Think back with me a few years... say to November of 2000. The presidential race was coming down to a critical count in one state... Florida. Ultimately, we'll never truly know the outcome of the Florida recounts as the Supreme Court interceded where it had no business being in the first place and essentially declared George W. Bush to be the winner and the 43rd President of the United States. Thank you very much Sandra Day O'Connor. Needless to say, the ramifications of that decision has produced 7+ years of sheer hell for this country.

Though the full recount was never completed, most media outlets continue to report that Bush won Florida and the presidency by 537 votes. Nader tallied nearly 100,000 votes in the state, the overwhelming majority of which would have undoubtedly gone to Al Gore had Ralph not been in the race at that point. But Nader stayed in and the rest as they say, is history.

Now fast-forward to today... Speaking on NBC's "Meet the Press" this morning, Ralph Nader once again declared his candidacy for the presidency.

"One feels an obligation to try to open the doorways," Nader said. "Dissent is the mother of assent and in that context I have decided to run for president."

Well that's just fantastic freaking news, isn't it? As if the Democratic party wasn't sharply divided enough as it is. The rival Clinton and Obama camps, it's no secret, have been engaged in open warfare for months now. As the field has narrowed and the race tightened, that warfare has only gotten more intense and more brutal. Who ever ultimately wins the nomination is going to face an uphill fight to rally and unify the party around them. But I think that it could have been done. Now however, with Nader sticking his nose into the race, those divides in the party will more than likely only deepen. The Democrats stand to lose significantly more from Nader's entrance than do McCain and the Republicans as he's going to further fracture an already fractured Democratic party. There are a lot of Dems out there who would rather vote for Nader than vote for either Hillary or Obama, so just as in 2000, most of Nader's support is going to come from the left. Voting for Nader is essentially giving a vote to John McCain and the Republicans.

I'm all for the widest range of voices and perspectives. I'm all for third-parties and think that we should do more to encourage their growth to ensure that we're getting the best candidates into office. But this election is one of the most significant in our nation's history. Everything is at stake and the fate of our country is truly hanging in the balance. Right now is not the time for grandstanding and casting a protest vote. Ralph Nader has absolutely no chance of winning this election and after multiple failed bids for the White House, he damn well knows it. He has yet to carry even a single state in any election that he's run in. Not even close. This is just a matter of Ralph Nader being his usual egomaniacal self, trying to get his name in the papers and his face on television.

Obama put it best today when he said...

"My sense is that Mr.. Nader is somebody who, if you don't listen and adopt all of his policies, thinks you're not substantive. He seems to have a pretty high opinion of his own work... I do think there's a sense now that... if somebody's not hewing to the Ralph Nader agenda then you must be lacking in some way."

Many people intensely dislike Nader because of his stubborn refusal to withdraw from the 2000 elections. Though I personally think he should have fallen on his sword back then, I don't think that there is any way that he could have forseen the sh*tstorm that was about to hit this country. Most of us knew that Bush was going to be a nuisance, an annoyance even, but I doubt that anybody actually knew the depths he and his administration would drag this country through. But we've had 7 years now to see the truly horrific things the Republicans have done to this country and to other countries around the world. We've had 7 years now to see the absolute evil that Bush-Republicans stand for and seek to perpetuate. A John McCain presidency is for all intents and purposes, another term for George W. Bush and the Neo-Cons. For Nader to step into the race, to threaten to further fracture the Democratic vote is unconscionable.

There is too much at stake right now. I'm not saying that the Democrats have all of the answers. Because they don't. But the answers they do have will help begin to put this country back on the right track and will hopefully begin to repair our image around the world.

Maybe his candidacy won't have a noticeable impact on the general election. But it might. And it scares me to think that he could potentially syphon off enough Democratic votes to have an impact, to hand the presidency to John McCain. This country cannot afford another Bush-Republican presidency. This country cannot afford John McCain. And this country cannot afford for Ralph Nader to step in and muddy the waters any more than they already are. Nader needs to do the right and honorable thing for this country and for the American people. He needs to step aside.