to show for more than twelve years of existence.

Since The Progressive doesn't see this, or refuses to mention it, perhaps you should throw off the mantle of the historical legacy of the Progressive Era and just admit your magazine is another voice of limousine liberalism.

David Havelka

Silver Spring, Maryland