Nader talks about letters he is sent to george w. Bush and barack obama regarding our domestic and foreign policy. Its great to have you here ralph on cspan thank you. Im honored to interview you on this new book. Yeah the Reference Point those days. Its a message that 103 letters i sent to president bush and president obama in 2001 and 2015 that were not acknowledged or not answered. So i thought i would embarrass myself by putting them all in a book to raise a bigger issue which is the most Democratic Media is when a person writes a letter to anil elected official cant be censored, cant be distorted, and not to respect it or even acknowledge it so people dont know its going to some dark hole. Its a major issue i think. Most young people dont realize that a young a written letter to an official has more impact. They get like a half 1 million letters a week, you dont expect them to answer every letter. Yes teams of volunteers go to the white house every morning and they separate all these letters. No one expects the president to answer all of these. But he has staff, he has departments, he has agencies throughout the executive branch and they should all be acknowledged at least. Thats my complaint, they have robo letters for high profile issues like the gm bailout. They will send out robo which is often like this, or they will write letters to supporters or contributors and president s do write personal letters to a governor or mayor who supports the president or who gives some finances. So if anybody says the president doesnt sign particular letters to particular people, doesnt know theyre talking about. And so they do play favorites heres how you can get a letter automatically from the white house. You say dearest pres. I want you to attend my Daughters High School graduation. So they have to be polite so they write a letter, expressing regret. Or dear mr. President i want to give you money that theyll answer right away. I have a variety of letters which could have been farmed out to the secretary of energy head of the federal trade commission no they dont even acknowledge my letters. So i wrote bush and obama a letter and i said what is your policy on answering letters . They they didnt answer that one either. So by comparison i sent to critical letters to the Prime Minister of canada and that came with formal acknowledgment by the director of correspondence saying they absorbed my message and have reverted to the correct ministry. So at least you know that a human being or more answer the letter. If it all goes to a dark hole and its not acknowledged, fewer people will write letters. And the Postal Service shows letter writing is declining and not just because of the internet, whats interesting it in canada as they have a policy to encourage people to write letters to their members of parliament or Prime Minister. Because its free. No stamp as needed. In our country our country the politicians are free, they send letters to eyes but we cant do it in reverse. So you said that most of the letters were not answer, a couple were can you speak about that . I. I want to make it really easy for president obama when hes running for reelection i said heres what pres. Carter did once, he went to a major hotel bar room ballroom three blocks from the white house and we filled it 1000 liters of citizen groups, labor environment religious, charities, you name it. Who have millions of members out there to support these group its called the nonprofit sector. I said youve gone to india, you always need a little spark and the letter youve gone to india to promote Harley Davidson motorcycles, this is just three blocks. Surely you can just walk across the street. And he did walk across to pay homage to leaders that he criticized everyday. But i but i thought this was a good letter for him and good for the nonprofits and they would get more contributions from some people. By the way, a lot of jobs are involved in the nonprofit sector, so more so more contributions more service for children, people in need, so i sent the letter copy to michelle obama. She writes back, and says thank you very much but the president is too busy. So you see when you do persist when you try to get an answer you get a response that is more interesting. There is another letter you got from president bush when he actually invited you to contribute to his library. What did you reply . This is a letter to me by name you know they can separate out deer hairy. Was was this a letter in response to what you wrote . He was out of office this was in 2012, he was asking for money for his president ial library. I consider certified i consider george bush a certified were criminal, i picketed picketed him. I challenged him publicly, the computer is nonpartisan. So anyway i chided him on his criminal invasion of iraq and how he didnt have the decency to open up to iraqi refugees who were trying to feed their families their chef chauffeurs some some of them lost their lives and nobody let them in. We only left about 10,000 iraqi refugees inches and then at the end said i think i want to make a contribution in kind. So i i sent him a book by this mainstream think tank guy, the title of the book is rogue nation. Did you get a reply to that . Know im get a c someday if they catalogued it in the president ial library. A lot of the letters are funny in some ways you wrote one about a terrace named e. Coli. Can you speak about that . Well there is is a bacterial outbreak in europe, some people died it was a viral and bacteria and they gave it the name e. Coli and then some numbers. So ive been trying to get president s back to president clinton to redefine terrorism. If your worried about a loss of civilian life you better worry about viruses and bacteria. Not just the ones that come from africa asia you are a scientist, its a scary thing. If we dont get ready in time it could be like a influenza academic epidemic after world war i. So how my going to get to these people . So i decide to write a letter in the name of e. Coli. E. Coli is sitting in the petri dish in austria. If life is very limited theyre going to, get it. Theyve already analyzed that has no more use, so this e. Coli virus i so this e. Coli virus i need to do something to redeem myself. So the letter returned to sender makes the case for the president to prevent deadly act epidemics all over the world. Theres no one better than the United States to confront that, if we can get over the restriction of the word terrorist to a few gangs. I was at a few of the events you spoke about the book the one, the first one where you did the book launch in d. C. I wanted to ask him i was really fascinated by how that talk went. It was a great talk but the first question you got was about why did you give the election to al gore and . Have you ever been to an event where that question wasnt asked . Very rarely. I thought your answer was so spot on and so direct, the audience was very skeptical go about their stunt democrats but you got applause like serious applause. Please talk about the answer i think its important for people to hear. We can never tolerate political bigotry against thirdparty candidates who exercise their election rights. We have we all have a right to election. So big guys, third parties well have a right to get boats from one another. Which means were either spoilers of one another or none of us are spoilers. Why should the green party get the third class citizen. But the pragmatic reply is if you ask al gore why he lost the election, he would say one i won the election, the election, i won the popular vote the electric electoral votes through florida. And and then he will say it was stolen from him. In florida, jeb bush and shenanigans, and in the Supreme Court of course. He also wouldve been president if he wouldve 11 state tennessee which he represented in the senate. When you see either options one to her three any one of those options he couldve been in the white house. 250,000 voted republican in florida how much was the election loss by. 537. Also arkansas when he was Vice President to clinton because in my clinton to campaign. Im amazed at how many times people continue to ask that question. Part of it is an alibi they so dislike the republicans that theyll go for anything the democrats offer. I save you do that youre gonna lose your bargaining power. How do you the progressive wing, the democratic the Democratic Party which is becoming corporatized, militaristic, corporate cystic, wall street hat. Its not my going for the least worst. Im not going to put any pressure on you in april may, june july they tell them what they want the corporate democrats to hear. Which is blanket support no matter what the democrats will do that you wont like because the republicans are worse. Every four years of at least worst mindset the party gets worse. Speaking. Back to the book did you send a copy to the white house . Ice sent it to the white house with a letter but theres no guarantee that it got better. I think i now have a contact in the white house and i may give it to her so she can give it to the resident in the oval office. What would be a victory for you in this . A phone call from the president and invite, what would be a victory. It would be first of all to acknowledge the letter. By the way i send these letters around you cant put all your eggs in one white house basket. You send it to reporters, opponents, members of congress you send it around. Maybe a University Professor whose interested in the subject. An acknowledgment that is courteous, and i would like substantive responses. We tried for six years to get an appointment with the secretary of energy, who meets all the time with the Nuclear Energy and i had been leading anti Nuclear Groups for decades, and never been able to see him. He would just blows out. So i wrote wrote to president obama and said your secretary is not giving equal time, nowhere near. No answer, and they didnt even refer to the secretary of energy for response. So i would like the sprawling executive to get some of these letters and respond, if they come from the white house they should have more meaning. Used up to two president s bush and obama. Obviously written letters to other president s, why did you stick with those two . Are they more egregious compared to the others for not replyings . Is it because of email . Part of it there securing their seat, they dont want to they dont want to answer in the wrong way. Yes they have robo letters they dont want to answer the wrong way i would write to jimmy carter and once in a while he would responder his special assistant would respond, i would say asking for a congressional hearing and it would be in the Washington Post or the new york times. Now, no matter how fresh or new a letter is, lets it comes from a professor against missiledefense suppose he writes a letter and its new the the press doesnt report these as they used to. I once wrote a letter to a Public Public official on what we call plank lung disease and it was killing the workers in North Carolina and south carolina. It was on page three of the Washington Post. Its a die need the media, we need to revive it and theres no one who can stop us. No one can stop us from writing letters and sending them around. No one can stop us from writing more powerful letters by putting cc and by putting cc and sending it to all parties, and then people will say this person is a networker its going to a reporter i better write it back. Host you have a podcast on an nadir. Org. Do you put those letters in the podcast so you have other ways to bring them up obviously sending them to the white house youre not getting the response and attention but certainly theres a lot of people out there reading alternative media so aside from the alternative lets talk about the use of the podcast to get that information out. The ultimate goal is to get the information out its not just to get an answer obviously. Do you do a multitier approach to sending out this information . Guest i should do more of that the radio interviews people on very important subjects that are not the news. So that is the whole bulk of the program i just interviewed Steve Silverstein from sampras cisco, he helps others fund seven or eight people where you can come in second in the popular vote and still become president. It happened four times in american history. Most recently in 2001 gore came in first ambush came in second. But the Electoral College college put bush first. They now have 165 electoral votes, they have laws passed from maryland, new york, illinois, california if they go to 270 thats the 270 thats the end. What do these laissez . It says in maryland or california that they will throw the electoral votes completely to the winner of the National Popular vote. So they redefine what the Electoral College cannot do. So we had him on, but youre right i should herald some of the letters and summarize them. Host one way would be to put the letter out and put it out to the white house and along with it you would do some sort of grassroots activism so maybe others can write similar letters and focus on the issue because a lot of times, from what i hear , from people in congress and even the white house is that they do and respond to the white house by the number of calls and letters that they get on an issue. The b2 yet make count the letters and they count the calls. They they may not respond but it has an impact if its coming in in larger numbers. Host do you ever get a call back if you call the white house. Guest i would maybe get a call back after the third call you have to be quite persistent. Host one was the last time youre invited to the white house . Guest it was under bill clinton. He was us bill accardi was a special assistant to handle our group and invited several times but only to see him. Host here you are one of the most hundred most influential people by time i am magazine by atlantic, im just flabbergasted that having run from president and i understand theres an old saying in politics that you brings your friends close and your enemies closer. So whatever you are bringing you closer, theres probably a better purpose you think . Why think . Why do you think there is this resistance to ralph nader . Guest i think two reasons one the 2000 campaign produced a lot of shunning by the democrat in congress and in the white house how dare i challenge a mutating Democratic Party that is a shell of what it was in the 1960s. We couldve gone through all these bills for environment, consumer and worker safety we kind of got through them today. But we them today. But we got them through 1960s. The second thing is if you dont get Mainstream Press coverage they dont think they need to respond to you. So the new york times, they decide theyre not going to cover certain citizen groups and they will say, why why should we bother responding . Its too bad because these letters often point out things going on in their own government that they dont know about. Things going on in the country they dont know about. They dont like the criticism, they like the praise. Its just not good politics i think you pointed out his lack of politics to do that. If i go go to the chamber of commerce if i was in National Association to manufacture you can be sure they would respond. They respond to perceived power. In the 1960s if you had good knowledge, good information about how cars could be made safer for example, how the air could be clean, that often went over the hurdle and you could get press. If you got press, the centers senators and representatives would respond. Host a lot of people talk about, when i speak speak different about ralph nader they will speak about your legacy. You are 81 years old, you old, you must be thinking about that. You must be thinking about what will be the average american would say not growing up in the 1960s with the issue of gm and all that, what would you like people to know u. S. . B2 more than that we would like to. We would like to have a 50th anniversary in safety and speed. And have a series of events to create new groups and introduce new leaders whose names are not on the evening news. Thats really what legacy is all about. Its not about memory, its about putting forces and motion and then multiplying themselves. Like least start a Public Interest groups back in the 1970s, there are over 25 of them now. Their student funded, fulltime staff, they have scientists, lawyers, they have scientists, lawyers, lobbyists. Places like massachusetts and new york they file referendums and lawsuits. I like to give people ideas that they put into place. For example, i put it had a discussion about what a Great Community restaurant would be like and now you have several restaurants which have a bookstore, an event room with events on most every night artistic, poultry, artistic, poetry, political, nothings off the limits. And a food store. Host that can be inch added to your Public Interest founding which is interesting because it did come out of the conversation we did have. I remember talking about it when jerry brown was running for office and you helped him to cobble together his platform at that time. In the 1990s he had had a box full of on. Host it had a picture of this gap pet statue of liberty was scaffolding around it. I have copies of that. Your idea was that you really do believe in citizens thats the beauty of all this. You believe in in citizens and he feel very strongly, and knowing you for so long, that if people just knew how much power they had and what it is they are up against and what they can do, that they can in fact affect change. Do you think the average american has strengthened or weakened over time are you up against such a tide that its hard to get your views across . Spee2. Guest there is a progress factor here and people know who is doing them in now. They they didnt even know that the Auto Companies were selling them less than safe cars. The gleaming 55 chevrolet with the hood ornaments and music,. Host theyre all in cuba by the way now. Guest but now they know who rules them, they know whos degrading them, under insuring them, insuring