Why do you think that is? I'm wondering if there's not a deeper ideological difference between the conservatives and liberals that would make the left carnivorous and the right not.

Yes, distrust of authority. Which is obviously not a problem for the right, because they're authoritarian. I think it's about that simple.

Let's say the Democratic Party does find a way to enfold the Greens, Green issues. What does a post-Nader left look like?

First of all, it's ecumenical. A post-Nader left would have to incorporate hardheaded people of different ethnicities, regions, some absolutely opposed to the war in Iraq, some opposed to certain aspects only. Everyone who was committed to rising above the circular firing squad, including on domestic issues.

Some would be deficit hawks, some would want socialized medicine. It would have to include people from major organizations, certainly the AFL-CIO and NAACP. It would include people who recognize that to do successful politics in Missouri, let alone Alabama, is going to require a different political orientation than doing it in Vermont or Massachusetts. But there would have to be a rock-bottom underpinning that the privatizing, rightwing, anti-feminist, anti-gay attitudes of the Republicans are wrong. And a new center would have to form, not just a political center but a center of energy in which the corporate church and the corporate right don't get to rule. It's a tall order, but I think a necessary one.

Do you think that's likely to happen?

There is some sense now that people are in that mood now. If you look at the MoveOn poll, one of the questions they asked was: "Which of the candidates are you prepared to support, if he or she is the nominee?" And a very high percentage said, "Anybody." Anybody who could beat George Bush. I think that's the right sentiment for the moment, because the reality of this moment is that unless Bush is defeated, most of the objectives of every group I just mentioned are going to be in the ditch. It is a united-front moment. And a lot of people are clearly in that mood. So that's auspicious.

But the post-Nader left would also have to have a focus on security. The Republicans are the people who failed to prevent 9/11, and that should not be forgotten. This is a time to be with the police and firefighters, and there are some on the left who might bridle at being in coalition with the police, but those differences need to be superseded.

The post-Nader left needs to be a patriotic left, and should be indignant at the thought that the corporate rich who are lining their pockets and keeping their kids out of the armed service are the real patriots and we're the outsiders. I think they're the outsiders, and we're the patriots, and we should be proud of it.

Speaking of patriotism, I've talked to several people who went into something of a patriotic funk on July 4th, who watched the fireworks and said they just felt sad that this was not the democracy they wanted, this was not the America they loved. How should they channel those feelings?

You have to be incremental. You have to do something every day which is both practical and forward-looking so that you don't throw up your hands. I talk to a lot of people who are in the throw-up-your-hands mood. Many people who look upon the direction of this country with horror are in that mood.

But it's a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you look upon the right as invincible, then this is more likely to become the future. Karl Rove, etc. -- these people are not geniuses, they make mistakes, they could have very easily lost the 2000 election. They could have been defeated in a number of the 2002 elections if the Democrats had had some gonads, and there seem to be Democrats who have learned that lesson, too. The right thing to do is to do the best you can and not to be obsessed with the consequences, many of which will be unknown for a considerable amount of time.

And again this is something the Republicans have understood. The right felt for decades that they were in the wilderness, that the country had become communist. [William] Buckley, when he started the National Review, wrote in an editorial something to the effect that history has rolled over us and all we can do is leap up and try to thwart it and shout "Stop!" That's an admirable attitude. I've never been one who thought accomplishing anything was going to be terribly easy. Many of the reforms of the '60s -- for example, the civil rights movement -- were no picnic, God knows.

History moves in fits and starts, like tectonic plates.

What advice do you have for activists now?

Movements need to be inventive. The MoveOn people are inventive. Who knows what kinds of other invention will come to pass?

Living in your moment, not trying to impose old language, old tactics, on a different reality. The best organizers are the ones who can size up the world and find the apt thing to do. So people do move history in that manner, and you can't anticipate who's going to.

There's a lot of vitality in sectoral movements -- environmentalists, gays, some unions, civil libertarians and others. I wouldn't be surprised if the energies that ought to follow don't have to do with starting up new constituencies, but with federating, multiplying the energies, of things that are already going. But I don't know how those federations would look. Sometimes a charismatic leader makes a difference. Sometimes some local movement like living-wage, sweatshop protests, will do it.

But what people need are victories. A lot of mileage could accrue from leveraging these groupings not just into more protests but into on-the-ground victories. And circulate these victories. And this is always possible.

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