TAMPA -- In a chilly room atop Ybor city’s Cuban Club Tuesday night, Ralph Nader, the Ecology Party's nominee for President of the United States, schooled his supporters on how to “make people angry enough to vote Nader/Gonzalez in 2008.”

The more than 150 faithful listened intently with theirs sweaters and coats still buttoned up as Nader talked about how both of the major party candidates, Sen. Barack Obama and Sen. John McCain were slaves to corporations that have usurped power from the people.

He charged Obama with raising the most money from corporate America of any candidate in history, and said that if he is elected it will be more of the same corporate politics because “most Washington politicians are cowards.”

In his third run for the White House, Nader cautioned his followers against voting for the least worst candidate joking “hope and change and change and hope. Have got you hypnotized yet?”
Nader said instead of voting for Obama people who want real change should cast a ballot for him because it will give the Ecology party’s agenda leverage.

“The more millions of vote we have, the bigger our base, the more power we have to change the corrupt corporate government,” he said.

--Robbyn Mitchell, Times staff writer