Making a Personal Protest

It was noon Saturday, the appointed hour for peace activist Jerry Rubin to begin his latest hunger strike.

This time, Rubin would shun food in an attempt to persuade independent candidate Ralph Nader to drop out of the presidential race so as not to draw progressive voters from the Democratic nominee, Sen. John F. Kerry.

But first, as shoppers meandered past his “peace table” on Santa Monica’s Third Street Promenade, Rubin bit into an apple. No one appeared to notice.

Fifteen minutes later, the hunger strike was officially on.

“I feel Ralph Nader was partially responsible for George Bush’s victory in 2000,” Rubin declared, echoing a familiar critique of Nader’s earlier Green Party candidacy.

“I mean this not as a personal attack against Mr. Nader, but just in general: Stupidity is not a progressive value,” Rubin said. “And I feel we will be going in the wrong direction if George Bush is allowed to occupy the White House for four more years.”

Rubin, a deeply tanned 60-year-old wearing a Gandhi T-shirt, has long been an antiwar fixture in Santa Monica. In December, he legally changed his name to Jerry Peace Activist Rubin. (He is not, however, the leftist Jerry Rubin of the “Chicago Seven” who was charged with inciting violence during the 1968 Democratic National Convention and died in 1994.)

On weekends, Rubin preaches peace from behind his table, peddling $2 bumper stickers with slogans like “Arms Are for Hugging.” He has conducted more than 30 hunger strikes, by his count, including one in 1997 that ended when he collapsed and was rushed to the hospital. This time, he will allow himself vegetable broth, herbal tea and juice during the first week.

Rubin’s latest strike failed to immediately sway Nader, who is on the ballot in more than 30 states and has sued for ballot access in several others.

“He’s not going to change Ralph Nader’s mind,” said campaign spokesman Kevin Zeese.

But a few locals were impressed. Roland Koncan, a wispy-haired attorney who asked Rubin to bless a flower he planned to take to a Pacific Palisades shrine that houses some of Gandhi’s ashes, lauded Rubin’s “noble cause.”

“We hate Bush!” Koncan’s 8-year-old son, Caelin, shouted gleefully.

“We don’t hate Bush,” Koncan said, after admonishing the boy not to drag the “sacred flower” on the sidewalk. “We don’t hate anybody.”