Al Gore's coming back — but how far?
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Updated 5/22/2006 12:47 AM ET
By Anthony Breznican and Bill Nichols, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON — In a parallel universe, President Al Gore reports that his administration has stopped global warming. Gas costs 19 cents a gallon, and oil companies warrant a federal bailout. "If it were the other way around, you know the oil companies would help us," Gore deadpans.
OK, so that was on NBC's Saturday Night Live on May 13, and Gore isn't president. But the reality is, Gore is back and he's hot.
Six years after his agonizing election loss to George W. Bush, the former vice president is basking in the limelight generated by the national release this week of An Inconvenient Truth, an independent film that documents his crusade against global warming.
Gore says he's trying to get people to lead their leaders. A groundswell of political will from regular citizens, he says, will pressure politicians and automobile, fuel and chemical corporations to embrace green technology.
"There are a few irresponsible companies, making billions of dollars by dumping massive qualities of global warming pollution into the Earth's atmosphere," Gore, 58, told USA TODAY. "When 50.1% of the American people are passionate and committed and feel the sense of urgency that's appropriate here, then the political system will flip. I think we're close to a tipping point."
Gore's re-emergence has fueled speculation that he still wants to be one of those leaders. He has fun with the idea even as he bats it away. Asked where he'd like to be in 21/2 years, he strokes his chin, stares ahead and says dreamily, "Standing on the steps of the Capitol — " before buckling with laughter.
Seriously, Gore says, "I've been in elected politics for more than a quarter-century. I've run four national campaigns. I've been there, done that. I've found there are other ways to serve, and I'm enjoying them."
An Inconvenient Truth, based on a slide show Gore developed and has given for years, is part documentary, part dark comedy and part horror thriller. As narrator, Gore makes jokes at his own expense, presents a cartoon clip from Fox's cartoon Futurama about cooling the ocean with ice cubes and shows footage of storms, floodwaters and scorching drought that would be thrilling if they were fiction instead of fact.
He presents scientific data and news footage to illustrate havoc in weather patterns caused by pollution. He says greenhouse gases are increasingly raising ocean temperatures, leading to superstorms like Katrina; disrupting the wilderness food chain, leading to more tree-killing beetles and more wildfires; and contributing to droughts and floods.
While there is a consensus among scientists that the planet is warming, politicians and others disagree over the pace of climate change, how much damage it's doing, what causes it and what to do about it. Some groups — many of them funded by fuel and chemical companies — are skeptical.
The Washington-based Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), one such group, has created ads in response to Gore's film. One shows a person riding a bicycle in the snow while a woman intones: " 'Let's force people to cut back,' they say."
Myron Ebell, CEI's director of energy and global warming policy, acknowledged that the group gets funding from companies such as ExxonMobil but says that doesn't compromise him. His group says global warming is not a crisis, and oil use shouldn't be curtailed.
Ebell says deforestation, not pollution from fossil fuels, is to blame for some climate problems. He also says "niche technologies" such as solar, wind and ethanol "can only provide small amounts of the energy we need."
Instead of giving up on such alternatives, Gore says, the country can adapt to make energy both plentiful and less environmentally toxic. And he wants the push to come from both parties. "I think this is a moral issue, not a political issue," Gore says.
Gore is a longtime environmental advocate whose best-selling 1992 book, Earth in the Balance, made the case that human activity threatens the planet. In his new role as film star, as well as recent speeches ripping into Bush policies on secrecy and the Iraq war, he's a prominent voice for liberals.
Some Democrats say Gore should not rule out running for president. "He would bring stature, good name, name ID, money and a rallying cause — the environment," says Donna Brazile, Gore's 2000 campaign manager.
Joe Trippi, who ran former Vermont governor Howard Dean's bid for the White House in 2004, says Gore is well-positioned to run as an outsider whose stands are much sharper than most leading Democrats. "He's a guy who doesn't have to worry about who he offends," Trippi says. "He has the unique ability to say that he's worked within the system and the system's broken and he can lead the way."
Bruce Cain, head of the Institute of Governmental Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, says a Gore candidacy would be problematic for several reasons, including New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's head start on fundraising and lingering perceptions of Gore as a bad candidate.
"He was regarded as wooden and prone to artificial makeovers," Cain says. "Even if you believe he's found his true voice out of office, the question is whether the old consultant-managed wooden image would reappear once he got back into the limelight."
Gore says he is a changed man since 2000: "I have been through a lot, and the old cliché about 'whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger' does have some validity to it."
And he still has impact in the political world. A recent e-mail campaign he agreed to do for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee raised more than $200,000. That made it the most successful e-mail campaign the committee has done.
But Gore is far more involved in civic and private-sector pursuits than in politics. A longtime technophile, he is a board member at Apple Computer, a senior adviser to Google and a founder of Current, an interactive cable TV network. He is also helping launch a new bipartisan education group, the Alliance for Climate Protection.
It's the next phase of the crusade now immortalized in An Inconvenient Truth. As he puts it, mocking both his environmental and high-tech preoccupations, "Saving the planet, one slide at a time."
Contributing: Jill Lawrence |
