As for whether I’d believe me: I probably wouldn’t. The fact remains, I did it, as a class project for a causal analysis course taught by Donald Rubin. The question I was actually investigating was whether voters with similar demographic profiles were more likely to vote Nader if they were in safe states as opposed to swing ones. I found that there was a small but significant effect.

As to “cheated”: no, I don’t believe that Nader “cheated” Gore of a win. Nader had a right to run, and his voters (myself included) had a right to vote for him. Still, I believe the evidence firmly demonstrates that without Nader in the race, Gore would have won. No cheating, but still, a causal effect.

Do I find Bush’s win regrettable? I do. Do I cast the blame on Nader? That would be a waste of time. I cast the blame on the election system. If we’d had approval voting, or any of a dozen other good systems I could name, Nader could have exercised his right to run, and even done much better than he did, without spoiling the election.

I don’t want to fight with you. I want to convince you that voting reform should be a key issue for anyone who’d like to see a viable third party. You say that our system “allows for” third party votes; if that merely means spoiled elections, then I think we need more “allowance”.