I just don't get it. Al Gore has managed to hold it in all these years, while nearly any other politician (or former one) would be screaming from every cable network rooftop: "I GOD DAMN TOLD YOU SO!"
I came across this article today. I was looking through some old web archives, and figured why not look around the old front pages of news sites. Well, CNN.com had a real doozie from August 15, 2000:
Gore, in St. Louis, says Bush would put U.S. back in record red ink
August 14, 2000
Web posted at: 8:43 p.m. EDT (0043 GMT)
ST. LOUIS (CNN) -- Making his way to the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles, Vice President Al Gore told a rally in St. Louis that this year's presidential election was a "battle for the future of our country."
Oh, but it gets better... much, much better.
Gore said his Republican opponents would lead the country back to the policies of the 1980s, adding, "What they caused last time were record deficits, repeat recessions, high unemployment."
It would be funny, if it wasn't so eerily correct. But we ain't done yet, folks...
There's this polite, ever so douche-baggy quip from the W camp:
"Dan Bartlett, another Bush spokesman, said Gore, as part of the Clinton administration, has had the past 7 1/2 years to work on Medicare and Social Security reform and was now at work on the "difficult task of reinventing his record of failing to."
Hmm, eight and a half years after that, and I think Bush, as part of the Cheney administration, has not only reinvented how to fail, completely redifined the meaning of the term.
But we'll end with this number, which might hit a little to hard for some. Though, this is what makes the entire article relevant to today.
Gore said he would set aside a portion of the nation's budget surplus to expand Social Security and Medicare and would make use of a "lock-box" to keep funding for health care safe from other political uses... Gore's more ambitious proposal -- and more costly, at $253 billion over 10 years (emphasis mine) -- would add a Medicare prescription drug benefit, offering free coverage for low-income recipients, a monthly premium arrangement for others and catastrophic coverage for all.
Damn boy! That sure sounds waaaay too expensive. Why would we ever need to spend that much on health care reform?
Oh... wait...