Posted on 06/05/2007 9:44:18 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
LONDON (AFP) - Al Gore said the war in Iraq mirrors the lack of action on climate change in that the best evidence has been ignored, in an interview published Saturday.
The United States was sucked in by "crass manipulation" over the moves towards the invasion of Iraq, the former US vice president turned environmental campaigner told British newspaper The Guardian.
And Gore, who is repeatedly asked if he will run for office again, said he did not have the skills it takes to get elected as US president -- though he admitted there was no job in the world like it for influencing events.
"What the invasion of Iraq has in common with the climate crisis is that in both cases the best evidence was ignored," Gore told daily.
"In both cases there was more than sufficient evidence to convince any reasonable person that the invasion of Iraq was a catastrophic mistake, and the failure to begin sharply reducing carbon dioxide was an even worse mistake."
Gore was asked about New York Senator Hillary Clinton's admission that she had not read the intelligence brief on Iraq before voting for the March 2003 invasion.
"The individuals that failed to discharge their responsibilities as elected officials to master their briefs is important," he said.
"But to me, the more important question is how the United States of America could have been so vulnerable to such crass manipulation.
"Many of them were afraid of being branded unpatriotic, sure, and many journalists were, as many have since acknowledged, and that is unhealthy in a democracy."
Gore, defeated by George W. Bush in the 2000 US presidential election, is repeatedly asked if he will stand against Clinton and others in the race to become the Democratic Party's candidate for the 2008 election.
But he is not sure if he is willing to do what it takes to try to get elected, The Guardian said.
"The kinds of skills that are rewarded in this new communications environment include some that I don't think I have in abundance ... a tolerance for artifice and repetition, an appreciation for clever manipulative strategies," he said.
He insisted he was content to be campaigning for action on global warming.
"I am under no illusion that there is any position in the world that approaches that of the president of the United States in terms of its inherent ability to influence the course of events," he said.
"But I do think that this is an effort that is worthwhile and one I feel very passionate about, and I intend to see it through."
Gore was recently nominated for a Nobel Peace Price for his work in drawing attention to climate change, while the film he helped make of his best-selling global warming book "An Inconvenient Truth" earlier this year won an Oscar.
He is behind Live Earth, a 24-hour relay of rock concerts to promote action on confronting climate change.
The July 7 event spans Sydney, Tokyo, Shanghai, Istanbul, Johannesburg, Hamburg, London, Rio de Janeiro and New York and intends to reach over two billion people on television, radio and the Internet.
Apparently he hasn’t received the memo - Climate change isn’t in our power to manipulate.
Gore will get the Demo nomination and has an excellent chance of becomming our next president.
If he was smart he would fade into the woodwork and disappear.
But he is not, so he pays out plenty of rope to hang himself.
As evidence continues to mount that man made global warming is a hoax.
Here is a good video on some salient points.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4boaEbtjByU&mode=related&search=
Theres a ton of jokes there..
Please run Gore, oh please, please, please. It would be a hoot.
“Gore will get the Demo nomination and has an excellent chance of becomming our next president.”
No and no.
The Goracle is the only rat who comes across as a bigger lunatic and more stupid than Hillary. And the environment doesn’t even show up on the top ten list of American concerns. Gore is a fringe, one issue candidate.
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