Dear Al,
You made it. You are a global hero of the 'save the earth' movement, the Numero Uno of those who fight to promote the responsible treatment of the environment we all share and in which our children and their children will have to be able to breathe. Your criticism of Bush is scorching. And, most importantly, you may yet be called by the Democrats to save the day in 2008. So please, for your sake and ours, stop reinventing yourself and, above all, drop this unbecoming coyness.
You know that I am one of your long time supporters. And I am grateful to you for inviting me early in my career -- in 1976! -- to address your Congressional group, the Clearing House of the Future; for serving as keynote speaker at our annual Communitarian meeting; and for including me in White House meetings you ran as vice president. In short, this is a friendly voice.
On the Saturday, July 7th edition of NPR's Weekend Edition, Scott Simon asked you if there was "something incongruous in you flying around the country in a huge, air-polluting airplane and shouting 'global warming, global warming.'"
You responded: "Well, our whole civilization has a pattern that has developed over the last 150 years that makes it easy to participate in generating the global warming pollution, but many of us have long since become what's called 'carbon neutral.' I'll be traveling by Amtrak from the first of these concerts in North America on the Mall to Giants Stadium, and the concerts themselves will set a new green standard."
Scott: "I'm not sure if I understand this phrased as 'carbon neutral.' To be 'carbon neutral,' wouldn't you have to stop breathing?"
You: "Well, the phrase is actually used to mean two things: reducing CO2 pollution as much as you can and then through the use of offsets, verifiable, audited reductions of CO2 emissions elsewhere to have a net impact of zero or less."
Such responses just set our teeth on edge! Amtrak is not carbon neutral. And the fact that you traveled between two stops by train does not begin to answer the question about the effects of all those private jet flights. Can't you simply say "fair enough, but sometimes you have to add a tiny bit of pollution to mobilize hundred of millions of people for a cause"?
Next, Scott asked you: "Mr. Gore, I saw you on The Today Show, and you convinced me you don't want to run for president. Is there something I missed?"
You: "No, I don't have any plans to be a candidate."
Scott: "That's not the same thing now."
You: "Well, it's the nuance you may have heard me repeat, but it's one that has a purpose. I haven't made a so-called Sherman statement, but the reason for not doing so isn't an effort to be coy and leave the door open for running. It's just there's no reason to do that."
Can you not simply say, "I do not plan to run, I have set up no campaign headquarters nor an exploratory committee, but I will not close all doors, burn all bridges. No one can tell what the nation may need months or even a year from now"?
Frankly this constant reinvention of yourself (remember when you chose to change the colors of your clothing?) and this coyness makes quite a few voters and followers uncomfortable. You and they deserve better.
Amitai Etzioni is University Professor at the George Washington University and author of, most recently Security First: For A Muscular, Moral Foreign Policy.