Is Al Gore more important than the President? 02138’s Bom Kim traveled to Los Angeles to ask the former vice president and environmental missionary about the earth’s lost balance, the current inhabitants of the White House, his respect for Michael Moore, and how it feels to be Harvard’s most influential alum. Oh, and one other thing: Is he running for president or what?
"If you don’t spend all your time raising money, you can communicate about the public interest."
02138’s Bom Kim traveled to Los Angeles to ask the former vice president and environmental missionary about the earth’s lost balance, the current inhabitants of the White House, his respect for Michael Moore, and how it feels to be Harvard’s most influential alum. Oh, and one other thing: Is he running for president or what?
Vice President Gore, we’re arguing that you are, at this moment, more influential than President Bush. Are we nuts?
Well, thank you for feeling that way, but yes.
We’ll have to agree to disagree then. But how influential do you think you’ve been since leaving the White House?
I’ve simply tried to have a positive impact. I actually feel that I have failed to reach my principal objective of moving the U.S. and the world past a tipping point on the climate crisis. It’s important to not confuse progress with success.
Are you having more fun these days?
(Laughs) It’s a tricky question, because the issue that I’m most focused on isn’t one associated with having a lot of fun. But there is joy in expending one’s fullest efforts in a cause that feels worthy and feels like it’s what you’re supposed to be doing. So in that sense, yes.
You were often referred to as the most powerful vice president.
That was before Dick Cheney.
Point taken. Cheney has made the argument that the vice presidency is not part of the executive branch. Is he right?
(Laughs) Of course the vice presidency is part of the executive branch! But I fear that I’m losing my objectivity where President Bush and Cheney are concerned. Not much surprises me anymore. I have a lot of friends who share the following problem with me: Our sense of outrage is so saturated that when a new outrage occurs, we have to download some existing outrage into an external hard drive in order to make room for a new outrage.
A recent poll shows that if you entered the presidential race, you would handily win the New Hampshire primary. Isn’t that tempting?
Sure. But I am old enough and have been a candidate enough times to have a very high level of resistance to temptations of that sort. I trust my instincts, and it doesn’t feel like it’s the right thing for me.
But if you believe global warming is such a crisis, wouldn’t you be more effective within the White House than outside it?
I’m under no illusion that there’s any position in the world as influential as that of president. But it doesn’t feel like the right thing for me to be a candidate at this point. I have had the experience of seeing how necessary it is to have adequate support among the people as a whole for the dramatic policy changes that are needed. It may well be that the best use of whatever skills and talents and experiences that I have gained is to concentrate on creating that sea change in mass opinion about this issue, so that whoever is elected will face a groundswell from the people themselves.
Will you endorse a candidate in the primary?
Odds are that I will.
Who?
I haven’t made that decision yet.
Do you feel some obligation to endorse the wife of your
former boss?
Uh … no. I have friendships with her and with the other candidates,
and they’re all on equal footing at
this point as far as I’m concerned.
Are you advising any candidates?
No.
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