The Fallacy of Comparing Ralph Nader to Ross Perot

[ericson00]

I've seen again in a few threads people bring up Ralph Nader, a true spoiler, and then Nader defenders/apologists and/or Clinton-haters claim "so did Ross Perot" or "by that logic, Ross Perot..."

Here's the truth, once and for all, to quell what was a popular GOP talking point to discredit Bill Clinton's strategy:

National Exit Polls:

If Mr. Perot had not been on the ballot, 38 percent of his voters said, they would have voted for Gov. Bill Clinton, and 38 percent said they would have voted for President Bush.

Exit polls and electoral college:

The analysis, based on exit polls conducted by Voter Research & Surveys (VRS) for the major news organizations, indicated that in Perot's absence, only Ohio would have have shifted from the Clinton column to the Bush column. This would still have left Clinton with a healthy 349-to-189 majority in the electoral college.

And even in Ohio, the hypothetical Bush "margin" without Perot in the race was so small that given the normal margin of error in polls, the state still might have stuck with Clinton absent the Texas billionaire.

For Bush to have won the EC, he'd have " target="_blank">needed to win nearly every state he lost by less than 5%, which would be impossible given his sub-40 job approvals on election day 1992, and the fact he'd actually have needed to pick up Wisconsin, which he lost in 1988.

Bush Sr.'s sub-40% job approval near and on the election was similar to Carter in 1980, or his son in 2008 (when his party lost the WH) and LBJ in 1968 (when his party lost the WH) and far lower than Reagan in 1984, Nixon 1972, Clinton in 1996, or tossup races (with results that would be MoE in a poll, between 45-49%) like Bush 2004, Ford 1976, Obama 2012 (2/3 of those were re-elected).


When Perot wasn't in the race, Bush was losing by a lot more and near the 37% he got anyway; Clinton was far ahead:


Perot wasn't even a conservative; he was pro-choice, pro-gay rights, and to Clinton/Bush's left on trade. After all, Bernie Sanders accepted a gift from Perot.


I'm not the only one to debunk the Perot-myth.

Compare to Nader:

According to exit polls, 47 percent of Nader voters would have gone for Gore, 21 percent for Bush if it had been a two-man race.

once again, vs.

National Exit Polls:

If Mr. Perot had not been on the ballot, 38 percent of his voters said, they would have voted for Gov. Bill Clinton, and 38 percent said they would have voted for President Bush.

in most cases, Bush would've needed a huge amount of Perot votes to catch up with Clinton. Not the case with Gore and Nader in 2000.

THE END. Perot did not elect Clinton. Nader, however, did help elect Bush.

[The Second Stone]

1. Interesting. I may change my position on Perot

as I always considered that he was deliberately sabotaging Bush, whom he personally hated (hates if he is still alive).

You make a strong case for him not being an actual spoiler.

I did notice that in 92 a lot of Republicans I knew were not enthusiastic about Bush and voted for Clinton. That still would not make Perot an actual spoiler if he encouraged independence.

Nader intentionally elected Bush as far as I am concerned. Pure spite and spoiler from the get go.

[ericson00]

2. one thing to consider is the

reasons the Perot-myth has stuck around:

1. no one realized how sweeping and long lasting the electoral college changes that occurred in 1992 would be. Look at this:

From 1968-1988 (inclusive in both ends)
-IL, CA, NM, VT, NJ, NH From '68-'88 (incl.) GOP 6 out of 6,
-MI, DE, CT, ME, From '68-'88 (incl.) GOP 5 out of 6
-PA, MD. From '68-'88 (incl.) GOP 4 out of 6

Since '92 (incl), every one of those states except NH/NM has gone Dem 6/6. NM and NH have gone Dem 5 out of 6 times. And in races with and without Ross Perot. While most conservatives still buy into the lie, one rarity summed it up rather well:

Many Republicans tenaciously subscribe to this myth despite contrary evidence from contemporary polling data. This is because a generation ago Republicans had an apparent “lock” on the presidency as firm as any “blue wall” that today’s Democrats think they’ve built. Only the perfidious little man from Texas prevented perpetual Republican occupancy of the Oval Office.

The "Perot vs. Bush" personal dislike feeds their narrative's plausibility.

2. It made it seem like the narrative "America is a conservative country" was true, and was also justification for the GOP moving to the far-right instead of going back to the center themselves. This actually helps explain why everytime they lose, its "they weren't conservative enough." If the GOP had wanted to win this year, they'd have nominated Chris Christie and he'd have done what Clinton did for Dems with the DLC.

3. It fits the far-left narrative that centrism "doesn't really work," when in reality, it did in 1992 and the DLC being necessary back then.

[Kelvin Mace]

3. Except that Nader was NOT a "spoiler"

One more time: Gore won the election!

Claims that he didn't come down to 5 votes: Rehnquist, Scalia, Thomas, O'Connor and Kennedy.

Also, as I have pointed out before, SIX TIMES as many Democrats voted for Bush as voted for Nader:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1280&pid=160430

[ericson00]

4. I think Gore's campaign was lousy too:

He could've won any other state (at 267 EVs before faithless elector made the "official" tally 266), especially West Virginia:

And in 2000, that shift in the state—from blue to purple—caught Democratic presidential nominee Al Gore off guard. Former West Virginia Democratic Party chairman George Carenbauer, who worked on Bill Clinton’s West Virginia presidential campaigns, said Gore’s team ignored warnings that they needed to fight to win the Mountain State.
“I think they spent $300 there or something,” he says with a laugh.

And yes, he was not convincing to people (https://web.archive.org/web/20001214221524/http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2000/epolls/US/P000.html):


Moreover, given who ran FL, he should never have expected to win a rigged game like FL with George's bro as gov and campaign manager as vote counter.

but the point of this thread is that Nader is not Perot, and that he is amounts to a smear against the Clintons and an ahistorical lie.

[Kelvin Mace]

5. My opinion is that if Gore 2.0 had run

(the Gore who appeared AFTER the election and championed global warming), he would have won hands down in a walk.

[Buzz cook]

6. It depends on the media

Would the media have given Gore 2.0 air time to talk about global climate change? Would they have aired the more fiery speeches Gore gave on climate or foreign policy that he gave after the election?

Gore 1.0 did speak about climate during the 2000 race and he got ignored in favor of stories about the number of buttons on his suit.

Remember how Gore beat Bush in the debates on the night and then after a few days being told by the media that no it was really Bush that won and all Gore did was give big sighs?

The Nader effect was dwarfed by the media's big thumb on the scales.

http://www.dailyhowler.com/dh081202.shtml

Nader may have been one of the straws that broke the camels back, but he was a very minor one.