Not long before our nation launched the invasion of Iraq, our longest-serving Senator, Robert Byrd of West Virginia, stood on the Senate floor and said: “This chamber is, for the most part, silent—ominously, dreadfully silent. There is no debate, no discussion, no attempt to lay out for the nation the pros and cons of this particular war. There is nothing. We stand passively mute in the United States Senate.”
Why was the Senate silent?
In describing the empty chamber the way he did, Byrd invited a specific version of the same general question millions of us have been asking: “Why do reason, logic and truth seem to play a sharply diminished role in the way America now makes important decisions?” The persistent and sustained reliance on falsehoods as the basis of policy, even in the face of massive and well-understood evidence to the contrary, seems to many Americans to have reached levels that were previously unimaginable.
A large and growing number of Americans are asking out loud: “What has happened to our country?” People are trying to figure out what has gone wrong in our democracy, and how we can fix it.
To take another example, for the first time in American history, the Executive Branch of our government has not only condoned but actively promoted the treatment of captives in wartime that clearly involves torture, thus overturning a prohibition established by General George Washington during the Revolutionary War.
It is too easy—and too partisan—to simply place the blame on the policies of President George W. Bush. We are all responsible for the decisions our country makes. We have a Congress. We have an independent judiciary. We have checks and balances. We are a nation of laws. We have free speech. We have a free press. Have they all failed us? Why has America’s public discourse become less focused and clear, less reasoned? Faith in the power of reason—the belief that free citizens can govern themselves wisely and fairly by resorting to logical debate on the basis of the best evidence available, instead of raw power—remains the central premise of American democracy. This premise is now under assault.
American democracy is now in danger—not from any one set of ideas, but from unprecedented changes in the environment within which ideas either live and spread, or wither and die. I do not mean the physical environment; I mean what is called the public sphere, or the marketplace of ideas.
It is simply no longer possible to ignore the strangeness of our public discourse. I know I am not alone in feeling that something has gone fundamentally wrong. In 2001, I had hoped it was an aberration when polls showed that three-quarters of Americans believed that Saddam Hussein was responsible for attacking us on Sept. 11. More than five years later, however, nearly half of the American public still believes Saddam was connected to the attack.
At first I thought the exhaustive, nonstop coverage of the O.J. Simpson trial was just an unfortunate excess—an unwelcome departure from the normal good sense and judgment of our television news media. Now we know that it was merely an early example of a new pattern of serial obsessions that periodically take over the airwaves for weeks at a time: the Michael Jackson trial and the Robert Blake trial, the Laci Peterson tragedy and the Chandra Levy tragedy, Britney and KFed, Lindsay and Paris and Nicole.
While American television watchers were collectively devoting 100 million hours of their lives each week to these and other similar stories, our nation was in the process of more quietly making what future historians will certainly describe as a series of catastrophically mistaken decisions on issues of war and peace, the global climate and human survival, freedom and barbarity, justice and fairness. For example, hardly anyone now disagrees that the choice to invade Iraq was a grievous mistake. Yet, incredibly, all of the evidence and arguments necessary to have made the right decision were available at the time and in hindsight are glaringly obvious.
Those of us who have served in the U.S. Senate and watched it change over time could volunteer a response to Senator Byrd’s incisive description of the Senate prior to the invasion: The chamber was empty because the Senators were somewhere else. Many of them were at fund-raising events they now feel compelled to attend almost constantly in order to collect money—much of it from special interests—to buy 30-second TV commercials for their next re-election campaign. The Senate was silent because Senators don’t feel that what they say on the floor of the Senate really matters that much anymore—not to the other Senators, who are almost never present when their colleagues speak, and certainly not to the voters, because the news media seldom report on Senate speeches anymore.
Our Founders’ faith in the viability of representative democracy rested on their trust in the wisdom of a well-informed citizenry, their ingenious design for checks and balances, and their belief that the rule of reason is the natural sovereign of a free people. The Founders took great care to protect the openness of the marketplace of ideas so that knowledge could flow freely. Thus they not only protected freedom of assembly, they made a special point—in the First Amendment—of protecting the freedom of the printing press. And yet today, almost 45 years have passed since the majority of Americans received their news and information from the printed word. Newspapers are hemorrhaging readers. Reading itself is in decline. The Republic of Letters has been invaded and occupied by the empire of television.
Radio, the Internet, movies, cell phones, iPods, computers, instant messaging, video games and personal digital assistants all now vie for our attention—but it is television that still dominates the flow of information. According to an authoritative global study, Americans now watch television an average of 4 hours and 35 minutes every day—90 minutes more than the world average. When you assume eight hours of work a day, six to eight hours of sleep and a couple of hours to bathe, dress, eat and commute, that is almost three-quarters of all the discretionary time the average American has.
In the world of television, the massive flows of information are largely in only one direction, which makes it virtually impossible for individuals to take part in what passes for a national conversation. Individuals receive, but they cannot send. They hear, but they do not speak. The “well-informed citizenry” is in danger of becoming the “well-amused audience.” Moreover, the high capital investment required for the ownership and operation of a television station and the centralized nature of broadcast, cable and satellite networks have led to the increasing concentration of ownership by an ever smaller number of larger corporations that now effectively control the majority of television programming in America.
In practice, what television’s dominance has come to mean is that the inherent value of political propositions put forward by candidates is now largely irrelevant compared with the image-based ad campaigns they use to shape the perceptions of voters. The high cost of these commercials has radically increased the role of money in politics—and the influence of those who contribute it. That is why campaign finance reform, however well drafted, often misses the main point: so long as the dominant means of engaging in political dialogue is through purchasing expensive television advertising, money will continue in one way or another to dominate American politics. And as a result, ideas will continue to play a diminished role. That is also why the House and Senate campaign committees in both parties now search for candidates who are multimillionaires and can buy the ads with their own personal resources.
When I first ran for Congress in 1976, I never took a poll during the entire campaign. Eight years later, however, when I ran statewide for the U.S. Senate, I did take polls and like most statewide candidates relied more heavily on electronic advertising to deliver my message. I vividly remember a turning point in that Senate campaign when my opponent, a fine public servant named Victor Ashe who has since become a close friend, was narrowing the lead I had in the polls. After a detailed review of all the polling information and careful testing of potential TV commercials, the anticipated response from my opponent’s campaign and the planned response to the response, my advisers made a recommendation and prediction that surprised me with its specificity: “If you run this ad at this many ‘points’ [a measure of the size of the advertising buy], and if Ashe responds as we anticipate, and then we purchase this many points to air our response to his response, the net result after three weeks will be an increase of 8.5% in your lead in the polls.”
I authorized the plan and was astonished when three weeks later my lead had increased by exactly 8.5%. Though pleased, of course, for my own campaign, I had a sense of foreboding for what this revealed about our democracy. Clearly, at least to some degree, the “consent of the governed” was becoming a commodity to be purchased by the highest bidder. To the extent that money and the clever use of electronic mass media could be used to manipulate the outcome of elections, the role of reason began to diminish.
As a college student, I wrote my senior thesis on the impact of television on the balance of power among the three branches of government. In the study, I pointed out the growing importance of visual rhetoric and body language over logic and reason. There are countless examples of this, but perhaps understandably, the first one that comes to mind is from the 2000 campaign, long before the Supreme Court decision and the hanging chads, when the controversy over my sighs in the first debate with George W. Bush created an impression on television that for many viewers outweighed whatever positive benefits I might have otherwise gained in the verbal combat of ideas and substance. A lot of good that senior thesis did me.
The potential for manipulating mass opinions and feelings initially discovered by commercial advertisers is now being even more aggressively exploited by a new generation of media Machiavellis. The combination of ever more sophisticated public opinion sampling techniques and the increasing use of powerful computers to parse and subdivide the American people according to “psychographic” categories that identify their susceptibility to individually tailored appeals has further magnified the power of propagandistic electronic messaging that has created a harsh new reality for the functioning of our democracy.
As a result, our democracy is in danger of being hollowed out. In order to reclaim our birthright, we Americans must resolve to repair the systemic decay of the public forum. We must create new ways to engage in a genuine and not manipulative conversation about our future. We must stop tolerating the rejection and distortion of science. We must insist on an end to the cynical use of pseudo-studies known to be false for the purpose of intentionally clouding the public’s ability to discern the truth. Americans in both parties should insist on the re-establishment of respect for the rule of reason.
And what if an individual citizen or group of citizens wants to enter the public debate by expressing their views on television? Since they cannot simply join the conversation, some of them have resorted to raising money in order to buy 30 seconds in which to express their opinion. But too often they are not allowed to do even that. MoveOn.org tried to buy an ad for the 2004 Super Bowl broadcast to express opposition to Bush’s economic policy, which was then being debated by Congress. CBS told MoveOn that “issue advocacy” was not permissible. Then, CBS, having refused the MoveOn ad, began running advertisements by the White House in favor of the president’s controversial proposal. So MoveOn complained, and the White House ad was temporarily removed. By temporarily, I mean it was removed until the White House complained, and CBS immediately put the ad back on, yet still refused to present the MoveOn ad.
To understand the final reason why the news marketplace of ideas dominated by television is so different from the one that emerged in the world dominated by the printing press, it is important to distinguish the quality of vividness experienced by television viewers from the “vividness” experienced by readers. Marshall McLuhan’s description of television as a “cool” medium—as opposed to the “hot” medium of print—was hard for me to understand when I read it 40 years ago, because the source of “heat” in his metaphor is the mental work required in the alchemy of reading. But McLuhan was almost alone in recognizing that the passivity associated with watching television is at the expense of activity in parts of the brain associated with abstract thought, logic, and the reasoning process. Any new dominant communications medium leads to a new information ecology in society that inevitably changes the way ideas, feelings, wealth, power and influence are distributed and the way collective decisions are made.
As a young lawyer giving his first significant public speech at the age of 28, Abraham Lincoln warned that a persistent period of dysfunction and unresponsiveness by government could alienate the American people and that “the strongest bulwark of any government, and particularly of those constituted like ours, may effectively be broken down and destroyed—I mean the attachment of the people.” Many Americans now feel that our government is unresponsive and that no one in power listens to or cares what they think. They feel disconnected from democracy. They feel that one vote makes no difference, and that they, as individuals, have no practical means of participating in America’s self-government. Unfortunately, they are not entirely wrong. Voters are often viewed mainly as targets for easy manipulation by those seeking their “consent” to exercise power. By using focus groups and elaborate polling techniques, those who design these messages are able to derive the only information they’re interested in receiving from citizens—feedback useful in fine-tuning their efforts at manipulation. Over time, the lack of authenticity becomes obvious and takes its toll in the form of cynicism and alienation. And the more Americans disconnect from the democratic process, the less legitimate it becomes.
Many young Americans now seem to feel that the jury is out on whether American democracy actually works or not. We have created a wealthy society with tens of millions of talented, resourceful individuals who play virtually no role whatsoever as citizens. Bringing these people in—with their networks of influence, their knowledge, and their resources—is the key to creating the capacity for shared intelligence that we need to solve our problems.
Unfortunately, the legacy of the 20th century’s ideologically driven bloodbaths has included a new cynicism about reason itself—because reason was so easily used by propagandists to disguise their impulse to power by cloaking it in clever and seductive intellectual formulations. When people don’t have an opportunity to interact on equal terms and test the validity of what they’re being “taught” in the light of their own experience and robust, shared dialogue, they naturally begin to resist the assumption that the experts know best.
So the remedy for what ails our democracy is not simply better education (as important as that is) or civic education (as important as that can be), but the re-establishment of a genuine democratic discourse in which individuals can participate in a meaningful way—a conversation of democracy in which meritorious ideas and opinions from individuals do, in fact, evoke a meaningful response.
Fortunately, the Internet has the potential to revitalize the role played by the people in our constitutional framework. It has extremely low entry barriers for individuals. It is the most interactive medium in history and the one with the greatest potential for connecting individuals to one another and to a universe of knowledge. It’s a platform for pursuing the truth, and the decentralized creation and distribution of ideas, in the same way that markets are a decentralized mechanism for the creation and distribution of goods and services. It’s a platform, in other words, for reason. But the Internet must be developed and protected, in the same way we develop and protect markets—through the establishment of fair rules of engagement and the exercise of the rule of law. The same ferocity that our Founders devoted to protect the freedom and independence of the press is now appropriate for our defense of the freedom of the Internet. The stakes are the same: the survival of our Republic. We must ensure that the Internet remains open and accessible to all citizens without any limitation on the ability of individuals to choose the content they wish regardless of the Internet service provider they use to connect to the Web. We cannot take this future for granted. We must be prepared to fight for it, because of the threat of corporate consolidation and control over the Internet marketplace of ideas.
The danger arises because there is, in most markets, a very small number of broadband network operators. These operators have the structural capacity to determine the way in which information is transmitted over the Internet and the speed with which it is delivered. And the present Internet network operators—principally large telephone and cable companies—have an economic incentive to extend their control over the physical infrastructure of the network to leverage control of Internet content. If they went about it in the wrong way, these companies could institute changes that have the effect of limiting the free flow of information over the Internet in a number of troubling ways.
The democratization of knowledge by the print medium brought the Enlightenment. Now, broadband interconnection is supporting decentralized processes that reinvigorate democracy. We can see it happening before our eyes: As a society, we are getting smarter. Networked democracy is taking hold. You can feel it. We the people—as Lincoln put it, “even we here”—are collectively still the key to the survival of America’s democracy.
© 2007 Time, Inc.
What an insightful article.
This is a really smart and interesting piece, as only Al Gore can write. He hits on a lot of current intellectual themes, “ecology of information,” the role of reason and speechmaking in a democracy, etc. but I am torn between loathing and liking his “TV bad, internet good” message. I don’t think it is that simple really. Look at the amount of capital going into sites, not to mention policing those sites like YouTube. Anytime something potentially revolutionary comes about, someone woth capital or power is there screaming about it. Look at Napster. Look at OLGA. Look at the Pentagon’s ban of YoutTube. Maybe networked democracy is taking hold, Al, but the material and physical access to that network is often curtailed by the same powers who won’t air MoveOn’s message.
Excellent article by Al Gore. He’s right on target with all of his points. The ironic thing, however, is that it was the 1996 Telecommunications Act which was signed into law by Clinton, that significantly deregulated the media ownership rules and we are living with the consequences right now.
Al - you should have been our president in 2000. All is forgiven. Please come back.
Whoa!
an excellent book related to this topic is
“The Death of Discourse,” showing how well
protected is the Right to Free Speech for
commercial purposes, rather than political
purposes.
And I didn’t know there was a second edition
published in 2006.
Al Gore should have been the president since 2000.
Lets get behind him in 2008.
Dear Al
Welcome to CommonDreams, the interactive democratic forum of the future. The most passionate and best informed political minds in our country meet here to debate, argue, pontificate and commiserate, to praise and condemn all kinds of ideas, to respect and belittle each other in a free for all of ideological chaos.
We didn’t change the votes of 20 establishment democrats in the Senate the other day, though we did put them on our hit list. John Yoo and others have begun to take note of the “liberal blogs” with mild alarm, so we are not altogether toothless. Still, I have no idea how the radical disparity which is our unique charm gets batched up and directed to the goal of political whallop. Half of us are ready to exit stage left in the next election, or just give up on this dumb country altogether.
The sleep of reason, according to the Goya print, produces monsters, and I mean nasty, formidable monsters like Carl Rove, big oil and the Iraq occupation, the Machiavellian PR monsters you describe. Most of us (Americans) lapsed into narcolepsy long ago, and I’m afraid we aren’t going to wake up. On this blog we talk long and loud about what we should all get together and do, but we have no organizational principle to make our excellent marketplace of ideas into more than a howling of progressive monkeys.
We need a Carl Rove of intelligence and common decency. Care to apply?
While I see Gore as a postive force in our nation …
I think we have to remember that Al Gore stood silent when the farce of Election 2000 was challenged and only ONE Senator would have been required to move the investigation and stop the automatic approval of the hideous results.
I’m also rather mystified as to Al Gore’s selection of Liebermann as his VP.
A questionable choice which is obvious today and should have been obvious to Gore at the time.
Also, I have to applaud Al Gore for his work on Global Warming, but he also has had OIL company backing.
Nor do I see Al Gore much discussing “Who Killed The Electric Car?” — or advocating the mass production of ELECTRIC CARS which could be commenced immediately.
Americans need to reclaim control over our natural resources.
Why is OIL in the hands of a few private families?
Let’s hear Al Gore on these questions, PLEASE–!!!
voxclamantis - nice name!! - I agree with all but the comments on Rove. We need nothing like a Rove or a Goebbels and yes they are both the same. They use fear and character assassination lies and deception to accomplish any given task. We do not need such a person for the so called progressive movement. I think what is more true is that there are too many of us (Americans) who are standing in our own feces waiting for someone else to come along and lead us. I say wake up and lead yourself. The real reason there is no organizing principle is because there is no such thing as a progreesive movement. The term itself is too generic to be anything of any force. Typically a “movement” has a single focus and can be sustained long enough to make a change on a specific issue. This is why there are so many different groups (NGO’s) whose focus is either a single issue or relatively narrow objective. These groups are successfull in making changes as well. There are conservative and liberal groups of this nature as well. Looking at things from this perspective one can see how the thinking is the same. What is truly needed is a complete overhaukl of the way we think and operate socially today. Real change can be affected with 3 simple changes to the way we live.
1) Fund education equally based upon the number of students per district rather than the property taxes collected from a given district.
2) Remove entirely the private funding of elections and publicly fund elections across the board at all levels of government.
3) Implement a fair tax (NOT the FairTax) across the board for sales and income taxes. 10% for everyone if you make $1 or $1 billion, it doesn’t matter - as everyone pays the same. ALL earnings would be equal as well whether it is from the Dow Jones or from McDonalds.
If this is done then we can say we are the land of equal opporunity without being hypocrites we currently are.
When ballots fail, bullets fly. This is the unfortunate outcome when an out of touch insensitive, exploitive (criminal) ruling class’s equations that attempt to balance between maximum exploitation and peasant revolt fails. The bone grindings become too strong to ignore. The apathetic awake from their slumber, but unreasoned and enraged like a beast. Civil war is hell on earth, the sleep of reason its sire.
Smart, visionary, brave, speaks truth to power -this is what a leader sounds like.
America, and the world, need Al Gore. Al’s decision to reject bitterness and put one foot in front of the other on the path of truth telling after the selection of George Bush as President is changing the world.
Join http://www.algore-08.com/, demand that he run for President. Our future depends on it.
TV is the idiot box, the boob tube, and the requirements of TV are basically to fabricate lies, advertisements that hide the truth. As HL Mencken said, in the long run, perhaps, we’ll reach a point in human progress where denying the truth will be a crime, and not only a crime but a dishonorable act.
Maybe he was thinking about the Internet, in the long run.
Skepticism is the mother of truth, and that only comes about in two way communication.
And the Senate was silent because they’re basically a gang of corrupt office seekers who wouldn’t know the truth if it shat on them. Robert Byrd an honorable exception, of course.
Neoconned ~
I can accept two of your three suggestions, but the funding elections is not something I’m ready to sign over to the tax-fattened politicians of the country.
My proposal would instead make illegal any “soft” money, along with any money in the name of a corporation, organization or non-human entity. Political contributions need to be limited to those made by singlular and identifiable human beings!
Anything else, is and should be recognized as ~ BRIBERY!
Regardless of party of political ideology, no one should promote or accept the ability of corporations, industries, PACs, unions, or any other group to hand over funds to any party or candidate. If people, you and me, individuals, want to support and promote a candidate, then they should do so publically and verifiably.
As to this article; Mr. Gore has no credibity with me what-so-ever. His personal consumtive excesses bespeak his lip-service to any ecologically driven cause. It just fits his political needs, so he helps build a crisis-driven bandwagon. He’s old news, with old thoughts, and no ability to gather or maintain interest on a national level.
For those of you so caught up with his charm and charisma ~ don’t look at his words, look at his actions.
What has he DONE besides criss-cross the globe in private jets while not luxuriating in his luxury estate that uses 24 times the typical household energy use??
He talks a good line, but does he actually do anything to make a change?
I like Al and believe he would be an excellent person to serve as president. He represents a rare opportunity to choose a leader whose vision represents a unified policy toward the environment, growth oppotunities in the economy through green technoligies, and an energy policy that would reduce our use of imported oil, reduce our balance of payments defecite and strengthen our economy. For the reasons described by Al in his essay this opportunity will very likey not be taken advantage of. The public will choose some divorced philanderer (not that I have anything against divorce or philandering), but a self-proclaimed Christian who will promise to uphold family values and crusade against homosexuals and abortion.
Al has defined the problem very insightfully, but he offers no real suggestion for a solution to the problem. There probably is no solution to the problem. There will always be individuals willing to do almost anything to obtain power, and why would candidates stand up and try to talk reason to the public when high priced 30 second spots will command the short spanned attention of the voter whose head is plugged into the cathrode ray tube? Occasionally candidates do attempt to rely on truth and reason, but they are ignored and defeated rather quickly. With the media now giving those who possess and hunger for power easy access to control the hearts, minds and wills of the populace, how will the populace ever break free from the hold over them?
I guess I am one of those people Al is referring to who has lost faith that government will ever respond to the needs of the people at large, as opposed to the interests of big business, American companies who want cheap labor and access to third-world resources, and war profiteers. I haven’t lost faith in the government so much as I have lost faith in the ability of my fellow man to wise up and understand he is being played for a chump.
@PDFee, uh, Al Gore flies United, not private jets (I sat next to him one x-country flight, and learned that he goes through security like the rest of us). The private jet thing is destructive misinformation brought to you by you-know-who (and it’s not Voldemort).
We;ll now we know that Al can talk the talk–what we still don’t know if he is willing to walk the walk.
Like all the other presidentiial wannabes Al, your mantra should be “actions speak louder than words” instead of “money talks, bullshit walks”.
Thank you, Al Gore. We needed this.
The great political divide of the century might be between people who accept enlightenment reason and people who openly reject it. It is a divide that cuts soundly across old partisan lines.
I know progressives as well as conservatives who accept reason, and although they disagree on countless points, they share a common ultimate goal of making people everywhere better off by applying principles of scepticism, logic, and empirical testing. Of course, the ideas of one side will turn out to work better than the other’s in practice, but both will work better than any conclusions reached without enlightenment reason.
Enemies of reason also exist on both the right and the left. On the right we find the religious fundamentalists, who embrace hopelessly outdated dogma because it makes them feel safe and has served them well in the past. On the left we find the postmodernists, who believe that the concept of reason must be fundamentally flawed because it has not yet produced a classless global utopia.
Reason is defined by its fallibility. It is founded upon the ability to reject a deeply held belief because you have found another that you believe is a better approximation of the truth. The truth is ultimately unknowable, but it does not matter, because we are obliged to act upon uncertain ideas.
neoconned and bandido:
People concerned with being informed by and large turned off their television sets in November of 2001 when the information blackout predictably rolled across America like dust from the collapsing towers. We simply went elsewhere for ours news and opinion, to the proactive jungles of the internet. Something inchoate and new seems to be forming here, out of a collective chemistry that does seem disorganized and a bit ineffectual right now. Still, a global tsunami of information is bringing people together, and we have to put our hopes on it since we are so utterly disorganized in other ways.
I guess my wish for a benevolent Rove is like asking for a benevolent Hitler. Of course we don’t need his manipulative evil. But we do need political efficacy, and you can’t say Rove is not a past master of that. What to do? Do we believe that some kind of viral ubiqity of morality and intelligence will reach critical mass and replace the traditional machinery of power? I don’t know. I agree that real education is crucial, since large numbers of blind people behave as you might expect. I am very alarmed at American insularity and dumbness in the face of the urgent need for change.
conscience:
I felt the same way about Gore in the 1990s when he voted for the first Gulf War. He is not our knight in shining armor, and I think we are best off not to be looking for one of those. Increasingly, for all his contradictions and past screwups and misjudgements (Lieberman! My god!) I have come to see him as a sincere and reasonable voice devoted to the common good, and it is hard to argue against the desperate need we have for that right now. The secret to Gore is his reasonableness. Reasonable people, unlike Bush and his dogmatists, are aware that reason itself is fallible, and frequently change their minds.
All those calling for Gore to run for office seem to have forgotten his medeocre perfomrance while in office and his positively apalling “me-too” response to Bush’s campaign while running for the presidency.
Gore was able to write the insightful article above ONLY because he isn’t running for office.
Read the vacuous Edwards Piece below this one to see what Gore would sound like if he were running for office.
Gore reminds us that some in Washington are not the imbeciles they play on television. He, and undoubtedly a number of current members of Congress, understand the deterioration of the US political system and are disturbed by it. But as PJD notes, when faced with the pressures that accompany a campaign, they generally revert to their imbecilic characters and start spouting gibberish again.
As for public financing of elections:
The airwaves belong to us, the people. The broadcasters should be required to bid, every 5 years, for the use of the frequency/channel, the revenue to be used for paying for political ads, OR, they be required to offer FREE broadcast time, in prime time, to candidates; and candidates who accept the free time are banned from buying broadcast time.
run al, run.
Not only is Al Gore the best prospective candidate on the national scene, he is the best candidate.
Please run, Al, run!
It is difficult to read the article by Mr. Gore and not feel agonized. Not by the argument he presents, which is insightful, but by the search for the true heart and mind of Al Gore. He is the same man that has argued for the continuation of the Electoral College, a check on the democratic impulse. He is the same man that surrendered the presidency to Mr. Bush rather than threaten the democratic illusion. Seemingly, Mr. Gore was more concerned that we simple-minded citizens would see the potential subversion of democracy exploited by Bush and company and think democracy over if he took the matter to court. The fact of the matter is that it would have restored some sense of faith in government had we seen that theft on the highest levels would not be tolerated. An abridgement of our very limited rights to choose a government was allowed by Mr. Gore in his failure to challenge the election results, and his failure allowed the Bush gang to perform the same subversion of democracy in 2004. By all evidence, the election process in 2008 will be the worst yet.
Mr. Gore should also discuss his role in the New Democratic Leadership Council and its stance on becoming a more corporate friendly Democratic Party. It is hard to imagine a true concern for democracy, the voice of the people, the protection of the internet, the protection of the environment from a man who played such a key role in the NDLC. Mr. Gore is clearly a bright man. Perhaps the brightest we have had on offer for our highest office in some time. But I fail to see evidence that he will put into practice the ideas he expresses in the media.
I would also take issue with the romantic notions of the printing press and ages gone by. A printing press was by no means a cheap entrance into the marketplace of ideas. In fact, the MARKETPLACE of ideas is just what we have lived by in this country since the Constitutional convention, wherein proportional representation was first set at such a high bar as to make individuals surrender their power in democracy in much the way that Tom Paine had warned against. Read the constitution and consider the power of one person representing 30,000, and then consider again who far we are from that number today. We have no contact with our representatives in government. They are not our neighbors or our friends. They have never seen the vast majority of us face to face, let alone gotten to know us and our concerns. They are an elite, far removed from the control of the people, easily purchased by monied interests. Easily convinced, if need be, that they are doing the right thing because they are so far removed from the voices of dissent. The debate that reaches the ears of the representatives is a debate of those able to afford their ears and it has been that way long before the invention of television.
Mr. Gore is a member of the American aristocracy, fabled not to exist in our “government by the people.” I am pleased by his article, but all the more disgusted to think on the decisions he has made in his recent political life when his understanding is so deep, his ability to display compassion for democracy so moving. Run for office, Mr. Gore. Turn back NAFTA. Check corporate power. Nationalize the internet. Lead a no-holds-barred assault on our system of campaign finance. Please, prove to me that you are the human being you are CAPABLE of being. Until then, I will read your articles with a true agony of conscience.
Slightly off topic, but, I think I’m falling in love with voxclamantis…sigh….
Big Al ! You have every right, and indeed a mandate, to go right now to the White house, order our military home to arrest boy bush, nullify everything he did, and assume the presidency. First on your agenda, withdrawl from all bogus oil wars, and an apology to the world.
Anything short of this won’t cut it. Don’t be afraid. The only thing I’m fearful of is YOUR fear of doing this. We’re not civilized right now. Fix it, Mr. President.
Speaking of silence, why did Al Gore stand passively by while the 2000 election was stolen from him? Why didn’t he raise hell, and rally the people, like the people were rallied in the Ukraine during a similar election theft? If the political discourse has gotten strange since 2000, Mr. Gore has played a role in the beginnings of that strangeness.
neoconned said: “3) Implement a fair tax (NOT the FairTax) across the board for sales and income taxes. 10% for everyone if you make $1 or $1 billion, it doesn’t matter - as everyone pays the same. ALL earnings would be equal as well whether it is from the Dow Jones or from McDonalds.”
Wrong!
If you’re making $15,000. or $65,000./yr., 10% of your pay as taxes means a hell of a lot more to you than 10% of a $1,000,000. or $5,000,000 income earner’s pay does to them. Low-to-medium wage earners spend a significantly higher percentage of their earnings on living expenses than do high-wage earners; or you could say that high-wage earners have a much larger percentage of discretionary income left over than do low-to-medium wage earners.
This is why a progressive income tax along with a sales tax is much more equitable than any combined flat or “fair” tax. One way to make things more fair is to eliminate the loopholes and deductions available to high-wager’s that cannot be taken advantage of by those who earn less.
I wonder…….does anyone think Dubya could write anything remotely close to this?????
My God people, we truly have a retard in office.
Hey exdem… I’m not so sure about falling in love but I certainly love the commentary and the name voxclamantis!! It means the “voice of one crying out” and this one surely has some good things to say.
voxclamantis said “Do we believe that some kind of viral ubiqity of morality and intelligence will reach critical mass and replace the traditional machinery of power?”
Actually I do beleive something of that sort will take place soon. As you yourself have said “I am very alarmed at American insularity and dumbness in the face of the urgent need for change.” Well that urgent need will become more and more obvious as time goes on. So eventually people who typically behave as sheep will see that they are being led to slaughter even if it is as they pass through the entrance to the slaughter house. So soon I think there will be a sea change in the way people think about life. We cannot continue to live as if we are not part of our natural surroundings. Gore has to do some real soul searching though if he does run. Will he take the money that he got in the past or will he remain unbought as he presently is? If he does run that remains to be seen. As for me there are a few candidates in that category of unpaid for by big corpo’s - Obama, Kucinich, Gravel, and possibly even Huckabee but his lack of belief in evolution may hurt his chances outside of the Republican party.
And you’ve just now figured this out, vbratt??
Great Article…too bad no one will read it.
Maybe if Britany had his love child, he could read it to the paparazzi
has anyone ever read carl sandburg’s bio on lincoln? gives a whole different perspective on how things haven’t changed.
An insightful article? Mostly lifted - the TV parts, anyway - from “Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television,” Mander, 1978. Mr. Gore skips the Brainwashing chapter, which is the most pertinent, however, because even he, like most of us, either refuse to believe we CAN be brainwashed, or that brainwashing is just a “myth,” or that no corporation would ever be so evil as to brainwash us all…
And what is the result? We’re greedy, hollow, surface, inattentive, dispassionate, impulsive, illogical… just like, say, most commercials. We are literally programmed 4 and a half hours a day to buy more, get more, get famous, et al. We’re programmed to fear the coming thunderstorm (StormWatch!), the local fire, or the “missing child,” but not the government’s shredding of the Constitution, or the secret No Fly List, or foreigners who don’t hate our freedoms, just the bombs we use to spread them.
The “Me” generation is still playing video games and attending rock concerts and doing drugs - they never “matured” because TV told them not to. And they raised a generation of greedy self-servers whose mission in life is to acquire more of everything. For themselves. Commonwealth is a curse word, and actually working, as opposed to manipulating other peoples’ money for a percentage, is anathema.
The other, “conservative” “Me” generation - they, too, are brainwashed to buy buy buy, but their brainwashing occurred during the 700 Club and The Gospel Hour. So they, too, are programmed to want more, but also to pray, hate gays and foreigners, and adopt stem cells.
The question then, is: is it possible to counteract tens of thousands of hours of constant bad information infusion?
You know things are bad when Gore starts to look good
All I can offer to this debate is a rather personal quote from my favorite author….maybe it will stir some thought…
——-LOGIC AND OTHER MALE PERVERSIONS——–
The revival of group hatreds in this country has dismayed and even frightened me ever since it began in the late 1960’s.
Back in my high school and college days, in the late 1940’s- early 1950’s, we all remembered Hitler very well, and only partly because he looked like Charlie Chaplin. Teachers taught us that Hitler was terrible, not because he hated the “wrong” group, but because hating any group is illogical, unscientific and leads ultimately to violence.
Sometime when I was busy and didn’t notice, Political Correctness took over Academia and they stopped teaching that. They started teaching that Hitler was terrible because he hated the wrong group, but it’s okay to hate other groups.
Logic has nothing to do with it; logic itself has become suspect (just as happened in Nazi Germany).
This rebellion against rationality originally intended to make Radical Feminism and its doctrine of male fungibility respectable, and it succeeded, at least in the major media, but it also made fungible group hatred respectable in general. Now the anti-Semites and all the other hate mongers have begun crawling out from under their rocks, and Academia does not have the ammunition to argue against them. Academia cannot argue the rational principle that hatred of any group does not make sense; they dumped logic (as a “male” perversion).
The argument between Left and Right now consists only of debates about which groups we should hate.
-Robert Anton Wilson
TSOG: The Thing That Ate The Constitution and other everyday monsters pg 99
New Falcon Publications 2002
————————————————–
Until those on the “Left” or from the “Prolgressive” movement take RESPONSIBILITY for the damaging effects of the Politial Correctness movement and theory there seems little ground to stand on when calling for an infusion of reason into the modern debate.
It’s pretty simple to identify a problem, especially a gordian knot of a crisis like this.
It’s pretty easy to employ hindsight and a staff of many to write cogently about it.
However, try tying the bell around the cat’s neck Mr. Gore.
Come up with a single idea that will threaten to shake the Earth.
I have no doubt that you are an honorable and concerned (if not alarmed) citizen. I, for one, am willing to forgive you for the seemingly honest mistakes that some choose to rant here about. I am certain that you and your team are doing the best you can.
But that is not leadership. A leader must be capable of presenting a vision of the future. And we find ourselves now well past the point of no return. Those who dream wistfully of retuning to the status quo of the past are not only wrong, they are stupid. Our world changes. Systems of government change. Rules for functioning within them change. America as we knew it will not survive this crisis no matter how many of us bail water or how big our buckets are.
This entrenched, bloated, corrupt & top-heavy structure is already crumbling. We should be preparing for its imminent collapse. We can build something 100 times better out of its rubble.
I just wrote my final project for a government class on this same topic. I only wish I was as articulate as Mr. Gore. I tip my hat to the master.
“the present Internet network operators have an economic incentive to extend their control over the physical infrastructure of the network”
I first started posting on the internet on the Yahoo message boards. I found it so educational that I’ve never looked back. I believe that the process of opening your mouth and proving you’re a fool is extremely valuable in encouraging people to improve their knowledge of the world. Television absolutely discourages this; the internet encourages it. When Yahoo closed its message boards, I felt in some way that they were discouraging independent thought. Certainly, I felt discouraged. Fortunately, I’ve found other venues for spouting. Gore is on the right track on this one. Network providers have the ability to squelch independent thought should they choose to do so, simply by allowing no venue with which to comment.
He was already elected President once — he should be President right now. Sure Nader was a far better candidate but who’s won is who’s won.
Thank you, President Gore! You are on such a roll. When the Right attacks, we will defend you.
Xthplanet,
There was a fellow named Gramsci who had much to do with the evolution of that phenomenon (though he was quite well-meaning and the law of unintended consequences is invoked here), and the corporate media has adopted that perspective wholeheartedly for a variety of reasons.
Gore annoys: I’m not sure if his last two paragraphs are helpful to Google, and not Verizon.
( Contrast Gore’s “internet” commentary, with say that of Chomsky. ) Gore seems to be an apologist for supply side. a man of not enough action, at the most appropriate time, Maybe as he grows older he’ll grow more bold and effective: “F*3k the constitution - we need a rewrite!”
Gore was just as much of a bad choice as Bush in 2000.
Bravo, Mr. Gore.
There are very few people in this world that truly impress me, and in general, I snub my nose at politicians and the like. Perhaps one of my college professors and the barest handful of people long-dead fall into this category. All of whom put the good of others and the world as a whole at the foremost of their thoughts and actions, and I must now place Mr. Al Gore on that list as well.
I have not read an article in some time that was as honest and reasonable as this one. While most of us choose to lay blame, and rail against the established goverment(believe me, I am as guilty of it as anyone), there is so rarely someone who is willing or able to unite people for the common good. The choice of Joe Leiberman may sound like folly, but only if you lose sight of the fact that part of the goal is to unite the american people. Bi-partisanship is part of what has gotten us to this horrible state that we are in. Mr. Leiberman has in most instances voted ‘green’ and in my opinion will continue to do so.
I noted some question in previous comments about why Al Gore did not fight to retain the presidency in 2000, and while I cannot read the man’s mind, I think that I understand why. Think about what would have happened if he had. Aside from the fact that Bush had a practically unbeatable cadre of lawyers that he immediately sent out to litigate it until the end of time, it would have done as much to damage his credibility as it did to damage Bush’s, and made him look as petty as Bush. And lest we all forget, GW’s brother was governor of the state in question.A wise man chooses his battles. It also would, perhaps, have done more to damage the american people’s faith in the entire electoral process than has already done. We all know what having a farce for a president feels like, and I don’t blame him in the least for not wanting that farce to be him.
I must also add a small plea to the writer of the article, Please sir, take up the torch and run. There are is a great number of people who view you as the ONLY reasonable choice, and I for one would be honored to have you as my president.
…”All that is required for the triumph of evil, is for good men to do nothing.”
frank1569,
In the unpredictable evolution of human society, what overturns the social order is usually what those in control could not possibly have foreseen. Mr. Gore, to his credit, argues to keep the Internet safe from corporate predators who would use it for their own purposes. And if it does continue to develop without corruption by such corporate predators, it will most likely provide the impetus for the overthrow of the existing order.
As Gore points out, the most critical feature of the television era is the one-way communication, while the Internet allows communication not only back to the main content providers but between those like us responding to such content. And that can potentially become a much more stimulating activity, making the early and primitive uses of the computer and the Internet, such as playing video games, seem as dull and repetitive as Pong seems to X-box users.
As social interactions can be modeled as circuits of a sort (just as activity within a single brain can be modeled as an internal circuit) involving and connecting more than one brain, the Internet allows development of these circuits throughout the community, without any controlling node, such as the owner of the provider of content (e.g. television network), intervening to edit and otherwise direct the information flow. So common causes among non-elites can form and grow at an accelerating rate, not only challenging the existing order but providing the opportunity for completely redesigning it.
If the Internet can stay free of control by corporate predators, there may be some hope, but that is certainly a big if.
Great article. I am sure Neil Postman would like it.
But I fear that it’s too late. Al Gore gave in to right-wing pressure and conceded prematurely in 2000. Al Gore never questions the perks of the American military-industrial establishment. He could rock the boat a little more, he’s got nothing to lose. And he doesn’t talk about the fact that by now half the US population can be called open to fascist thinking without exaggerating anything.
I notice that the article was originally written for Time Magazine. The same Time Magazine which during the 1980s revered another dangerous right-wing moron called Ronald Reagan to the extent that I had to cancel my subscription.
And that Reagan and the uncritical reception he got in America by Time and the likes (but not outside America, he was loathed most places) is IMO when the present mess started. Al Gore is well-meaning, but he falls short of putting his finger on the really sore spots.
Because he is part of that establishment himself.
Post-postmodern (hereinafter PP; see PP’s entry above) is plainly correct in saying that there are enemies of reason on both the left and the right (claim 1).
PP is also right in denouncing postmodernists as inimical to reason and rationality (claim 2).
However, when PP states that “[t]he truth is ultimately unknowable,” I no longer follow him or her. Doesn’t PP consider the aforementioned two claims of his or hers to be truth claims? Are they not truths to which PP is committed?
Furthermore, when PP says that “the truth is ultimately unknowable,” is that not also a statement, hence a truth claim?
To deny that there is truth (as when it is stated that there is no truth) or to declare truth beyond the reach of our (human and faillible) powers is precisely - I beg to differ with PP in this respect — a postmodernist affliction.
It is also self-contradictory: indeed, to state that there is no truth is to deny the very act one performs in stating something, namely, the act of claiming truth for that something. It amounts to saying one thing, while doing its contradictory opposite.
In the interest of full disclosure, I too voted for Nader. I did so for two reasons. I knew Gore was going to win my state easily anyway, and I couldn’t support any ticket that had Joe Lieberman on it.
Hey, can all of us who are Democrats please how agree that Al Gore should be drafted as our Presidential candidate. This is the most perilous moment in American history and we need a man of his wisdom, experience, maturity, and courage. Hillary, Barack, John E. and the rest can do great things in his administration, but we need a world-class figure who, it should be remembered, was one of the most vigorous and articulate critics of the Iraq debacle before we went in.
Al, please, please, please run for President. It will allow hundreds of millions of people around the world to finally relax.
Mr. Vice President,
The irony is amazing, isn’t it? How those who rise on the strategies of statistical prediction espouse general contempt for the sciences that bare it. And how that very science suggests that way, for those cold enough to take us into the abyss.
It’s well you’ve been spared the corruption of abosolute power. Well for the world, for there is a true voice to hear. Well for you too, I trust.
for Araquin et al
I was also disappointed that Gore prematurely threw in the towel in 2000. But I’m reminded that when it comes to unrealistically sticking by your guns no matter how hopeless and ugly things get, we already have a president with that questionable virtue.
EveningLand,
I found a useful method to approach such questions is to distinguish between the model of the universe one holds and the actual universe giving rise to the perceptions that lead to creation of the model. And of course the model is recursive as we have a model of the model when we speak of the model, and so on.
And we revise our model whenever new information comes in, sometimes striking out old information and sometimes just making additions.
So I believe the position of someone like PP (though possibly not PP) would be that the observer’s current model holds T1 to be true, but in the universe, which is the source of the perceptions that lead to the model, T1 might not be true and we can never know with absolute certainty.
Scientific theories are models of the rules of the universe (there are models for rules and models for current states and past states and even for expected future states) that have been given some credence because they successfully predicted the results of certain experiments. And the more they successfully predict the outcome of different experiments, the more they are trusted, but that never means that they are infallible models, and one should always be open to improvements on such models.
And it should be mentioned that postmodernists typically deal with social sciences which are pretty much guesswork anyway, with no rigorous scientific experimentation possible.
Great article, Al - when are you going to announce your candidacy?
“Jefferson objected to the creation of a national bank not only on constitutional grounds but also as a matter of public policy. He saw the bank as a tool of special interests and an unhealthy concentration of economic power, part of a design to promote moneyed interests at the expense of farmers.” - In Pursuit of Reason
Wouldn’t it be great if someone serious, you know, someone with real credibility ran a completely sarcastic campaign mocking the whole stupid process. I’m thinking about what Stephen Colbert does to commentary. Try to imagine it for a minute. People are getting so fed up with the same empty campaigns over and over again, a little ridicule might be healthy. It would certainly make history.
Rotten to the core. That’s what America has become since Gore’s presidency was taken from him by the so called “supreme court”. Those bastards should be locked up for that.
Al, we love you man. Please take the reins of this sinking ship we call the USA.
Thanks Al for your lucid analysis of media. We all need this understanding to go forward as well as Marshall McLuhan’s focus on the mediums in our lives.
America doesn’t understand that Political Democracy can only be founded upon roots of Economic Democracy. First Nation ‘democracy’ (derived from the Greek meaning ‘Power of the People’) upon which we founded our structures had much deeper roots in the Production Societies. We have come to confuse marking an “X” every four years as democracy, when it is only a small part of it.
The real ownership society is ‘indigenous’ (derived from Latin meaning ‘Self-generating’). It is important that each of us in our workplaces begin to formally invest together in ownership (call it stewardship). Our real strength for each of us is in our field of professional expertise.
Environmental and Social organisations often miss the point that our primary concern is about livelihood and the causes we fight for, are secondary. In this sense we can begin to act as intentional communities by planning for our collective well-being on local scales, such as in our workplaces or communities. We can begin to honour our retail outlets by forming economies of relationship and investment with them. If we begin to plan together as groups of families, extended families and communities.
The right wing is so attractive to many because of its stated concern for livelihood although it applies this concern to a bastardised form of economy that kills withmilitary, arms contracts, natural resource exploitation rather than building with life and nature. The Left focuses on lobbying for governmental change but doesn’t organise its own economic forces locally. We often have objectives but don’t focus on our own means. We aren’t becoming the change that we want to see in the world, yet we are numerous and quite wealthy compared with the rest of the world.
Progressive ownership occurs over the course of a lifetime. The ancient Guild systems were based upon the progressive introduction of the apprentice, leading to journey to master. Accounting of the ongoing investment by each member of a Guild or Production Society allowed for each member to express a growing knowledge base from effort, experience, expertise and decision-making acumen.
First Nations used a form of Time-based accounting (the universal common denominator) for their labour investments. The String-shell seems to have been a system integrating capital, currency, social security and other values of our fractured economy.
Recapturing democracy is about exercising our specific knowledge strengths as ‘economic’ (derived from the Greek meaning ‘Care and nurture of the home and family’) producers and consumers. Political democracy is more of a ’straw’ vote, a sort of survey, important but not the foundation. In a world of 6 billion people, we need to structure democracy on our strengths as creators, not on a limited concept of government institutional consumers.
eco-montreal@mcgill.ca
Al, you are far too reticent on the subject of war crimes committed by the POTUS. There are hundreds of people on death row whose crimes pale in comparison to Bush’s. Every execution carried out in this country while the POTUS dines in the White House is a gross miscarriage of justice. Hundreds of thousands of dead bodies have been created by the Bush wars. By failing to use your voice, you become complicit in the crimes. Speak out! No one listens to the commondreams crowd, but they might listen to you. As long as a war criminal occupies the White House, this country is a criminal enterprise. Use your pulpit to bring mass murderers to justice. Anything less is just hot air contributing to climate change. Do you have the courage to blow the whistle? Millions of people are waiting for one courageous person with clout to come forward. You have an affirmative obligation to bring an end to this criminal administration, Al. You were its first victim and now hundreds of thousands have died. Atone for your failure to fight like hell in 2000 - come out and fight like hell now. Save America. When the criminals are behind bars, then we can pay attention to global warming. First things first. Without justice, nothing else matters. The history of this era is still being written. It will take a giant to stand up and demand the establishment of a war crimes tribunal. Are you that giant? If not, step aside and stop wasting our time. America needs a great, great person to come forward in this age of criminal government. Enter the real Al Gore. Show us what you are made of. Please, no more Mr. Nice Guy. Cowards have taken impeachment off the table, making a mockery of the constitution. Don’t just speak out, Al, roar like a lion and put an end to this fascist nightmare called the Bush administration. The most junior of prosecutors can convict the POTUS of war crimes. You, of all people, owe it to America and the world to see that justice is done.
I’m with alanlak above. If Gore were genuine, why exactly did he cave in so easily in 2000? Why did he pick the most conservative running mate (rejected eventually by his own party) to run as VP? Liebermann is basically showing himself to be a neocon.
And there are some interesting lobbyists in the background of the Clinton/Gore administration. Google some triangulation on terms like Joseph Trapasso, Knight, TVA, nuclear, tritium, etc. and you’ll be left wondering whether Gore is mostly part of the problem rather than the solution. Don’t be fooled easily. Gore talks the talk, no doubt. We have a new professional class of power seekers, and they use whatever exists at their disposal to tap a popular sentiment. But does he walk the walk?
Sorry, talk won’t cut it with me. I want to see right action, and I haven’t seen it with Al Gore. He wrote Earth in the Balance and then promised East Liverpool Ohio there would be no toxic waste incinerator next to their elementary school. He lied. He caved in on the whale ban treaty after promising to protect the whales. When James Baker’s white collar goons terrorized Florida precinct workers and stopped the recount, Gore said and did nothing. If he were a leader he would have fought back. I can’t trust him.
Dennis Kucinich put his career on the line to do the right thing. He knew he would be vilified and thrown out of office if he refused to sell Cleveland Municipal Light and he refused to do it anyway. That’s the kind of leader I want. One who’s not thinking about his own ass when he is making decisions.
I loved some of these posts! Sinnerjizm, you had me laughing my head off! Good point, alanlak and Paul. And kivals, I always find your posts interesting and thoughtful. Regarding Al Gore, it’s easy to sound good, but look at the track record. Someone on another post said “If we keep on doing what we’re doing we’ll keep on getting what we’re getting”. Voxclamantis, I’m not voting for someone whose response to pressure is to throw in the towel.
Neil Postman addressed the issue of the electronic revolution and how its impact will be at least as profound as that brought about by the printing press in ‘Amusing Ourselves to Death,’ written in the mid-80s. It should be essential reading for every student of political science. It’s scary to see how prescient this work was. His thesis (following from McLuhan) is that the way we gain information, over time, affects what we come to value as knowledge, even rationality.
Television now owns politics. Reasoned argument, even sustained thought, is out. Image, as sold through quick-cutting, sound-byte advertising, rules. Hence, we’ll have more post-literate minders like Mr. Bush. I fear it’s all (rapidly) downhill from here.
Media, Politics and backbone. The courage to stand alone.
Robin Cook’s resignation address. It was live on CNN or CNBC then cut off to return to a car ad or something. No one talks about it but it was a classic. Its a shame its never quoted.
If you watch the US political process its to a empty chamber and there is one there. Great entertainment but one must ask for whom ? TV (very sad). Our political environment has become a sporting event. Bring in the left hander ..
Can anyone post a similar speech from a US political figure?
Mr Cook died while walking in the Scottish Highlands a few years ago.
http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/03/18/sprj.irq.cook.speech/
Juan Siglo, May 18, 2007, 6:10 am.
I have this recurring image of a “dream ticket” for the Democrats in November 2008. For President of the U.S. Mr. Al Gore and for Vice President, Senator Barak Obama, from my home State of Illinois. My personal dream is that on January 20, 2009 the House Sergeant of Arms will drone in his familiar voice to the combined members of the Congress, “Mr. Speaker. The President of the United States of America. Mr. Albert Arnold Gore, Junior.”
The U. S. and the world needs Al Gore as President for two basic reasons. The first is to help save us from our wasteful lives and and progress towards a truly humanitarian world. The second is to correct the course of the current U.S. Ship of State which has lost its way into the most troubled waters in living memory.
Let’s go for it, Al. The people need you.
Smiling Jack
Democrats Abroad Canada
I miss the big lug.
I wouldn’t mind seeing a Gore-Feingold ticket but I wouldn’t be too disappointed in a ticket with Gore-Obama or Gore-Edwards or even Gore-Richardson.
And I will add that I do think Kucinich is a good, principled progressive. The US has many good principled progressives, but at some point we have to accept that none of them have a chance to win the US Presidency, or even the Vice-Presidency (unless you can count marginally progressive Feingold), in 2008.
So…a priority should be keeping the internet free!
I say let’s start a laughing revolution, everyone start walking toward the White House laughing and hugging each other, a perfect form of ultra non-violence. I guarantee the crooks in that house will run far and fast when they see the sea of smiling faces, knowing that in the enlightenment our shared knowledge has brought, we have overcome the fear that they daily try to instill in us.
Remember, the one who has it worst in your society or vicinity, he should be your King, and when he is lifted up, you will have a new King, we should continue to lift up from the lowest until we have all become Kings.
The power you think you have is an illusion keeping you enslaved, give it to your neighbor and you will feel what true power is.
Be Free.
Never Lie.
The man next to you is you, more so than you are yourself.
Hey Political Junkies,
Its mostly not about what Al Gore, Obama, Kucinich or anyone else can do from the top. It about what we organise and support each other at the bottom, the Tree Roots, the trunk, the branches and every other level. It helps to have folks at all levels who can contribute to a real solution, but lets work with what we have, wherever our feet are.
Real voting is with our dollars and time every day, not every four years with an “X”. Lets organise our own resources as individuals, families, extended families, communities, workplaces and livelihood encouragers. Its time to reorganise from our foundation.
Its not so much about our ideas, as how we come to manifest (to act upon) them together, first on small scales. The Common part of Dreams is that it starts with us. Why is their so little linking among citizens? Are we ‘fixated’ on centralised change?
douglasf.jack@gmail.com
I have to agree with Chico who says:
Big Al ! You have every right, and indeed a mandate, to go right now to the White house, order our military home to arrest boy bush, nullify everything he did, and assume the presidency. First on your agenda, withdrawl from all bogus oil wars, and an apology to the world.
Anything short of this won’t cut it. Don’t be afraid. The only thing I’m fearful of is YOUR fear of doing this. We’re not civilized right now. Fix it, Mr. President.”
______________
I also believe that our government can’t hide the truth forever.
The main reason I voted for Clinton when we were first running against Big George was because I was told Al Gore was one of the only candidates besides myself who thought that the JFK case was a crime of cover-up. I was very disappointed that Clinton has held back over a million documents from the people about the case but in spite of that we now have the proof of the cover-up which was the beginning of a new Height on “The assault On Reason” that we are trying to deal with today.
But don’t just take my word for it because you can use the Internet and google “George Bush and the JfK assassination”.
During all these years the media has avoided the issue with speculations on all the groups who had motive and all the different guys who claim that they shot JFK.
All that this guess work does is keep us from first getting justice about the bigger crime of the cover-up which not only is an assault on reason but also is what keeps us from ever finding out if possible who all shot JFK.
This will be a monumental break through in our political future and I think we can handle the truth.
Run Al run… we got um now!
Jim Glover jimglover@verizon.net
Al Gore is right! The evidence that this was a bogus war was there before Bush ever took us to war! It wasn’t hidden anywhere it was out in plain sight for everyone to read if anyone had cared to. I would not have found it if it had taken any large amount of research to find (I worked in those days and didn’t have the time I do now that I am retired). It was in our local newspaper that there was no proof that Saddam Hussein was connected to 9/11. And I likewise read that the UN Inspector’s could not find any evidence of WMD’s in Iraq. The rest came from observing our President! George Bush was ‘to hot to trot’ to start a war (or as Barbara would say beating the drums of war to hard). He harped daily on the subject like he does now on Iran. It all looked contrived and orchestrated then. Like he was trying to convince a wry public this needed to be done. He didn’t seem interested in even trying diplomacy! He had that ‘kick ass’ attitude that neocoms have become infamous for. So, a lot of us have always been against the war from the very beginning. I tried at the time to tell women I worked with of the lies that were being used. But, it did no good! I was called ‘unpatriotic’, ‘anti-war’, ‘a bleeding heart liberal’ along with several other names by the war hawks. People were in the war mood. Even some Democrat’s I knew were all for the invasion. Someone was going to pay for 9/11 even if it was the wrong people! So, the American public is ultimately responsible for this disaster. We allowed ourselves to be sucked in by a charlatan. We allowed him to much power with our freedoms. We ignored the wrong he was doing. We are the only ones who are going to be able to fix the mess too!
Dear Mr. Gore,
Only the people who read will be reached by this article. I think you need to make more video clips of your views. More people will be reached, and it would not hurt any to get your face out there a wee bit more.
Al Gore is currently the only person who is electable who would get us out of Iraq and make the necessary changes to impede global warming. In short, Al Gore is the only hope for the world. Please please run, Mr. Gore. This time you would win.
jstevens - you write:
‘Al Gore is currently the only person who is electable who would get us out of Iraq and make the necessary changes to impede global warming.’
I second your appeal - you have summed up the two most important points succinctly and correctly. I’ll add that I think Pres. Gore would also clean up the massive corruption now running our government.
So - run, Al, run.
BROAD STROKE
Damn well said
I just have to take a deep breath and imagine Al Gore talking to world leaders with such insight and intelligence, reflected in this article. Can we envision how the world might react to the US with someone like him as our president? I would be so very hopeful if he decided to run for president. Otherwise, these days, I’m feeling pretty scared.
Mr. Al Gore -
Americans need you and the global community needs you too. I know you might feel concerned about running for President of the United States again as the 2008 election might be rigged, and you have every reason to feel that way. However, it is imperative that you are a candidate for the 2008 election. Damn! You would be VERY popular Mr. Gore. Real popular… and I would wager that more Americans would take a chance with you in saving them and the United States of America than any other candidate right now, both Republican and Democrat, because you, Mr. Gore, indeed speak truth to power. IF you decide to run and IF you win the Presidency, please don’t let humankind down. As you are aware, the stakes are higher now than they ever were. You need to side with humankind over money and businesses and everyone else who does not side with the majority populace. Yes it is a big deal, but you, Mr. Gore, are one of few Americans alive who is able to handle this task in my mind - independent of anything else - because, as I mentioned previously, the human race is literally at stake here. I trust that human welfare trumps money in your mind. I hope that I am not incorrect. Thank you for reading this Mr Gore.
My first thought reading this was, as someone else noted, can you imagine GWB writing anything like it? Many comments here expressing concern that Gore is just another establishment opportunist. Who could rise to power in the US who isn’t establishment, may I ask? And isn’t it better to have a thoughtful member of the establishment running things?
What I really wanted to point out though in reading the piece is Gore’s complimentary mention of his former opponent for US Senator, one Victor Ashe. The very same Victor Ashe GWB is rumored to have had a homosexual liaison with, having met as students at Yale? Hmmmm…….
What makes Al think that the Internet is going to reenable the electorate’s discourse with politics? It doesn’t follow that sitting millions of already gullible voters in front of another hi-tech invention improves their critical reasoning powers.
Moreover, interconnectedness makes it even easier for information ‘traders’ to target the consumption of selective information. The statisticians would have a field-day - they could divide and sub-divide the electorate into tinier and more easily targeted demographic groups. “Spin, tailored just 4U”. Identify key swing groups and mobilize them.
The tools may evolve but the uses stay the same.
First of all, I wouldn’t blame Al if he doesn’t run for 2008. I think the Republican character assasination squad and the rigged election boards would just rake him over the coals again. Who needs that? He’s done more good out of office than he probably could have battling the neo-fascists in Congress as President. That said, the world would be a much better place if he had taken his rightful place in the White House in 2001.
Secondly, the United States is facing what all great nations and empires have faced in the past. Arrogance, bloat, complacency and a world that is changing faster than our government’s ability to make corrections in policy.
For Rome it was “Give them bread and circuses” of Nero. For Britain, it was unbridled arrogance in the belief that they were chosen by some higher power to dominate the world. And now it is our turn.
We have demonstrated through the failure of our society and our government over the last 60 years that we are no better authority in the world than anyone else.
So I say, go Al! Keep telling Americans what they MUST hear or they face the ineviditable end that has occured so many times before.
Al Gore has great insight… add to that his sensitivity, his experience, and his intelligence, and you sense what great wrong has been done to the American people by the US Supreme Court in December of 2000… this is the man that SHOULD BE LEADING OUR NATION…
Let’s hope he re-enters the political arena, runs for president, WINS, and puts this country back on track…
RUN, AL… RUN!!! WE NEED YOU!!!
Check out our groundswell at www.algore.org.
By the way, wouldn’t a GORE-CLINTON ticket be interesting too???
Sorry,
When I read this I felt I was reading ramblings from one of you folks.
Al Gores’ article is not as intelligent as some of the readers posting HERE! He is not telling us anything new!
Solutions Please!
Pleeze, pleez Al, come save us! We can’t get off the couch to save ourselves! There’s this guy Gravel running for prez saying to let the people decide and that we can become lawmakers, but we would have to do it and maybe miss American Idol! And we’re afraid of change! So pleeze come save us without us having to do anything!
“When ballots fail, bullets fly”? Are you all on Land Zanex?
Al is the biggest pusher of bull that I’ve ever heard.
Global warming is only for you ignorant people who do not want to do your own research into “science”.
The only reason we are NOT a total pile of U.S. ashes (vs 3K that went down in 2001) is that this idiot did not get to power. With any luck we’ll keep further idiots (like Bill’s wife) out of office long enough to somewhat prepare for the next attack.
The rest of you can keep sucking-up to each other as if your intellect will actually produce an measly line in some left-leaning liberal rag somewhere. Get a life!
While you keep on bitchin and doing nothing to improve this country, the rest of the Americans will take care of business despite you. Move to a communist country, cowards.
Take Al with you. Global warming is his product, and yours.
Perhaps Al Gore could tell us why he was and still is silent on President Clinton’s Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, saying the death of 500,000 Iraqi children was acceptable.
Was it acceptable to him?
How about the use of depleted uranium in the Balkans?
This man talks out of both sides of his face.
shilalee;
Dearie, your ‘Zanax’ prescription must be filled by someone with similarly poor life skills. Maybe you should up the dosage…
You were good on Larry King yesterday. The better you sound, the more the fascists hate you. You’re the teacher. Not much you can do about the reactionary children in your class that want to kill you, except to draft them in the Army. Travel is the best antidote for bigotry and they need to see what war is firsthand.
I appreciate ALL of the above comments. Although I don’t expect the vast majority of Americans to ever disengage from their T.V.s, it is good to witness the discussion of the few who are “tuned in” to something other than the T.V. And for all Al Gore’s limitations, he was the one that sparked this discussion, so, thank you Mr. Gore.
Hmm, it looks like Gore is trying to rewrite Noam Chomsky’s manufacturing Consent for a popular audience.
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Herman%20/Manufac_Consent_Prop_Model.html
Good luck, I agree with his message here but I was VERY disappointed with his presidential campaign in 2000.
I would love to see Gore/Edwards or Gore/Richardson.
Hillary is a wolf in sheeps clothing.
She is getting funding from the right.
I do not trust her as far as I can throw her.
Gore’s argument recalls that of the late communications theorist, Neil Postman, in his brilliant mid-eighties work, “Amusing Ourselves to Death” (still in print, well worth the read). Postman argued that television in effect reduced all public discourse to entertainment. He contrasted what he called the typographical or print culture of the Enlightenment, when average individuals could follow complex philosophical or theological reasoning to the sensationalist nonsense world created by television. Visual media, where the picture changes every three seconds, where things that have no logical connection are juxtaposed in a “now this” format, where advertising interruptions are constant and an in-depth story is a minute long destroys attention span and the very ability to think. It is the perfect medium for demagogy and fascism, full of simplistic solutions, empty fake dialogue, and overemphasis on appearances. Gore is right to see the internet as a potentially elevating, more rational alternative to TV, in good part because it goes back to using print media. The problem is that we have all been so conditioned by television’s idiot talk and entertainment format that most of us no longer know how to use print to construct well reasoned argument.
The critisims of Al Gore reflects a campaign of misinformation from the right wing media. Had the election not been stolen from Al Gore in 2000. The 9/11 attacks would probably been averted since he would not ignored the warnings as had tbe Bush team. Not to mention the uncalculatible damage from Bush’s sellout to the energy cartel and special interests.
What is wrong with you people? Talk is cheap and Gore is full of it. Will someone name even one right thing Gore has ever done? Just one? I can name plenty he has done wrong, some of which I have detailed in an earlier post. Fitrakis and Wasserman pointed out that after the “election” of 2000 he prevented the Congressional Black Caucus from opening an inquiry into the disenfranchisement of Forida black voters, even to the point of telling sympathetic Senators that if they tried to sign it, as presiding officer of the joint session of Congress he would not recognize them. WHY? Look into his family’s behavior in Venezuela. He was instrumental in the passage of the disastrous Telecommunications bill. Repeatedly he has said one thing and done the opposite. And you want him for President? Do you want to see history repeat itself? Yeah, he said he’s learned from his mistakes. And he told East Liverpool Ohio there would be no toxic incinerator next to their elementary school, and now they have one UPWIND next to their kids’ school playground. And if he got the nomination, what makes you think he wouldn’t fold again if the Republicans started bullying him? I see nothing in his history to give me confidence, and nothing to indicate he has sympathy or understanding for the working class. NAFTA anyone?
The most important message I got from Al’s article:
Democracy requires an informed and vigilant citizenry. At the present time the majority of the U.S. population do not meet this requirement; therefore, they deserve what they got (Dubya), and not democracy.
The Assault on Reason is a good opportunity to revisit the Florida 2000 assault on the vote. According to my calculations, Kathleen Harris’ convicted felon purge resulted in the failure to count a 15,000 vote advantage for Gore over Bush. Check out the math in this week’s essay, Florida 2000 and Al Gore’s New Book, at MP3-My Politics and Progressive Perspective: http://hankedson.squarespace.com
Al Gore has reached a summit in a local peak. A larger mountain, however, is whether, when push comes to shove, the US is really a democracy or rather coasts towards a republican empire when the life of the vast majority is better than tolerable; indifference, television and smart opinions all set in. Still, I would like Gore to climb the intermediate peak of the presidency, if for no other reason than global warming, which affects us all.
Thanks, stelablu67, for making me laugh histerically with your “I wouldn’t trust her as far as I can throw her” line.
Hello
I would like to add Al Gore to the list of corporate Republican right wing Democrats.
It is the “good cop/bad cop” scenario and a brilliant platform, Global Warming…Karl Rove could not have done this one any better.
And where was his stand AGAINST free trade when it when into full overt swing during his “reign” in the whitehouse?
oh, Global warming is another fear inducing “war on….”
to generate fear and $$$$$ yes, we the people will be paying for in sudden taxes. i was slow to wake up to this…it is important to peel away the layers. yes, pollution is a major problem and is excessive use of resources…yet the warming is due to the growing strength of the sun and evidence of this has been recorded for centuries. The agenda is a global one that will serve the few and control the many (us!)
May I suggest “tales from the time loop” by david icke.
thank you.
Hello
I would like to add Al Gore to the list of corporate Republican right wing Democrats.
It is the “good cop/bad cop” scenario and a brilliant platform, Global Warming…Karl Rove could not have done this one any better.
And where was his stand AGAINST free trade when it when into full overt swing during his “reign” in the whitehouse?
oh, Global warming is another fear inducing “war on….”
to generate stress, anxiety and $$$$$ yes, we the people will be paying for in sudden taxes.
i was slow to wake up to this…we are used to looking for someone out there to “save us”.
it is important to peel away the layers. yes, pollution is certainly a major problem and so is our excessive use of resources…our quest for material gain.
yet the warming is due to the growing strength of the sun and evidence of this has been recorded for centuries.
The agenda is a global one that will serve the few and control the many (us!)
peel away the layers to mr gore
and the fact that the article is printed in PRO REPUBLICAN BASED TIME MAGAZINE!!!
May I suggest “tales from the time loop” by david icke.
thank you.
It seems to me that, “We the people”, each of us, are not taking responsibility. We are quick to point fingers and make others to blame, Democrats, Republican, Bush, Cheney, the right, the left, the media, but what did you do today to make a difference? Notice I used the word “We”, I include myself, I turned my back on my country of birth and decided to live in Europe, way back when this really all started, Reagan was elected president. I thought by not identifying with it and not directly supporting it, I was not part of it, which was then maybe partly true. But this is no longer true for me as I see and feel the ripples permeated through all of life, perpetrated by and in my land of birth. We are the problem, “We the people”, for not making a difference, complaining will get us no where. It is each and everyone’s responsibility to become Responsible to life and for ones own actions, do we give the corporations our money, then like it or not we are a part of that collective. Each of us will find, as we take more conscious responsibility for our own actions, all of them, we can make a difference! It is like America is very sick and we want to attack the symptoms, (Democrats, Republicans, Bush, Cheney, the right, the left, the media, corporate America, etc.), rather than the cause, we are the sickness. We can make a difference but we should begin in our daily lives and take responsibility there with the little things before we point our finger and make others responsible. Our problems did not begin with Bush and will not end with Bush and his gang of thugs, it will end when “We the people” take responsibility for our own actions.