This year’s presidential race is flanked with several different parties and ideas. One party known as the Green Party is represented by Ralph Nader. These “Greens,” have had a major impact on this year’s race for the high office, and their campaign continues to gain momentum.

Nader was born in 1934, the youngest of four to Lebanese immigrants. After his education at Harvard Law school, Nader spent a short time in the army.

Very critical of the bipolar party system that he looks upon as the same “corporate party with two heads … called Republican and Democrat each wearing different makeup.”

In an article by Walt Contreras Sheasby titled: Ralph Nader: The Ecological Crisis, “Everybody has to get Involved,” Nader’s criticism has extended to include several issues in control of the two major parties including health, the environmental, and ecological issues.

After establishing his law practice, Nader entered the political arena in 1964 as a consultant on auto safety for Assistant Secretary of Labor Daniel Patrick Moynihan.

Nader endorses what is known as the Concord Principles, an “agenda for a new Initiatory Democracy.”

Some of these principles entail:

* Establishing a democracy that embraces usable facilities that empower all citizens.

*The separation of ownership of major societal assets.

* Strengthening the capacity for self-government and self reliance as individuals and as a community.

* Allowing tax payers to discern how their tax dollars are spent.

* Having easy access to business and government services through computers.

Nader is credited with his involvement in the Environmental Protection Agency, the Consumer Product Safety Commission, the Freedom of Information Act, the Safe Drinking Water Act, the Meat and Poultry Inspection Laws, the Occupational Health and Safety Administration, the Coal Mine Health and Safety Act as well as many others.

Nader has also been active in the environment, trying to bringing various ecological concerns to light. According to Nader’s ecological vision, “We’ve got to do what past generations never had to do … Man-made hazards are transcending our traditional physiological alert system. We can’t taste the mercury in swordfish, we can’t smell carbon dioxide, we can’t see hydrocarbons or feel radioactivity from the nuclear plants. We’ve got to rely on our minds, less on our bodies, to signal pain or anger or fear. We have to do something,” Nader said.

Information provided in this article and more can be found on his campaign biography web page at http://www.rahul.net/cameron/nader/rnbio-e.html.