Ryan Lizza has a very sympathetic profile of Al Gore in the latest New Republic [here]. The NR has been in Gore's pocket for a very long time, so long in fact that it can no longer recognize just how very, very repulsive and arrogant their hero is.
For one thing, Gore is so full of himself that he is insufferably rude.
A few nights earlier, I had watched Charlie Rose interview Gore at the 92nd Street Y in New York, and, during a few exchanges, Gore turned the tables on him, pointedly asking Rose to clarify a rambling statement, which the host then struggled to explain. Similarly, several times during a recent TV interview with Diane Sawyer, Gore gently ridiculed her for asking about the 2008 horserace or his weight, rather than the substance of his book. "Listen to your questions," he admonished at one point. Gore believes he has written a serious book, and he is in no mood to suffer fools. The night before our meeting, I had a nightmare about the interview.[emphasis mine]
What a guy, that Al -- and as for Ryan, I hope the emotional trial of being in the awesome presence of his hero didn't cause him to be incontinent.
Not only is Al full of himself, he's full of fecal matter.
Gore thinks in terms of systems. He isn't content merely to describe a problem, but rather tries to understand the underlying structures that enable it. This was true of his early forays into ecology, his reinventing government effort in the Clinton years, and his strategic thinking on arms control and foreign policy generally....Basically, Big Al says [authoritatively, of course] that the problem is that TV replaced print as the primary information system for most people. The result was a managed, one-way flow of information that replaced the earlier dialogue of democracy.
Lately, Gore has also taken a systems view of the Bush years. The story of the structural dysfunction behind the last six-and-a-half years begins, according to Gore, with a brief history of the relationship between the press and democracy.
That's right, Al -- before TV political elites couldn't control information flow, "the people" had full access to information systems, and Bush won because his managers were able to make him seem so damn good in front of a camera.
And Gore has nothing but contempt for today's political process. According to him politics is irrevocably broken, candidates are helpless in the grasp of their managers, and there is no real national dialogue, either between parties or within them.
Do tell! What about the healthy spirit of dissension that is currently frustrating political elites in both parties? It seems that throughout the TV age -- roughly 1960 to the present -- American political culture has been characterized more by dissension and dialogue than mindless conformity and elite manipulation. Remember the Sixties, Al? Vietnam and Watergate? The collapse of Keynesianism? The Reagan revolution? The current resistance to globalization? All that and more?
It is striking to note that Al's incomprehension of his own times is matched by his confidence that his simplistic systems approach explains all.
What an insufferable and arrogant fool! I'm glad he lost.
Since Gore does not suffer fools gladly, he must be filled with self-loathing, either that or completely blind to his own faults. I suspect the latter.
