Notable & Quotable: The New Cornel West
June 9, 2023 5:50 pm ET Cornel West announces his run for president as the candidate for the People's Party, June 5. Photo: CornelWest/CornelWest via REUTERS From “Cornel West Should Not Be Running for President” by Joan Walsh for the Nation, June 8: I loved early Democratic Socialists of America leader Cornel West. I loved author of the 1993 book Race Matters West. I loved everything about West until he supported spoiler Ralph Nader against then–Vice President Al Gore in 2000. . . . The Iraqi people, and the people of the entire globe, are so much the worse since Gore, the climate-change believer and war skeptic, was defeated by George W. Bush that year, with an assist from the Supreme Court. And Nader’s Green Party. West never apologized. He didn’t see a third party pl
Cornel West announces his run for president as the candidate for the People's Party, June 5.
Photo: CornelWest/CornelWest via REUTERS
From “Cornel West Should Not Be Running for President” by Joan Walsh for the Nation, June 8:
I loved early Democratic Socialists of America leader Cornel West. I loved author of the 1993 book Race Matters West. I loved everything about West until he supported spoiler Ralph Nader against then–Vice President Al Gore in 2000. . . .
The Iraqi people, and the people of the entire globe, are so much the worse since Gore, the climate-change believer and war skeptic, was defeated by George W. Bush that year, with an assist from the Supreme Court. And Nader’s Green Party.
West never apologized. He didn’t see a third party playing a spoiler role to Democrats as bad—obviously, since he’s about to do it again. He did support Barack Obama in 2008, but he turned on him fairly quickly, making criticisms that went way beyond Obama’s political decisions. Then he supported Jill Stein in 2016. More recently, West has gone off the deep end. He promoted his 2024 candidacy, on the fringe People’s Party line, with an appearance on former comedian Russell Brand’s Web show, now frequented by right-wingers. And weeks ago, he praised Florida’s extremist governor, Ron DeSantis, in The Wall Street Journal, “for his revolutionary defense of the classics.”
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