Ralph Nader & Abby Martin on US Rigged Corporate Elections

Most people know Ralph Nader as the insurgent third-party Presidential candidate in the 2000 elections, where the popularity of his stand against corporate hegemony struck fear into establishment politics.

But hundreds of millions experience Nader’s legacy everyday. Most notably, how virtually every automobile safety measure, from seatbelts to airbags, are the product of his relentless campaign against auto industry giants. His contributions as a consumer advocate span disability rights to exposing corporate pollution.

A long-time political figure with unique experience fighting from the center of Washington, Nader joins Abby Martin on The Empire Files to discuss today’s political climate, the corporate government and rigged elections.

Ralph Nader and Abby Martin on US Corporate Rigged Elections

Nader describes the invasion of Washington by Wall Street as the way in which the government has been indentured by corporatism; the Democrats are dialed into the same corporate interests as Republicans and both work to crush third party representatives from getting on the ballot.

Nader argues that Bernie Sanders gave up his bargaining power when he pledged to endorse Hillary Clinton as the Democratic nominee. “He probably knows that the democratic party machinery is controlled by the Clintons.” Nader says Sanders needs to use his grassroots support to make demands of the Democratic Party, and his followers need to start organizing beyond the campaign.

Hillary Clinton is a “corporate criminal”, who has never met a war or weapons system she doesn’t like. Her hawkish foreign policy casts light on her tendency to chase after war, and her support of Wall Street. “She’s a militarist and a corporatist,” says Nader. Her blind ambition of seeking power will likely push the United States into more wars.

The Clinton Foundation, which is funded by Gulf monarchies and mining magnets, saw an increase in donorship once Hillary Clinton became Secretary of State, showing just how close the Clinton’s ties are to the most oppressive regimes and corporations. While Hillary’s campaign has been supported most passionately by those calling for more women-led leadership, this brand of ‘Clinton feminism’ has latched onto something that is nothing more than an upwards career move, not a substantive movement towards equal representation.

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VISIT // https://Nader.org/ for his weekly column and radio show

CLINTONFLICKRRONAPROUDFOOT Visits from high-profile public figures are somewhat of a rarity at Hamilton College in upstate New York, so it wasn’t a surprise many students snatched up tickets to see Hillary Clinton last October. And after a talk which may have cost the school up to $300,000 (at her “discounted” student rate), the presidential endorsements quickly echoed across campus.

Her speech at Hamilton was just one of many stops on her lucrative nationwide speaking tour, a relentless self-promoting campaign aimed at earning her a head start in the 2016 presidential race. Across small towns and college campuses, with an acquiescent media fawning over her new book, Clinton hailed the United States as “the greatest force for peace and progress the world has ever known”.

Inserting herself in the collegiate demographic conveniently allows Clinton to rewrite history, absolving her role in some of the nation’s most criminal foreign policy initiatives – from the invasion of Iraq to the overthrow of Gaddafi in Libya. In fact, Clinton is widely known to be even more of a war-hawk than Sen. John McCain within Obama’s national security circles.

Her war mongering has paid off with heavy backing of the military industrial complex, exemplified by her relationship with Boeing, the world’s second largest defense contractor. In one instance, she set aside ethics guidelines in order to secure a multi-billion dollar deal with the company.

A few of the venues on her tour are particularly revealing. Aside from the usual events open to the public, she’s been paid hefty sums of money to give private speeches to investors at Goldman Sachs and the Carlyle Group – the former of which has since been revealed as her second largest political donor. Modern-day presidential campaigns can’t be run on a shoestring – the 2012 race exceeded $1 billion in campaign spending and in 2008, Goldman Sachs exceeded every other corporation in spending for Obama.

Hillary Clinton’s list of donor buddies stretches far beyond the 1200 yards of Wall Street, and considering how banks and war are leading the pack, the damage wrought by them does too. If she wins the 2016 election, America is guaranteed four more disastrous years of neoliberalism and war.

Ming Chun Tang

Abby Martin talks about Clinton’s horrible track record on foreign policy and war mongering on Breaking the Set.

Hillary Clinton 2016: Recipe for Endless War

Follow @AbbyMartin

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