[RSCT] "Excluded democracy: Scholastic and the two-party system" by Ralph Nader

[Rick Kisséll]

CounterPunch.orgWeekend Edition

      December 19 - 21, 2008
      Scholastic and the two-party system 
      Excluded Democracy 
      By RALPH NADER 
      Earlier
this year, while speaking in Fargo, North Dakota, Colleen Donley
brought her nine year old son, Adam, from Perham, Minnesota, to the
gathering to complain about the curriculum materials on the
presidential race produced by Scholastic Magazine. Adam wanted to vote
for me but their mock paper ballots had only two choices picturing John
McCain and Barack Obama. 
      A "meet the candidates" again pictured only the Republican and Democratic
candidates. Ms. Donley noted that it would not have been difficult to
add the four other presidential candidates who were on enough state
ballots to theoretically gain an Electoral College majority. There was
extra room on the page to do so.

      Pursuing
her inquiry she noticed that only the Democratic and Republican options
were available for research, games, posters and issues. For example,
the game "Be a Candidate" had two party choices but only ?their? issues
and views.
      
Scholastic
News Online did interview me on educational issues on March 3, 2008.
But the students and their families in these public schools obviously
pay greater attention during the autumn when mock elections and other
interactive modes are produced by Scholastic Magazine to teach the
children about presidential politics?past and present.

      Exclusion
of third party and independent candidates goes hand in hand with the
failures to educate the children about the pioneering contributions of
candidates and their parties that challenged the two-party domination
in American history.

      This
continuing limitation of voter choice has been entrenched in
exclusionary ballot access laws, a largely partisan judiciary, denial
of being on the national debate stage by a corporation controlled by
the two major parties and other obstructions unknown in other
democracies. 


      Scholastic
Magazine is published by a private corporation. For many years its
reach into the public schools has been enormous: up to 18 million
children. Its "educational" materials are colorful, easy to read and
very often uncritically adopted by teachers and administrators.

      Whether
there are subjective political motivations by the top executives is
something for further inquiry. Suffice it to say that children should
know how alternative presidential candidates and their parties
pioneered the anti-slavery, women's right to vote, worker and farmer
justice movements in the 19th century before either of the larger
parties ever did. 


      The
children should learn the connection between unobstructed candidates'
rights to be on ballot lines and voters' rights to have a choice beyond
one party gerrymandered districts or only two parties offering
candidates sharing establishment political agendas.

      Reducing
the harbingers of advances in justice in America such as social
security, Medicare, regulation of business abuses to minor footnotes or
designations called "the other" is accepting the power structure's
mauling of a competitive democracy.

      The
public school teachers and parents should have the intellectual
curiosity and democratic value systems of Ms. Donley and the outraged
parents who contacted her with similar blackouts on their children's
alternative choices for president.
      
Year
after year of these blackouts results in millions of children growing
up to passively accept the two party "duopoly" and the restriction of
voter choice. That there is another political world out there that they
can help cultivate is not at their level of expectation. So nearly half
of the voters stay home and many citizens reluctantly vote for the
least-worst of the two big-party candidates. 


      Mock
presidential elections, following classroom study and discussion, occur
in October before the real voting in November. Children do take their
exciting experiences in school home and spark conversations with their
parents. To indoctrinate them in the inevitability of the two parties
offering the only winners and the only agendas and the only debaters is
to defeat the opportunities to recognize and support other political
initiatives. 


      The
very opportunity to build alternative politics from election year to
election year is rooted significantly in such early age.

      Shame
on Scholastic Magazine, Incorporated for restricting these visions and
understandings. Bravo to mothers like Colleen Donley and youngsters
like her son Adam who strive to wake up the public school curriculum
choosers and the boards of education.

      Ralph Nader is a consumer advocate and three-time presidential candidate.
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