An Open Convention For Gore

Al Gore once campaigned for me with his foot in a cast. As we waited to be introduced at a luncheon he confided that the injury had ended his dream of an NBA career; that and the fact that he was 46 and Vice President of the United States. I expressed my sympathy.

Later, I was privileged to work with him in the Clinton White House. I saw right away he had impeccable character and a superb mind; curious, imaginative and relentless. And he was funny. This last part was hard to get across to friends back home.

One problem was his dry humor. Like the best sketch comics, he never smiled too soon. He used pauses like Jack Benny, pretending to mull over an indignity, allowing his listener to absorb the full irony of a remark or situation.

A bigger problem was that he was less funny in public, as if on the way to the lectern his personality seized up. His wooden, sing song delivery reminded me of how my third grade class said good morning to our principal. He liked to preach.

It was easy to lampoon. Reporters, including scores of envious boomers out to burnish their 'just plain folk' credentials, were merciless. In a pivotal 2000 debate, Bush lied and Gore sighed. Cable news spent a week ignoring the lies and replaying the sighs, long enough to reverse overnight polls that had Gore winning the encounter.

That December, the Supreme Court disgraced itself by declaring Bush president. A new book by Jeffrey Toobin reveals that Justice David Souter, an appointee of Bush's father, considered resigning over it and that Sandra Day O'Connor, a Reagan appointee and the critical fifth vote, sees it now as the worst mistake of her career, which it no doubt was.

Gore won the popular vote not only nationally but in Florida, where thousands of blacks were robbed of their franchise and where a deceptive ballot tricked thousands of Jews into voting for a man they loathed. 'Hanging chads' were beside the point. Gore won Florida not by a few hundred but by many thousand votes.

The duty of a court in an election case is to honor the intent of the voters. In Bush v. Gore, the Court deliberately ignored voter intent. The majority believed so little in the logic of its own ruling that it forbade its use as precedent in future cases, an act itself without precedent in a system built on it.

The arc of the moral universe indeed bends toward justice. Seven years later, the true winner of 2000 is taking a victory lap such as the appointed winner will never know. The Nobel Prize Gore won for his crusade against global warming has whipped into a frenzy fans already bent on drawing him into the 2008 presidential race.

God knows there's reason to pick him. He's funny in public now and he's as close to visionary as politics gets. He championed the internet before other politicians knew the word. He studied terrorism and loose Soviet nukes a decade before 9/11. His 2002 speech opposing the Iraq war was more than prescient, it was brave.

Gore was taking punches on the environment long before the elder Bush taunted him as 'Ozone Man'. Even as he savors the world's applause, his thick skin comes in handy back home, where the debate on global warming heats up more slowly than the planet, there being so few politicians in the business of telling inconvenient truths.

In the last Republican debate not even John McCain said the word 'conservation'. Mitt Romney is for fuel efficiency but isn't sure we need federal standards. Fred Thompson wonders what causes global warming. Fred got endorsed by James Inhofe, the guy who compares Gore's Oscar winning film to "Mein Kampf" and calls global warming "the greatest hoax ever perpetrated."

Democrats are better but not by enough. House Democrats passed a bill raising fuel standards to 35 miles a gallon by 2020--13 years to get to where Europe is now. In the presidential race, only Dodd has a believable energy blueprint. As always, the front runners have the least to say.

The Democrats' odious 2004 platform endorsed "the right of every American to drive the vehicle of his or her choice." Gore would never tolerate such an abdication today, but he once did. In 2000 his advisors, pitching him as the un-Clinton, gulled him into dropping the environment for "family values" and a tinny sounding populism. Gore says he'll never again let a pollster tell him what to say. His supporters think he means it; so do his opponents.

Gore's willingness to risk the skepticism of the unconverted is invaluable when so many basic systems are in need of restructuring; energy, health care, defense and the budget being just the big four. His election may be the one thing that could wipe clean a stain on our democracy.

But will he? A million pundits have already told you why not. Some ask why, with global celebrity, a sizeable fortune, an Oscar, an Emmy and a Nobel Prize, he ever would. He can already hang with Leonardo DiCaprio and Nelson Mandela.

I read him differently. Gore knows all the things a president can do that even a Nobel Laureate can only dream of. If Hillary weren't leading the field he'd already be in. But she isn't planning on faltering any time soon and Gore is smart enough to know that a primary challenge to her would only license a lazy media to put him back on the couch.

There is still a faint possibility, a chance not only for Gore but for an Edwards, Dodd or Richardson. It's the chance that the insanely frontloaded nominating process backfires on party insiders, distributing delegates to enough different candidates to keep anyone from getting a majority.

Democrats have jiggered the rules to favor front runners ever since McGovern. Believing that a short primary calendar, like a short meeting, favors whoever's in charge, they front load the process. States lusting for attention pushed it up even further.

The first New Hampshire primary took place on March 11, 1952. By February 9th, 2008, the Virgin Islands, District of Columbia and 31 states will select 2,776 delegates, about two thirds of the total. By March 11, 2008, 87% of delegates will already be chosen.

Never before has there been a prospect of so many delegates up for grabs with so many candidates still in the race. One of two things will happen. If Clinton sweeps, prepare for the longest intermission in the history of show business, from early February till August 25th in Denver. But if Obama, Edwards and a second tier candidate outperform expectations, she might not make 50%. Then the fun begins.

Both parties have embarrassed themselves by allowing primaries to begin so early that campaigns bleed into the holiday season of the preceding year. (Jingle Bell Rock the vote.) The debates are a stinging disappointment. Delegates would ask much tougher questions than those posed by the celebrity press, and demand real answers to boot.

A political party ought to have time for second thoughts. It ought to make its selection at a point closer in time to when voters make theirs. Ironically, a convention might prove more open than primaries, at least to ideas. For the first time in memory, the platform might matter, forcing Democrats to sort out whatever it is they really believe.

Republican justices who appointed Bush were said to fear "chaos." But in a system as calcified as ours, a little chaos may be just the thing to water liberty's tree. A process can be more chaotic and more rational. The convention and the months leading to it would be a battle for the soul of a party. In that battle, the drumbeat for Gore could be deafening.

Comments

[eddiestardust]

Nope, not going to happen...Hillary has it too
much sewn up for it to be a brokered convention.

BUT...

If Gore got in now, it would be a fight, to be
sure, but Hillary would lose.

Gore has little chance to become president if
Hillary wins.

If Gore does not run and Hillary loses, then he
has one more shot.

[splashy]

Those Repub judges idea of "chaos" is to let actual progressives have a go at governing, because the wealthy rightists wouldn't have as much say in what happens.

Can you imagine it? A time when the WORKING PEOPLE have more control than the corporatists? To the corporatists/bankers/money pushers, who are parasites on our economy, that would be CHAOS. They would actually have to SHARE the wealth with those that GENERATE IT, you know, the workers - God forbid!!

What a scam they have going. It's been GREAT for them, horrible for the 99% that are not them.

[wrabbitt]

heres an idea, you get picked like jurors do to vote on bills in front of the new congress made up of regular people on line. just because congress believes we have no concept of the strength of the american voter don't mean we can't dream. lets move into the next century with out lobbyists,congress, senate , or insurance/drug cartels, let the american people vote on whats important to us. not some aged,out of touch ex lawyer with a need to make money off our needs change this mess... save Democracy before it turns into something worse ...

[bushlies]

Unfortunately, I think Al Gore was so disgusted at the way the political process was highjacked by the Repugs and their Supreme Court in 2000 that he wants nothing more to do with politics. It will take a deadlocked convention for Gore to be drafted, and that doesn't look like it's going to happen. It's unfortunate for us as a nation because I think he is the best man for the job.

The odious Repugs are more likely to have a deadlocked convention than the Dems. That will bring L'il Bro Jebby into the mix with all the horrors such a prospect will produce.

Sucks, doesn't it?

[speak2ar]

Gore is not the same man he was in 2000;
indeed, we are not the same country we were.
Gore has found strength and sharpened his vision. But he is not alone in this. The lessons of the past eight years added to years of dedicated service have given clarity of vision to others who must be included in our next administration. Two men of good character are Wesley Clark and John Edwards. Read Clark's "A Time to Lead for Duty, Honor, and Country." He, like Gore, has a clear understanding of what needs to be done for our country. Clark can lead us forward. Gore can heal us.

[habajebe]

Gore was the man in 2000. He won fair and square and should have been allowed to be Pres by Poppy's Supreme buddies. But that's ancient history. At this point, Gore would be foolish to take on the responsibility of cleaning up the monstrous mess left by the Decider, Dead Eye Dick and their merry band of witless neocons. If the rule of law and many years of precedent had been followed in 2000, we wouldn't be in this position, stuck in the Iraqi quagmire, universally hated, routinely frightened, under surveillance, with the rich raping the other 80% of us. Things could have been so different, had Ms O'Connor found a spine and stood up for what was right. Again, ancient history.

An Edwards/Clark ticket would truly kick ass. We need an anti-Bush. Edwards would do a lot to reverse the gutting of the middle class, perhaps spreading this nation's emense wealth a little more fairly. "Lifting all boats," so to speak. Clark could take a Cheney-esque VP role, only with the vision required to make us safer and more secure and not solely to enrich Halliburton and their ilk. We could start the long climb back to the prominence we enjoyed before this country fell into the hands of charlatans, ideologues and thieves.

[phonyvet]

I am an old man with little money and no history of mainstream politics or political activism (although I did make the Selma-Montgomery march in 1965), but I swear to God I will contribute, canvass, and cajole, rain or shine, for Al Gore if he decides to run. It's clearly his moral and patriotic duty to do so; and it will clearly be mine, in however small a way, to assist him.

[blooddoc]

Amen, brother. Gore is the only (potential) candidate I would support financially - that is, beyond a simple vote. He has the intelligence, vision, and experience to turn this country around from the disaster that has been the Bush II years. Barring unforeseen events, I doubt he will decide to run, but if he does, I'm here. And,I suspect, so are a few million others.

[avergejoe]

To introduce a little sanity about Gore;
he chose LIE-BERMAN as a running mate!

[azn1011]

only because he wanted to distance himself from Bill Clinton, which i think was a mistake.

[SaintPete]

Hillary would be fine as Pres if Al Gore were part of her administration- it would happen if she knew it will help her to gain consensus.

[SaintPete]

Curry, you say that thousands of old Jews in Palm Beach County were tricked into voting for a man they loathed- That is incorrect. They were victimized intentionally by low quality ballots cards which were purposely supplied, for just that reason. Dan Rather showed the evidence in his presentation on voting machines last month on HDTV. Here's a link to it: www.hd.net/drr227.html

[Giglawyer]

Yes tricked into using cards that the local Democratic party approved prior to the election.

Please let this die. Its over. Move On.

[splashy]

The person that designed those cards was a former Repub that had recently switched to Dem. Does THAT tell you anything?

Nope, won't let it die. It was an injustice.

[cad420guy]

Al Gore, the next Ross Perot.

[wrabbitt]

mad because Perot was right are we????

[rwe]

Let's have Al Gore run with Jimmy Carter as his running mate. This way we will have two the three worst Nobel prize winners, Yasser unfortunately couldn't be Sec of State. and Al would have the chance of coming close to Jimmy as the worst president ever

[Steamboater]

All this continued talk about Gore running is getting real tired. The man hasnt got it in him to go through it again and besides, he's become an icon for a green world. Forget it. He's not running.

[dkistner]

I doubt they would admit it publicly, but in the privacy of that voting booth, I think a lot of Bush voters would, out of guilt if not the need to fight for their country and children's future, cast their votes for Gore. If they're old enough to remember "Dallas," they just might be longing for a "Bobby in the shower" moment: A seeming eon's worth of very bad writing washed like sin down the drain; the expedient, rapturous end of a very bad dream!

[Boxorox]

Gore lost in 2000.
Bush won. Bush became and still is the president. Learn about the U.S. constitution and the American political process.
Let Gore try again in 2008.
But you have to get over this sour grapes tripe about a failed election 7 years ago.

[dirtystrat]

Not one of the recounts had Gore winning. Gore lost the election because he couldn't carry his own state pure and simple. The sooner you face reality, the better prepared you will be to face the future.

[splashy]

So, the resident repubs are spouting the BS once again.

[eddiestardust]

Dirtystrat,

I assure you, that if you were running for
an office and your opponent chose to take it to court to stop a recount, you would definitely cry foul.

[wrabbitt]

the president is supposed to be elected by the people don't that make the Electoral College unconstitutional? besides being antiquated and outdated who says who gets what? when in the course of human events...... do i go on or has someone besides me read this?

[littleblackcat]

Good name for yourself, friend. Gore did NOT lose in 2000, and bushit DID NOT WIN!!! Repuke appointees handed the office to what is undoubtedly the most repulsive, criminal, dishonest administration the world has even known.
That thing is not, never has been, and never will be president. The entire administration is in itself an "axis of evil" unknown to the U.S. until they moved in. Shed the title you have given yourself and use your head for something other than a hat rack.

[madcindy]

I'm a 67 year old lifelong Democrat who also supported Gore in 1988, worked for Clinton/Gore both times and for Gore in 2000.
I believe he will run and I respected him when I heard him say early this year that he would have nothing to do with a 600 day campaign. So I'm waiting with a DraftGore.com bumper sticker to support him again.
I also heard him admit that the President of the USA would be able to do more about Global Warming then he can as a private citizen.

[Dalicious]

I enjoyed your little fantasy, but there are hundreds of scenarios more likely than the one you enjoyed making up.