Algore speaks

[Flashermac]

THE GUARDIAN

31 May 2006

 

 

Gore: Bush is 'renegade rightwing extremist'

 

by Oliver Burkeman and Jonathan Freedland

 

 

Al Gore has made his sharpest attack yet on the George Bush presidency, describing the current US administration as "a renegade band of rightwing extremists".

 

In an interview with the Guardian today, the former vice-president calls himself a "recovering politician", but launches into the political fray more explicitly than he has previously done during his high-profile campaigning on the threat of global warming.

 

Denying that his politics have shifted to the left since he lost the court battle for the 2000 election, Mr Gore says: "If you have a renegade band of rightwing extremists who get hold of power, the whole thing goes to the right."

 

But he claims he does not "expect to be a candidate" for president again, while refusing explicitly to rule out another run. Asked if any event could change his mind, he says: "Not that I can see."

 

Mr Gore, who appeared at the Guardian Hay literary festival over the bank holiday weekend, is promoting An Inconvenient Truth, a documentary and book detailing the climate change crisis that he warns "could literally end civilisation".

 

The new levels of attention he is receiving have led some Democrats to call on him to run again for president, while others have responded with anger that Mr Gore did not show the same level of passion in the 2000 campaign.

 

He has since acknowledged that he followed too closely the advice of his consultants during that campaign, and - before he started to scoff at the idea of running again - swore that if he ever did so, he would speak his mind.

 

In the years since, he has been a steady critic of specific Bush administration policies. He opposed the war on Iraq at a time when most prominent Democrats were supporting it, and more recently spoke out against what he called "a gross and excessive power grab" by the administration over phone tapping.

 

In the interview Mr Gore also distances himself from Tony Blair on the subject of nuclear power, which the prime minister has insisted is "back on the agenda with a vengeance". Mr Gore says he is "sceptical about it playing a much larger role," and that although it might have a part to play in Britain or China, it will not be "a silver bullet" in the fight against global warming.

 

In the US, Mr Gore's environmental campaign has sparked a backlash from some on the right who accuse him of scaremongering. A series of television advertisements, launched by a thinktank called the Competitive Enterprise Institute, argue that carbon dioxide emissions are a sign of American productivity and progress.

 

Mr Gore's true attitude towards a potential return to the White House - or, at least, a potential battle with Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination - remains unknown.

 

At the weekend, Time magazine reported that he was telling key fundraisers they should feel free to sign on with other potential candidates. The magazine quoted unnamed Democratic sources as saying that the former vice-president had also been asking the fundraisers to "tell everybody I'm not running".

 

Mr Gore would not find it difficult to raise millions of dollars, if he did decide to run. But while public denials might prove a wise campaign strategy - not least by prolonging the period of positive attention Mr Gore is now receiving - actively turning away fundraisers does suggest a firmer resolve not to re-enter electoral politics.

 

It is significant, however, that Mr Gore refuses to go beyond saying that he has no "plans" for such a campaign. "I haven't made a Shermanesque statement because it just seems odd to do so," he has said - a reference to the famous announcement by the damnyankee General William Tecumseh Sherman, who unequivocally refused to stand in the election of 1884. "If nominated, I will not run; if elected, I will not serve," General Sherman said.

[chuckwoww]

A lot has happened in the last 4 years. He can talk like that now but if he'd come on too strong in the election Bush would have had a clear majority. Mind you Gore wouldn't have looked so bumbling without his minders.

 

And there's always the big question of how he would have handled 911.

[liquidflux]

I'd agree with the internet inventor that Bush is an extremist, but not to the right.

[..]

chuckwoww said:

And there's always the big question of how he would have handled 911.

Of course, there is always the question IF 911 would have happened, coming from some who believe that there is far more to that story than is public knowledge (ala the Kennnedy assassination)...

 

Cheers,

SD

[Flashermac]

Most likely Gore would have gone into Afganistan after Osama. But I can't see him attacking Iraq, knowing full well that Soddie had nothing to do with 9/11. That was Bush's bright idea -- and I'm still trying to figure out why.

 

p.s. This is presuming that Gore didn't retain that nasty bitch Albright. Who knows what she might have done.

 

 

 

[AF16]

Flashermac said:

Most likely Gore would have gone into Afganistan after Osama. But I can't see him attacking Iraq, knowing full well that Soddie had nothing to do with 9/11. That was Bush's bright idea -- and I'm still trying to figure out why.

 

p.s. This is presuming that Gore didn't retain that nasty bitch Albright. Who knows what she might have done.

 

 

 

Oil.

 

It's not a difficult question.

[chuckwoww]

Oil, Israel, PNAC. The GOP was riddled with Neocons. They were itching to invade Iraq. I wonder if Gore would have been able to resist the pressure.

[liquidflux]

AF16 said:

Flashermac said:

Most likely Gore would have gone into Afganistan after Osama. But I can't see him attacking Iraq, knowing full well that Soddie had nothing to do with 9/11. That was Bush's bright idea -- and I'm still trying to figure out why.

 

p.s. This is presuming that Gore didn't retain that nasty bitch Albright. Who knows what she might have done.

 

 

 

Oil.

 

It's not a difficult question.

 

I'd be bathing in oil if that was the case. Try another excuse.

[AF16]

I don't know why you would be bathing in oil, but the fact is that it's a huge storm brewing and the US and China are in a bitter fight for stable access to energy.

 

If you read the PNAC documents, written by the men behind Bush, you will se it spelled out in black and white. The plan to take Iraq? Written before 9/11.

 

Note that ensureing a stable deliverance of oil does not mean to litterarely steal it, it just means that you get access to buy the oil in a long term perspective, and that other nations can not blackmail you by threatening to sell to others or close the tap.

 

The sad thing is that the men behind Bush has said what their goal is and _ STILL _ the Bushsupporters does not belive it.

[McBif]

suadum said:

Of course, there is always the question IF 911 would have happened, coming from some who believe that there is far more to that story than is public knowledge (ala the Kennnedy assassination)...

 

 

Ah, Conspiracies. The "Hidden Hand". They explain everything. As for incompetence, stupidity, accidents, co-incidence, geo-political realities - these factors and more are completely ignored. What we have here is the sophistication of the ignorant; the insider trading of the outsider; the power of those who feel themselves unjustly powerless...

 

Remember Occam's Razor? Pick the scenario you think is more likely:

 

1) The evil President of the U.S. orders the World Trade Centre destroyed and kills 3,000 people so that he can "steal" oil from some shithole country (apparently his "evil" doesn't stretch to just announcing that, say, the Saudi oilfields are now U.S. property). Hundreds of people have to be on the conspiracy, but no worries. Why, he'll just bump off anybody he figures might spill the beans. Somebody talks to a reporter? Bump off the reporter! Oliver Stone gets a whiff? Bump off Oliver Stone! I could go on, but you get the picture.

 

2) Some jihadis hijack some airplanes and crash them into the World Trade Centre and elsewhere.

 

I may not possess the deep sophistication, penetration, sagacity and worldliness of the average Cairo cab driver or Hollywood starlet or UFO spotter or French neo-fascist, but I vote for number two.

 

For those voting for number one, why don't you do some research and get a Pulitzer Prize? You'd have some stiff competition, mind. Oh, I forgot: you don't wanna get bumped off...