You guys have been spouting on and off. The exaggerations, I mean. Dubya matches Gore on that score.
Yes, of course.....but only if you factor the media bias that currently runs at say...10:1.
My personal favorite is #11 in honor of the wife. #22 is pretty good too, nothing like the testimony of a fellow democrat and candidate for higher office;)
(Note: In 1996 I wrote a column titled "Four more years? Here are 40 reasons to say no." It became one
of the most widely read and reprinted pieces I've ever written. When Rush Limbaugh read the column
aloud over the air and mentioned that it could be found on the Boston Globe's web site, the digital tidal
wave that followed crashed the Globe's computer system. The switchboard operators were deluged for
days. In the weeks that followed, so many people called and wrote the Globe to request a copy of the
issue containing the "40 reasons" column that the back-issues department ordered an extra 1,000 copies
-- and sold out of them all. It was the most-requested issue of the Boston Globe, I was told, since the day
Larry Bird retired from the Celtics. What follows is a new "40 reasons" column -- updated for Election
2000.)
40 REASONS TO SAY NO TO GORE
By Jeff Jacoby
October 13, 2000
Al Gore for president? Amazingly, there are people who think that would be a good idea. Here are 40
reasons why it wouldn't:
1. He refuses to promise that he won't pardon Bill Clinton.
2. In his first year as vice president, he cast the tie-breaking vote to wrap the largest tax increase in
world history around the necks of American taxpayers.
3. But anybody who wants to *cut* taxes is peddling a "risky tax scheme."
4. Liar, liar (#1): "I found a little place in upstate New York called Love Canal."
5. Gore in the White House means four years of being talked down to like we're a class of unusually
slow 5th-graders.
6. Fed up with a landlord who wouldn't fix the overflowing toilets, clogged drains, and moldy walls in
their house, the Mayberry family finally gave up and moved out in July. The slumlord? Al Gore.
7. Listen to a liberal: "A president can lead only if other politicians believe that he keeps his word....
But Gore has displayed a Clintonesque tendency to say or do whatever is expedient" -- David Broder in
The Washington Post, Sept. 27, 2000.
8. He reacted to Clinton's impeachment by cheering the man who had sullied the Oval Office,
betrayed his wife, lied under oath, and obstructed justice: Clinton, Gore said, "will be regarded in the
history books as one of our greatest presidents."
9. Liar, liar (#2): "I ... walked through the elephant grass, and I was fired upon" in Vietnam.
10.Gore claims his favorite book is *The Red and the Black,* a novel written in 1830 by the French
author Stendhal. Puh-leez.
11. Private schooling for the Gores, but not a penny for vouchers that might rescue poor kids from
crummy public schools.
12. Asked whether his opinion of Bill Clinton changed when Juanita Broaddrick charged that Clinton
had raped her in 1978, Gore replied: "Whatever mistakes he made in his personal life are in the minds of
most Americans balanced against what he has done ... as president."
13. He wants gasoline prices to go even higher. ("Higher taxes on fossil fuels ... is one of the logical
first steps in ... a more responsible approach to the environment" -- Al Gore, *Earth In The Balance,* p.
173).
14. Liar, liar (#3): He told seniors in Florida that his mother-in-law pays $108 a month for the same
arthritis medicine he gets for his dog for $37.80.
15. Listen to a liberal: "He waged a relentlessly negative campaign, engaging in distortions and
misrepresentations" -- Al Hunt in The Wall Street Journal, Feb. 3, 2000.
16. For his first campaign chairman, he chose Tony Coelho, a political shakedown artist and
influence-peddler who left Congress under an ethical cloud.
17. And for a campaign manager, he chose Donna Brazile, who in 1988 was fired from the Dukakis
campaign for spreading filthy rumors about George Bush's private life.
18. On an adjusted gross income of $197,729 in 1997, Gore donated $353 to charity. Stung by bad
publicity, he upped his donations the following year -- and issued a press release trumpeting his
generosity.
19. He boasts that he was a co-sponsor of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance bill, a scandalous
proposal to silence grassroots activists and prevent challengers from raising the money they need to
compete against incumbents.
20. Liar, liar (#4): "Co-sponsor"? Gore left the Senate before McCain-Feingold was ever introduced.
21. He cozied up to loathsome race-baiter Al Sharpton in a private meeting in his daughter's
Manhattan apartment -- then had his aides deny that any such meeting was taking place.
22. Listen to a liberal: "Why should we believe that you will tell the truth as president if you don't tell
the truth as a candidate?" -- Bill Bradley, Jan. 26, 2000.
23. He wouldn't french-kiss Tipper in front of guests at his dining room table. But he was gauche
enough to do it at the Democratic convention in front of 4,400 delegates, 12,000 members of the press,
and a nationwide TV audience.
24. "I was raised a good part of my life on a farm. I've cleaned out hog lots. I've planted. I've
harvested. I've taken up hay all day in the sun, and then ... helped neighbors take it up by moonlight
before the rain came." Puh-leez.
25. Liar, liar (#5): "I accompanied James Lee Witt down to Texas when those fires broke out."
26. He chose a running mate independent-minded enough to oppose affirmative action, favor school
vouchers, and back partial privatization of Social Security -- then forced him to recant on all three.
27. He is so unhinged on the subject of global warming that he compares it to the Holocaust.
28. Listen to a liberal: "Gore is manifestly willing to lie for political convenience" -- James Fallows,
The Atlantic Monthly, July 2000.
29. He slams George W. Bush for admiring Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia -- without
mentioning that he voted to confirm Scalia in 1986.
30. He says support for gays in the military will be a litmus test for anyone he names to the Joint Chiefs
of Staff.
31. Say good-bye to your car: Gore has proclaimed "the strategic goal of completely eliminating the
internal combustion engine."
32. Liar, liar (#6): "The size of the federal government will go down in a Gore administration."
33. Gore sold his 1991 Gulf War vote to the highest bidder. According to former Senator Alan
Simpson, Gore offered to support whichever side "would offer him the most and the best speaking time."
The night before the vote, he barked at the GOP Senate secretary, "Dammit, Howard! If I don't get 20
minutes tomorrow, I'm going to vote the other way."
34. He mocks conservative activists as "the extreme right wing, the extra-chromosome right wing." An
extra chromosome is what causes Down syndrome.
35. On a tour of Monticello in 1993, Gore paused before some sculpted busts to ask, "Who are these
people?" The unfamiliar faces: George Washington and Benjamin Franklin.
36. He may just be the nastiest campaigner in national politics.
37. His explanation for not realizing that his fund-raising calls from the White House were soliciting
hard-money contributions was that "he drank a lot of iced tea during meetings, which could have
necessitated a restroom break." Puh-leez.
38. Oh, yes, there was controlling legal authority. It has been illegal since 1883 to solicit campaign
contributions in government buildings.
39. He'll exploit *anything* for political advantage: In his convention video, he made a point of
showing off a nude drawing of his wife.
40. Liar, liar (#7): "There has never been a time in this campaign when I have said something that I
know to be untrue."
Forty already -- and I didn't even mention his tobacco hypocrisy, or how he created the Internet, or the
fundraising felonies at the Buddhist temple. But how many reasons do you need? If 40 won't convince
you, nothing will. |
