Thank you, Andrew Riely, for accusing the Green Party of betraying its principles. It is an honor to know that even detractors acknowledge that we have them, compared to the Democratic Party which, for practical consideration, does not.

Riely strongly condemns Minnesota Greens who support Ray Tricomo's (who won the Green primary) bid for US Senate. He claims Tricomo will cause Paul Wellstone to lose the election and thus ensure a dark, Republican future.

We urge those that share Riely's concerns to look at the whole picture. There are at least three problems with their spirited claim, related to politics, law and fact.

This condemnation seems natural only when one ignores the political outlook that spurred the modern US Green electoral movement in the first place. The Democratic and Republican Parties are controlled largely by the interests of highly concentrated wealth. The result has been a marked rightward drift in both parties, but the contrast is more apparent with the Democratic Party. The Clinton/Gore administration pushed welfare reform, NAFTA, GATT, approved dozens of giant mergers, the 1996 Telecom Act, higher military spending, corporate welfare and more. Matters become more troublesome when you consider the solutions to social and environmental ills that are available, but were not pushed by that administration.

Thus, the Green Party was formed to give a voice to people who don't want to vote for a corporate agenda. It was formed because the government and media have become so unresponsive to citizens that the platform of candidacy appears to be the last, most viable chance to get on the public agenda. Riely condemns the Green Party for doing this. But if not advocated through principled candidacy, then how can meaningful (not piecemeal, rhetorical or symbolic) reform be accomplished in the long-term?

How long are we going to buy these scare tactics before we realize that they're not getting us anywhere? How long are we going to let our ideals be silenced, every two years, by cries of, "This isn't the right election to vote for a third party" before we realize that according to the Democratic Party, there may never be a "right" election to vote for a third party? How long will our consciences withstand betraying our own principles with every trip to the polling place for the sake of a political expediency that only screws us over in the long run?

Remember, the quality of the Democratic candidate isn't the issue here. Riely condemns Green competition against both Wellstone and Al Gore, representing quite a contrast within the Democratic spectrum. So why don't Greens only run in non-competitive, unimportant elections? Because the nature of our political economy and media system is such that those elections are given no coverage. That is hardly the way to get one's message out.

Furthermore, there are legal reasons why the Green Party of Minnesota endorsed a candidate for US Senate (though it was the wrong one, and happily he was defeated in the primary). In Minnesota, anybody can pay a relatively small fee, fill out 10 minutes of paperwork and be declared as a candidate for a major political party's (like the GPMN) ballot line. This means that, if the Greens dissuaded other Greens from running, it was likely that somebody looking for some media attention (in such a competitive and hyped race) could have registered for the ballot line and become the official Green Party candidate for US Senate.

And finally, the facts: claims that Wellstone is "has demonstrated his commitment" to the ideals of the Green Party and that his record is "close to spotless from a liberal's point of view" are arguable at best, and depend heavily on your definition of the word liberal. Wellstone voted for the USA PATRIOT Act (eroding civil liberties), the Defense of Marriage Act (little more than legislative gay-bashing), supported the use of force resolution starting the "war on terrorism," broke his promise not to run for a third term, hasn't signed on to a bill requiring labeling of genetically-modified food, waited months and months to come out against the proposed war on Iraq (and still makes no public fuss about it), didn't serve as the one senator required to allow the Congressional Black Caucus onto the senate floor in Jan. 2001 to challenge the certification of the presidential "election" results and prominently acted as the Democratic establishment's mouthpiece in the anti-Ralph Nader scare campaign of 2000. We'd like to point out that Wisconsin Senator Russ Feingold voted against both the PATRIOT Act and the Defense of Marriage Act, and didn't dip into the coffers of the wealthy to raise millions (an estimated $10+ million will be spent by Wellstone) of dollars for his re-election.

And, contrary to Riely's assertion, Ralph Nader has not actually endorsed Paul Wellstone's candidacy; in fact, Nader said that Wellstone is "probably the best senator in the US Senate, although that's not saying much." Truly, Wellstone has done a good amount of fighting for liberal causes. But he is not, as shown above, beyond the realm of legitimate criticism. Nader defended the Green Party's right as a major political party to actually run candidates, saying "If you're going to build a third party, you stay with the third party's candidate." That's the trick: in order to become a viable force for long-term progressive change, the Green Party has to act like a major party, which means—gasp—running candidates. The alternative is continuing to criticize the rightward drift of the Democratic Party in the odd-numbered years and shutting up when politicians listen: election season.

If Andrew Riely wants to argue against Ray Tricomo's political principles, he should. By obscuring the need to challenge the Democratic Party, he is doing democracy and civil discourse a great disservice.