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Volume 38 Issue 3
October 3, 2000

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Third parties forge ahead despite debate snub
Ariz. Greens, Reformers ponder election coalition

BY J.W. WATSON
MESA LEGEND
Submitted October 3, 2000

Maggie Selk, a 54-year-old public affairs assistant with Salt River Project, knows she’s just an old hippie reliving her youth among the 20-somethings hovering around Boston’s Night Club in Tempe, who are begging for a mosh pit to reach fruition.

Jim Allen/MESA LEGEND
Tempe band Sons of Serro, with guitarists P.J. McGorty, left, and John Chavarria, entertain a diverse crowd of Green Party members and supporters Sept. 23, at Boston's Night Club in Tempe.

“I see a lot of the ’Sixties in these kids,” says Selk, with a mischievous grin. “We didn’t trust the older generation either.”

In fact, Selk doesn’t trust her own generation — especially fellow Baby Boomers Al Gore and George W. Bush, the two presidential nominees millions of Americans will see in three nationally-televised debates this month.

While Selk admits she’s always up for a good old-fashioned Gore-and-Bush-bashing-fiesta, she has, instead, come to Boston’s tonight to promote one of her own. Selk is treasurer of the Arizona Green Party and one of presidential nominee Ralph Nader’s most loyal supporters.

On this night, at a Green Party/Nader benefit concert, Selk is enjoying the sweet smell of rebellion in the otherwise cigarette smoke-filled air of Boston’s, discussing her belief that Nader — a consumer advocate who declared the Chevrolet Corvair “Unsafe At Any Speed” in the late ’Sixties — is “the only presidential candidate this November who isn’t for sale.”

“The media isn’t going to tell you, because they are corporation-dominated,” Selk says, as a mostly-punk lineup of local acts, including Destroy Miranda, Sons of Serro and Fred Green, take the stage. “The last thing they want is to have Nader and (Reform Party nominee Pat) Buchanan in front of a microphone telling us we’re being run by big corporations — their advertisers.”

The nonpartisan Commission on Presidential Debates, formed in 1987, has excluded Nader and Buchanan from this month’s debates, citing poor showings in most public opinion polls nationwide where each candidate maintains around five percent support on any given week.

This year, unlike 1992, when then-Reform Party nominee Ross Perot had the same level of support, but was allowed to participate in the debates opposite Bill Clinton and George Bush, the CPD has increased its required showing in the polls to at least 15 percent.

BUSH	Let's Get Ready to Rumble!!! Find out how presidential candidates Al Gore and George W. Bush measure up toe-to-toe in our continued coverage of this year's election. Get the vitals on the two front-runners and find out how each hopes to knock out their opponent in November. Don't forget about Pat Buchanan and Ralp Nader. See how they influence voters on election day. Check out the Legend Oct. 17
GORE
BUCHANAN
NADER

However, many polls, including one conducted by NBC two weeks ago, indicate more than 60 percent of registered voters want to see Nader and Buchanan in the debates — reassuring Selk she isn’t alone.

“I know I’m not the only one who sees how unfairly we’ve been treated this year,” Selk says. “But that doesn’t matter now. We have to continue to go out there, knocking on every door if we have to, to get people involved.”

As she and other members of Arizona’s Green Party are tossing around the idea of a rally at Tempe’s Town Lake sometime this month, Selk says she’s not opposed to calling on other disgruntled third parties to form a coalition to sway voters away from the traditional two-party system.

However, while he agrees such a coalition would strengthen, not weaken, the parties, Maricopa County Reform Party Chairman John Gilbert doesn’t see it happening anytime soon.

“I don’t think there’s a snowball’s chance in hell,” says Gilbert, a 46-year-old construction business owner. “Everyone is so controlled by big money right now, I don’t think there’s even a slight chance at the two parties getting the opportunity.”

With little chance of such a coalition forming and subsequently being effective this late in the political season, Selk concedes the difficulty of motivating herself to motivate others.

“It’s hard, it really is,” Selk acknowledges. “But we have to maintain our passion.

“There are those of us who don’t believe in simply voting for the winner. We have to vote our hopes, not our fears,” says Selk, restating what seems to be both the Green and Reform parties’ rallying cry for November.

“Nader is not the last candidate we will ever have. So, we will have to keep educating and keep people aware.”

And with that, Selk returns to spreading the gospelesque words of the Greens, possibly bashing Gore and Bush along the way — and possibly bashing a few mohawked punks in the pit that is picking up steam.

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