CONOR O'CLERY/AMERICA: The foreign policy experts gathered in a wood-panelled room in upper Manhattan listened respectfully as Ralph Nader made his pitch.
Standing beneath framed portraits of the great and good, the independent candidate explained to them why he was running for president.
George Bush, he said, did not deserve another term. In fact he should be impeached for pushing the nation into a war in Iraq based on false pretences. His "messianic militarism" had exposed the fragility of America's democratic institutions. The war waged by this "out-of-control west-Texas sheriff" had been used to kill democracy, dissent and social progress.
He also wanted to challenge the "corporate globalisation" that was eroding workers' rights and to renegotiate America's membership of the WTO and its secret court system that had eroded US sovereignty.
And, he said, he wanted to highlight 30 social issues not addressed by either candidate and international dangers such as the "great pandemic" that was coming from China but no one was doing anything about. And he was the only candidate with a plan to bring home the troops from Iraq.
When the veteran consumer rights crusader finished, the members of the Council on Foreign Relations applauded politely. Many are New York liberals whose views on George Bush are not dissimilar. But the questions that followed had a distinctly hostile tone.
How on earth would Nader's candidacy help to defeat Bush? Why was he so stubborn? Why did he not get out of the race rather than risk giving the White House to George Bush - again.
In 2000 Nader got a mere 3 per cent of the vote as a Green Party candidate, but it was enough to allow Bush to defeat Al Gore in Florida and some other states.
Nader reacted somewhat testily (he gets this now wherever he goes). He wasn't going to play the game of "what if?" he said.
He could just as well ask, what if the mayor of Miami had not bought off thousands of Cuban votes?
"Given the wholesale abandonment of liberals such as you," snapped Nader to one questioner, a former supporter, "I will get more votes from anti-war conservatives."
Since Howard Dean conceded to John Kerry, Ralph Nader is indeed the only anti-war candidate in the presidential race.
John Kerry's policies on Iraq are little different from the president's.
The Massachusetts senator voted for the Iraq war, he supports the June 30th deadline, he is all for a greater UN role, and he would increase troop strength if necessary.
This is the Bush line but Kerry is campaigning on the premise that only he has the credibility to put together a genuine new international coalition.
(Unwilling to offend the Jewish lobby, Kerry also agrees with Bush's blanket support for Ariel Sharon, has dropped his criticism of the Israeli wall, and did not have anything to say about the killing of children by the Israeli army in Gaza last week.)
The Democratic candidate clearly wants to avoid becoming a target for not supporting the troops in Iraq.
With the war becoming increasingly unpopular, the prospect of Nader attracting a significant anti-war vote in November is causing nightmares among Democrats.
Nader's argument that he will take more votes from Republicans doesn't stand up. The latest polls show that if the election were held today Kerry would beat Bush 49-47 in a two-way race, but in a three-way contest it would be much closer, with Kerry's lead shrinking to 46-45 and Nader taking 6 per cent - mostly from Democrats.
"Nader is a genuine threat," warns Democratic pollster Stan Greenberg.
Kerry met Nader recently in Washington to try to cajole the veteran consumer activist into quitting. Nothing doing. The democrat took Howard Dean campaigning with him last week to try to nail the Nader-leaning anti-war votes, which could prove decisive in Florida and other key states.
Kerry people hope that Nader is running just to get into the presidential debates and will then drop out at the last minute, having made his point.
Some former Ralph Nader loyalists think it is more important to see Bush thrown out of the White House than to cast a protest vote.
Jason Salzman and Aaron Toso, who run a liberal PR firm in Denver, have created a website, Repentantnadervoter.com, which says the 2.9 million Nader voters of 2000 should now repent of their mistake.
"It looked like Gore and Bush were Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum, but Tweedle Dum has turned into a global tyrant," they say. A couple of unrepentant Naderites in Santa Cruz who oppose the stranglehold of the two-party system have launched a rival site, UnrepentantNaderVoter.com, but its links don't seem to be working.
John Kerry has been accused by the Bush campaign of flip-flopping. So when the Massachusetts senator suggested he might not accept his party's nomination until well after the nominating convention in Boston in July, they gleefully jumped all over him for indecision.
There was a good reason for Kerry's hesitation. Once nominated, a candidate cannot continue fund-raising, and with the Republican convention scheduled for September, Bush could keep raking in big bucks for another five weeks.
This week Kerry dropped the idea, especially after Boston's mayor, Thomas Menino, told him what he thought about the possible blow to hometown pride.
Robin Berrington of the US embassy in Dublin was (unjustly) ordered home in 1980 by then ambassador William Shannon for writing in a letter that Ireland was "small potatoes" with "food and climate well matched for each other - dull".
Now the retired foreign service officer is again putting his name to a controversial letter. Berrington was one of 80 former US diplomats who signed a letter to Mr Bush this month slamming the president for costing America its "credibility, prestige and friends" through his one-sided Middle East policy.