We’re still waiting for that Sherman statement…. From a report in the Daily Telegraph (Hat tip, Big Orange’s anoodle):
Friends of Al Gore have secretly started assembling a campaign team in preparation for the former American vice-president to make a fresh bid for the White House.
Two members of Mr Gore’s staff from his unsuccessful attempt in 2000 say they have been approached to see if they would be available to work with him again.
One of his former campaign team said: “I was asked whether I would be available towards the end of the year if I am needed. They know he has not ruled out running and if he decides to jump in, he will have to move very fast.
“He hasn’t asked them to do this, but nor has he told them not to.”
Among the senior officials not yet committed is Michael Whouley, who was national field director for the successful Clinton-Gore 1992 presidential campaign, national campaign manager for Mr Gore when he stood for re-election as vice-president in 1996, and then a senior adviser to Mr Gore in 2000.
The Big Dog thinks Gore might run:
“You’ve got the prospect that Vice President Gore might run,” Mr. Clinton said last night on CNN’s “Larry King Live.” Now, talk that Mr. Gore might enter the race has swirled for a while, though some pundits and political types dismissed it as far-fetched. Does Mr. Clinton, who may be the most politically plugged in man in America, know something that makes him think this is a live possibility?
Then again, Maybe not:
Recently released campaign finance records show longtime Al Gore friend and confidant Debby Butler gave $1,000 to Illinois Senator Barack Obama’s campaign.
After Gore won the Oscar for his movie, “An Inconvenient Truth,” she called Gore’s office just to check in and make sure he wasn’t interested in another run. They told her she was free to go with another candidate.
Which is not a denial, of course; Butler is “free.”
So…
I’d give money to Gore, like I gave money to Dean—and won’t send money to Clinton, Obama, or Edwards, though Edwards could still change my mind—for these reasons:
1. Gore is a proven winner. He won election 2000, and the Republicans stole it from him (Bush v. Gore was just the lat twist of the knife; the real theft was undertaken by Jebbie when he purged the Florida voting roles of Democratic voters).
2. Gore has the broad vision and the systems thinking. The 2008 election really is make or break for the country. The earth: Global warming. The world: The strategic disaster of Iraq, and the coming blowback. Society: Terrible, lethal inequalities and a ruling class that believes in nothing but thieving and lying, all under cover of so-called Christianity. The Constitution: Destroyed by the authoritarian Republican party. The government: A looted shell, infested with Christianist
moles and operatives, ready to sabotage anything good
For every single one of these problems, the Republicans are not just wrong, they’re fighting fiercely to drag the country over the cliff, past the point of no return. And Hilbadwards—good people, all—seem to think of these problems as policy issues, instead of seeing them as systemic, indicative of terrible sickness in the body politic.
I believe that Gore is the only (potential) candidate with the vision, the knowledge, and the experience to step up to problems of this scope, and take the fear out of our discourse that prevents us from addressing them.
3. Truthtelling is game-changing, as we saw with Dean. Gore can tell the truth on a larger scale than Dean could or can; no knock on Dean at all, it’s just that Gore’s worked on a broader canvas.
I see Hilbadwards being partial truthtellers: Barack Obama is good on the war, but “hope” is not a strategy. Edwards is good on inequality, but I can’t see him having the process knowledge to restore a functioning government; Hillary’s terrible on the war, and hasn’t, not once, addressed the Constitutional depredations to the Bush regime, as Gore did by attacking the crackpot theory of the unilateral executive early on.
And maybe Gore can take down the media, because I’m sure he’s been thinking about. Edwards has already experienced what the SCLM can do, first with Amanda, and now with the haircut, and has yet to even react. They only winged Obama with the “Hussein” thing, but they haven’t really started to work out on him. And Hillary’s addressed the problem by getting into bed with Rupert Murdoch. But Oscar winners do tend to be media savvy.
So, I hope Gore runs. I know he’s not a saint, he’s not running for Pope. The country needs a President on the scale of FDR, and the only candidate I can see of that scale is Gore.
Front page
No War, Vote Gore
What is it worth to save the Earth?
Gore! Gore! Gore! Gore!
Speaking of Gore, check out Laurie David and Sheryl Crowe’s face to face chat with Karl “Don’t touch me, it burns!” Rove…
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Gore is the Man...
A lot of us out here will definitely come home to Gore if he gets into the race. I like Gore-Obama, Gore-Feingold, Gore- Edwards, Gore-Richardson, even (gulp) Gore-Clinton. So long as it’s Gore. The Nobel Prize might just be the tipping point. C’mon, we need the guy!!
Is this real or just a plot
Is this real or just a plot to keep the former VP’s name in the headlines. After all, much of the recent attention he’s garnered will likely evaporate if it becomes clear that he is not running.
We’ll have to see.
Hell yes
Al & Bill ’08!
Oh… wait… that’s not what you meant. Damn…
But I still believe
And I will rise up with fists!!
I wish...
No, I dream of the Al and Bill ticket. But I’ll take whatever we can get.
Le Sigh
Gore is a bit of a hypocrite, okay, he’s a big FAT one, I just can’t find anybody liberal enough, beside Kucinich. I think everybody just wants to be Gore’s cheerleader. His wife is a fucking crazy that took the positive lyrics of DK and Twisted Sister to court back before I was even born, and she is still a rampant bitch today. I know politicians only marry for status and find other places for sex, like the environment or interns (beside Kucinich, his wife is hot!) but it still reflects on them poorly.
I’d only vote for the guy in the final election, but I won’t even consider him for a primary.
What a shame you won't consider Gore...
Better trolls, please!
No authoritarians were tortured in the writing of this post.
I just don't see Gore running
Although one can always hope. But Gore’s real interest is in stopping global warming, and I’ve come to the conclusion that he believes he can be more effective on his pet issue outside of electoral politics. Also, I don’t think that Gore wants to deal with the foreign policy headaches that GWB is going to leave his successor with because they’d take too much time away from what Gore is really concerned about. I’m afraid that if Gore ran for President, he’d just tighten up and turn back into the old Gore, because he’d stop having fun and start worrying about being “electable”. In the current era, candidates don’t run campaigns, campaigns run candidates.
BTW, I don’t think Kimberlee’s trolling. Kucinich could be a viable candidate if the Democratic activist base hadn’t decided beforehand that he was unelectable. I have some reservations about Tipper myself, although I don’t think that she’s a psycho bitch, and she’s come to have some regrets about her PMRC involvement. Do not fear, Kimberlee - with the possible exception of Nancy Reagan, no First Lady has run the country since Woodrow Wilson had his stroke.
…for the rest of us
Gore has better things to do
I’m with Dr. S. on this one. Gore is proving more effective, more powerful, and by all appearances infinitely happier in his current occupation than he ever did in politics. Goddess knows we need people like him in the politickin’ trade but I am not about to tell anybody who’s been through what he has that he is somehow obligated to sit chained to his seat pulling the oar on the Ship of State forever.
And I must differ with Thomas’ contention that
as I see it in just the reverse. It has, sadly, gotten to the point where anything anybody in politics says is perceived by the majority of people as being “just something he (she) is blathering about to get elected.” Even writing a book is seen as some sort of prelude to entry/reentry into the electoral scene, since it results in much TV exposure arranged by one’s publisher.
I fear that if Gore did weaken and heed the call of ego, no amount of “I reluctantly and humbly answer the call of the people to run for….” blah blah blah would help. The response would be a mass wave of “aw shit, he was just settin’ this up all along” rather than rejoicing at a well deserved comeback run.
And i say that wishing desperately that he would run for Senate again. Damn but I would love to see that twit Alexander knocked out of it and have somebody I can send mail to with at least a hope it might get read for some other purpose than being passed around Republican staff meetings to be giggled over before being shitcanned.
Huh? Call of ego?
He’s the best person for the job, is what I’m saying. False humility is a form of egotism too, though more subtle than the variety we’re used to.
No authoritarians were tortured in the writing of this post.
"Ego" is not a dirty word
but let’s face it there is some element of it in anybody who has the temerity to put themselves forward for the position of President. Especially somebody who has been the proverbial heartbeat away from the job for eight long years already, and simultaneously seen just how hugely ineffective a position it is to try to bring about change. (Not, alas, that Bill tried all that hard.)
Al’s been to the mountaintop, or one step down from it anyway. I don’t think he dropped his sunglasses or otherwise left anything behind at the summit that he feels a deep need to make that climb again to retrieve.
When President Edwards is sworn in, mind you, I would like nothing more than for him to create an equivalent of the “Minister Without Portfolio” position for Al. Give him an office, a salary, stationery with a nice letterhead, some staff (all with .gov emails and nothing else!) to give him rank to get into diplomatic meetings— and other than that let him alone.
Of course if he doesn’t want that job either, preferring total independence, I still want the job created but he should give it to Billmon.
This is all wishful thinking, I'm afraid
Al Gore would be a great president, and is some one who could lead the country out of the horrible mess it’s in. But anyone who takes on the job of cleaning up after the cretin in chief is going to have to have no life except that. that just isn’t Al Gore. He has a vitally important job in trying to save the earth, anyway.
Ruth
We're not convinced this article is legit...
Don’t get too excited, just yet…
We did some analysis of this article and are not entirely confident that it properly discusses a potential Gore run. Rather, we believe it may simply be a subtle attack on Hillary Clinton engineered, at least in part, by someone from the Edwards camp.
You can see your observations at: http://2008central.net/?p=530