I just don’t know how to tell you all this, but Al Gore isn’t going away and neither are the questions about what he will do next, having just scooped up a second Quill Award on the heels of his Nobel Peace Prize, in a year which already included an Emmy, an Academy Award and numerous other accolades.
The man is plowing through our prize-scape like an unstoppable bulldozer of acclaim.
So Al, where are you going with all this?
After nearly a week, Al, you are still out in front in Democracy for America’s Pulse Poll. What is most remarkable is that there is no mention of you, no position videos, no nothin’ to suggest writing you in except the fact that DFA provided participants with the ability to write in. As Abraham Running for Congress When I Turn 25 diaried, even though the poll is open until November 5, DFA was so taken aback, it sent out an e-mail this Tuesday to let DFA’ers know the rather shocking results and to add its own opinion:
Despite the fact that Al Gore has not announced that he will run and wasn't even included in the endorsement poll, DFA members have seized the power and written him in. With over 65,000 votes cast so far, the time has come for Vice President Gore to make a decision.
So, Al where are you going with all this?
Now lest you think it is only DFA’ers and Kossacks (and Red State!) who consider you to be a great bet, it seems the traders at InTrade agree. According to Portfolio.com
InTrade's traders reckon Gore has a 58% chance of getting the nomination if he runs, and an 89% chance of winning the presidency if he's nominated, and an all-over probability of 52% that he'll become president if he throws his hat in the ring.
Noting that Clinton is given only a 48% chance, Porfolio concludes that according to the market, you are "considered to be the best presidential candidate in America, on a pure electability criterion." Although the article follows the conventional wisdom that Clinton is currently so far ahead that you won’t throw your hat into the ring unless something catastrophic were to happen to Clinton, it nonetheless concludes that
Still, it's interesting to see how popular Gore is considered to be, compared especially to the other front-runners such as Giuliani, [17.6%] Romney (8.1%), and Obama (6.6%). Basically, the markets are saying that Gore would obliterate any of them, were he to run.
Well, Al, I think they’ve got it wrong that you won’t throw your hat into the ring unless Hillary capsizes. Your entry would capsize her in and of itself.
So what are you thinking, Al? We don’t really know. Today we have two tantalizing hints pointing in decidedly opposite directions. What can you tell us?
According to The Nation, there is a possibility that you are considering the possibility of possibly joining Rainforest Action Network in civil disobedience against the construction of new coal-fired power plants. Hmmm . . . .??
As many of us are already know, coal is the most carbon-intensive of the three major fossil fuels. Indeed, James Hansen, the NASA scientist who warned us about global warming during hearings before the US Senate in 1988 that that you initiated, has called for a complete ban on new coal-fired power plants "until we have the technology to capture and sequester the CO 2." Any plants built without that technology "are going to have to be bulldozed," argues Hansen, if the earth is to avoid "dramatic climate changes that produce what I would call a different planet."
And not long ago, you did mention to Nicholas Kristof in passing that you couldn’t understand "why there aren't rings of young people blocking bulldozers and preventing them constructing new coal-fired power plants."
According to the Nation, your office says you are considering it.
"He has not accepted any of their offers to date," Kalee Kreider, a spokeswoman for Gore, said of the RAN offer. Kreider did not deny that this phrasing leaves open the possibility of Gore saying yes down the road.
RAN’s national days of protest against coal are set for November 16-17, so we may know soon whether you intend to go in this direction. (BTW, any readers interested in learning more about these protests and how to become involved can learn more here.)
Of course, Al, Kossacks have been on top of the re-lauch of your current.tv website since day one (which was October 15). Barcelona diaried about the relaunch and linked to three videos that you personally uploaded the night before the launch in which you talk directly to the camera about universal health care, protecting our civil liberties and getting the troops out of Iraq. We thought it was interesting that were suddenly speaking directly to us on these important non-global warming issues.
Then today you surprise all of us with an e-mail to the AlGore.org list (people can join it by going here) to say the following
Current, the media company I co-founded six years ago with my partner Joel Hyatt, just last week launched a new web site that integrates television and the Web in an unprecedented way. It provides, as never before, a platform for citizens to make the media their own.
One of the features I'm most excited about on Current.com is called Viewpoints. Viewpoints is a virtual town hall where you can share your opinions, in video, about the issues that matter in the 2008 election: from global warming to government eavesdropping, and many more.
This digital town hall is already bustling, and you can find viewpoints from me and from a lot of people, including the candidates running for President. Come and listen to their positions and, more importantly, tell them and the rest of the world what you think!
http://current.com/...
Since Viewpoints is the only place on the Web where you can easily share your view in video, my hope is that you'll take this opportunity to go toe-to-toe with the pundits on TV and help contribute to a new platform for public discourse. All it takes is a webcam and 60 seconds.
And, since we'll be taking the most popular and most compelling viewpoints and airing them on Current TV -- now available in 52 million homes around the world -- you may very well get your voice heard on our global TV network.
I look forward to seeing and hearing you on Current.com, as we deepen the discussion on these important topics:
http://current.com/...
Thank you,
Al Gore
Well, I’ll be. Indeed, Al, you can expect to be hearing a lot from us, on Current and elsewhere, and we are keeping our eyes open and our ears to the ground for more word from you.
Then to cap it all off, your former campaign manager Donna Brazille wrote a very interesting op-ed published in the Knox News yesterday. In it, she opines that the decision to run for president is not political, but is 100 percent personal. She makes it clear she doesn’t cotton to pressuring you and Tipper, and she thinks we all need to respect your personal integrity and privacy and not act like we own you. Hey, that’s fair enough, right?
But then she just couldn’t resist letting loose with her personal feelings as well:
Like so many other Americans, I wish former Vice President Al Gore would declare his candidacy and let the chips fall where they may. But, for now, Gore has not shown any indication that he's preparing to re-enter a political arena so desperately hungering for a person of his stature and integrity.
. . .
Should Gore wake up one sunny morning and find himself ready to make an electoral comeback, there will be plenty of people ready to pack their bags and campaign for him 24-7 in the early states. We would have the contest some of us hunger for rather than the coronation most expect.
Al: Sunny morning, cloudy evening, monsoon (and we know you’d like a monsoon down where you live right now!), truer words have never been spoken. We’re waiting, and we’re there for you.
She also notes that you have transcended politics and achieved the stature of a great moral leader. If you don’t run, your endorsement (should one be forthcoming), she implies shouldn’t and won’t come cheap:
If, and only if, his endorsement were based on a substantive policy issue in which there was a wide difference among the candidates would his support be value-added to the non-Clinton candidate and not be perceived as being based on a personal grudge against the Clintons.
I couldn't agree more.
She concludes with this tantalizing line:
Our country will need his services again. Only Al Gore can decide if it is needed sooner rather than later.
Ah, but there she is dead wrong! True, only you can decide whether you are in or you are out. But you cannot make the decision as to whether the country needs your services sooner rather than later.
Let me be clear, Al: Our country needs your services. Sooner. Rather. Than. Later.
Brazille may or may not be right that the Draft Gore movement will have no effect on your decision (although, if she read the final pages of Assault on Reason and really appreciated them, I think she might not state her point quite so strongly!), but we now know one other thing too: Your staff is saving all those pennies, and stashing them "in jars" in the office!!!
So, have you given Al your two cents yet? I'm sure he'd love to hear from you.
The Honorable Al Gore
2100 West End Avenue
Suite 620
Nashville, TN 37203
Or, just hop on over to current.tv, sign up, click on the "Make a Point" icon and ask him yourself.
Hey, Al, where are you going with all this?