Athens — Three-time presidential candidate Ralph Nader continued to attack rival Barack Obama on Friday for “talking white,” and called him a “corporate Democrat” who has surrendered his principles.

In a speech to 150 on the University of Georgia campus, Nader accused Obama, poised to be the first black presidential nominee of a major party, binding himself with ties to major U.S. corporations.

“I don’t want him to talk black. I want him to talk justice,” the 74-year-old independent presidential candidate said. “What’s the point of this country being on the verge of electing an African-American president , after all these years — and then have it mean nothing?

“[Obama is] always talking about his past as a community organizer. But again and again, day after day, he’s back-tracking, surrendering, flip-flopping — and appointing the worst corporatist advisors you can imagine,” Nader said.

Nader is a driven, unwilling-to-please character who’s hard to explain. He was late on Friday for a promised press conference. He drove from Columbia, S.C. — this is not a campaign that can afford a hired plane.

Only two reporters attended, but Nader insisted on standing behind the crystaline plastic podium, then bowing his head to read his remarks, in a shiny, well-worn gray suit. Age is beginning to show, in more ways than one.

Midway through his speech, Nader wandered down a tangent that amounted to an attack on modernity that made you remember his puritan roots — and how much, in a way, he still has in common with conservative Christians.

But you have to wonder how it went down with an audience that was dominated by plugged-in twenty-somethings.

Said Nader:

”Childhood is now commercialized. These corporations have dared to enter territory they never dared enter. Fifty years ago, when I was a kid, about the only thing they would sell directly to kids was bubble gum.

“Now they’re bypassing, undermining parental authority in the most insidious ways, selling junk food, junk drink — huge expansion of childhood obesity, diabetes, hypertension — and junk programming. Violent, vicious, sadistic programming that they’re now involving youngsters [in] through interactive video.

“The most vicious type of exploitation of children, for profit, by these corporations, whose heads get invited to the White House, for White House dinners. These are electronic child molestors.

“And we let them get away with it? Undermining parental authority, turning these kids into nags? That’s what advertising does….

“Where’s their shame? What have they done to us? We’ve become Pavlovian specimens, starting at age 3, 6, 10, 12. Looking at screens. It’s now 60 hours a week, pre-teens and teenagers are looking at screens. Television, Internet, inter — you know, computer screens — and the video games.

“What does that do to attention spans? Socialization?

“You don’t see kids playing in the streets anymore, hardly. That may not be a bad idea, in some cities. But you know what I mean.”

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Stuff that requires your attention

Friday, July 25, 2008, 10:07 AM

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Today’s necessary reading:

— The AJC editorial board and Secretary of State Karen Handel go at it over the Public Service Commission candidacy of Democrat Jim Powel.

Here’s their take. Here’s hers.

— Rep. Ron Stephens (R-Garden City) suggests that a hike in the cigarette tax would shore up the state budget and save lives.

— And the decision by five U.S. House members from Georgia, all Republican, to swear off earmarks is forcing the state’s two U.S. senators to do some extra lifting. Click here to read.

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