I just read about this online, and to the best of my knowledge it's only a few hours old. Apologies if someone has already written about it.
While browsing the news online this evening, my eye was caught by a tantalizing headline: "Obama: I'd Hire Gore." According to the article, Obama has promised that if he is elected President, he will utilize Al Gore's knowledge and leverage to help solve the problem of global warming. From the article:
At a town-hall meeting, Obama was asked if he would tap the former vice president for his Cabinet to handle global warming.
"I would," Obama said. "Not only will I, but I will make a commitment that Al Gore will be at the table and play a central part in us figuring out how we solve this problem. He's somebody I talk to on a regular basis. I'm already consulting with him in terms of these issues, but climate change is real. It is something we have to deal with now, not 10 years from now, not 20 years from now."
I think this is fantastic news. Al Gore represents an authoritative bipartisan figure who has proven his dedication to fixing our impending (and beginning) climate catastrophes, and this could go a long way towards solidifying people's faith in Obama's progressive ideals, as well as proving his commitment to environmental protection (especially in light of Obama's controversial support of "clean coal," something I think is a bad idea even though I am an Obama supporter).
Not satisfied, I turned to Google News and dug a little deeper. Although I found no major news sources reporting yet, a number of smaller ones gave further tantalizing possibilities. KSLA News reports that "Barack Obama says he'd consider putting Al Gore in a Cabinet-level position," a statement corroborated by the Boston Herald, while another source, Pantagraph, takes it a step further by speculating that Obama "would consider putting [Gore] in a Cabinet-level position or higher." A quick search reveals several other websites reporting the same information.
Although this doesn't seem set in stone or an official policy item yet, I think it's very encouraging. Thoughts? How does this reflect on Obama's potential environmental policies? What influence do you think Gore might have on Obama's support of "clean coal?" I'd be interested to read other Kossacks' takes on this.