Zinn Won’t be Voting for Obama After All

 

from The Largest Minority:
This letter to Ralph Nader retracts Professor Zinn’s previous endorsement of Obama. He gave the campaign permission to publish it. 

Dear Ralph:

I was wrong in saying I would vote for Obama. I was not thinking of the slam-dunk states, of which Massachusetts is one, and I will vote for you in Massachusetts.

I still think that the electoral arena is one that saps our energy, and gets us nowhere. What you say about civic activity not having a chance to change policy is pessimistic and wrong, and if civic activity cannot be effective then electoral activity will be even less effective.

Civic activity is the only way things can change — you should know that better than anyone because you’ve been so good at it. Such activity affects public opinion which in the long run, when it becomes widespread enough, forces changes in policy. Electoral activity, in a managed political system when the candidacy of third party candidates can only show weakness, will not change public opinion. We are not in a Debs-era situation, when a powerful Socialist movement represented millions of people.

In solidarity,
Howard