Good news for Nader in the CA returns

An interesting thing happened in the California Green Party primaries on Tuesday. Many, actually, the majority of, Greens crossed over and cast votes in the Democrat or Republican presidential primaries; going for Gore and, overwhelmingly, for McCain.

At the same time Nader attracted the majority of his votes from people not registered as Greens. This may augur well news for the November election. It's reasonable to assume, I think, that savvy California Greens knew that Nader had the Green delegates in pocket, so they went out to do mischief in the Republicrat frontlines. But it's also good news that Nader attracted the attention of a lot of non-Greens. That speaks well of a possible broad-appeal coalition surge in November.

Of course the price Greens paid in California for playing mischief is that Nader showed, overall, a little more poorly than he would have otherwise, coming in behind Alan Keyes. There was some very early puzzlement at Nader seeming to slip back from where he was in California in the general election in '96, but I think a closer look shows him positioned nicely.

Now, if we can just get some media access, a better Internet presence, and some momentum for a minorities-gays-labor-college-kids coalition, Nader, and the rest of us by extension, will be in good shape.