The Beat

Gore Wins the Norwegian Primary

posted by John Nichols on 10/12/2007 @ 06:42am

Having now won the Norwegian Primary, it is reasonable to ask why Al Gore would want to slog his way through the snows of New Hampshire.

But the inconvenient truth is that never has the man who might yet be president needed to more seriously consider his personal legacy--not to mention the small matter of his potential to make the world anew--than now.

There is, after all, the matter of the open space at the end of what is now the most remarkable resume of anyone seeking – or considering seeking – the presidency.

Let's review.

This is how Al Gore's resumé reads as of this morning:

Son of a great senator.

Harvard graduate, with honors.

Vietnam veteran.

Award-winning investigative journalist.

Congressman.

Senator.

Vice President.

Winner of the popular vote for President of the United States.

Best-selling author.

Environmental activist.

Academy Award winner.

And, now, Nobel Peace Prize winner--he shares the prize with the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change--for "their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about manmade climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change."

As resumés go, that is one for the top of the pile.

But it begs the question: Shouldn't a man who has gotten this far be thinking about how to finish the journey?

And isn't the last stop the Oval Office?

To think that Gore is not pondering these questions today would be absurd.

Of course, the former vice president says, "The climate crisis is not a political issue, it is a moral and spiritual challenge to all of humanity."

No doubt about that.

But Gore cannot feign ignorance of his own "political issue." When he appeared in San Francisco on the eve of Friday morning's announcement, at a fundraising event for California Senator Barbara Boxer, the man of the hour tried to deliver an earnest address about climate change. But when he concluded his remarks, the crowd burst into chants of "Run Al Run!"

That message echoed the full-page ad that was placed by the burgeoning "Draft Gore for President" movement in the front section of Wednesday's New York Times. The advertisement bluntly suggested that the announced contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination lack Gore's ``vision, standing in the world, and political courage" -- not just with regard to climate change, but in his outspoken opposition to the war in Iraq, his defenses of civil liberties and his advocacy for a renewed commitment to science and reason.

"There are times for politicians and times for heroes. America and the Earth need a hero right now," read the Draft Gore movement's open letter to the soon-to-be Nobel man. "Please rise to this challenge, or you and millions of us will live forever wondering what might have been."

Now, that's pressure. But it is a velvet grip in which the peace prize winner finds himself.

Al Gore has arrived at the point that most politicians can only imagine in their wildest dreams. The entire world is asking him to be not merely a candidate but an ecological--not to mention, ideological --savior. And there is simply no question that he is viable. In fact, he is more viable than he has ever been.

Can Gore resist? Probably.

Should he resist? Probably not.

Sure, it will be said that Gore can do more to address climate change as a private citizen. But no one who as been so close to the presidency as he will miss the point that the most powerful official on the planet has some sway in matters involving the planet.

The last serious presidential prospect to win a Nobel Peace Prize was Teddy Roosevelt, who got the award when he was serving as president in 1906. (The Norwegians were impressed that he had convinced Japanese and Russian representatives to come to Portsmouth, New Hampshire, and that he had then gotten them to negotiate an end to a nasty little war they had been waging.)

Roosevelt exited the presidency in 1908 and almost immediately began to regret the decision. The peace prize was not enough to get Republicans to ditch his successor, the hapless William Howard Taft, and put Roosevelt at the head of their 1912 ticket. But TR did run the most successful third-party presidential campaign of the 20th century that year – as a "Bull Moose" Progressive.

Roosevelt never got over his belief that, had he just won the Republican nomination in 1912, he would again have been president. And, eight years later, at a point after the horrors of World War I when people were taking peace prizes rather more seriously, he was widely encouraged to make a run for the Republican nomination that probably would have secured him not just the party line but the presidency.

Roosevelt did not need much encouragement. Barely 60 -- the age Gore will turn next March -- the Rough Rider was ready for one more charge; indeed, family members and friends reported that he was raring to go.

Only the coronary embolism that did him in on January 6, 1919, was powerful enough to cure TR's case of presidency lust. And there is no reason to believe that Al Gore, a man who bid first for the presidency in 1988, considered running in 1992, spent eight years as an understudy, then bid again in 2000 – winning the Democratic nomination and the popular vote, but losing the job on a 5-4 technical call by the Supreme Court -- is any less inclined that Roosevelt was to give it another try.

There will be a lot of "fire-in-the-belly" talk over the next few days.

But Al Gore should not be worrying about checking his gut.

He should be thinking about the resume he has spent a lifetime preparing.

It is more impressive than ever.

Unfortunately, the suddenly more impressive character of Gore's resume only serves to emphasize that it remains incomplete.

A Nobel Prize for Peace is a fine honor. But take it from a man who won the presidency and the prize but could not leave the political arena.

"It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better," Teddy Roosevelt said as he prepared another run for the White House. "The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat."

Comments (357)

  1. Mr Nichols, like "Gore running in '08", you used to do a LOT of articles on the imminent impeachment of Bush and Cheney.

    Yet you don't much anymore...curious as to why?

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 07:25am

  2. Now what? Nothing. He now joins other "Peace Giants" like Arafat, Carter..and Gore...as the prize for "Peace Contributions" get even further diluted..this is irrelevent to most except those on the left..enjoy....what happens if we are still here in a few years? Or if more of his predictions get debunked? Will ALGORE have to return the money and medal?

    ALGOREs head now become more swollen, almost waterbrain like, and he will go nowhere near the 08 race, as he knows he will get slaughtered..what, he polls 10% now...and to enter the fray now would make him look silly as he gats clipped by the Clintons yet again, ...he will milk his Prize for quite awhile..

    yawner for those who think...

    Posted by john maasch at 10/12/2007 @ 07:44am

  3. "The entire world is asking him to be not merely a candidate but an ecological--not to mention, ideological --savior. "

    Really? at 10% polling? I think Hillary, and the rest of the country who will be paying the price for ALGOREs ideas might have a different take on this statement...

    Posted by john maasch at 10/12/2007 @ 08:18am

  4. Oscars for Guggenheim and Etheridge and a Nobel for Mr. Gore. Perfect.

    Posted by RLawrence at 10/12/2007 @ 08:41am

  5. Despite what HSUB might think, I'd love to see Gore run and WIN...

    my fear is though that he would run and LOSE. Not the Presidency. Despite what MAASCH and the "Bring it on" Right guys think, Gore would easily beat everybody from Giuliani on down, if on the mere fact that 70% of the country wishes they could go back in time and "re-do" 2000.

    No, I mean I would fear he would lose the primaries, and in the process so weaken the Dems with diviseness (Mr Nichols and other Gore fanatics wouldn't take it nicely if Her Nibs went dirty, which she would, and knocked Gore down to win the nomination)...and it would mean another 4 years of the guys who are promising us to "stay the Bush course". (Plus, atleast 2, if not 3 Repub nominations to the Supreme Court)

    But in the end, I don't think Gore will do it...if he's smart (which he is, after all, he's "revised" himself atleast two times since the "pro-life" "Zell Miller" model Gore of the early 80s).

    Unless he has good solid evidence that he could jump in in the next 2 weeks and ABSOLUTELY stomp Her Majesty WELL before the California and Florida primaries....he'd risk THE biggest embarassment of his life since he necked with Tipper at the 2000 Convention.

    And of course the courage to risk that the Clintons don't have a secret "Gore silver bullet" file that they would use...leaked to Fox News or even the Wall Street Journal, with some juicy tidbits they gleaned from 8 years with Al as #2.

    But, if he can overcome all that...more power to him and (as with any Democrat nominated, HAPPY), I'll vote for him as I'm sure many....MANY others would for President!

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 09:00am

  6. "if on the mere fact that 70% of the country wishes they could go back in time and "re-do" 2000.."

    Oh, really?

    70%...you really think that the 30% plus in that number that are repubs or independents would rather have had Gore? Mask, you know better...take the spending of Bush and increase it and you would have Gore..Iraq? No, might not have Iraq, but you would have more embassy bombings, Coles, 9/11s perhaps.....Gore didn't even know who Bin Laden was with North, and did nothing to preventy 9/11 aftrt the FIRST bombing of the TC...

    You are dreaming on Gore...and today he polls right up there with Edwards...this is a liberal elitist now and he spawns orgams for those whose religon is Global whatever....

    And this says nothing about what Hillary will do to him...he runs the risk of diappearing again and looking ridiculous at the hands of the Clintons..again.

    Posted by john maasch at 10/12/2007 @ 09:11am

  7. Really? at 10% polling? I think Hillary, and the rest of the country who will be paying the price for ALGOREs ideas might have a different take on this statement...

    Posted by JOHN MAASCH 10/12/2007 @ 08:18am

    Can you even hear yourself? 10% polling for a man who hasn't even declared any intent to declare as yet? With the Nobel under his belt, if he does declare now, watch that 10% climb to well over the half-way mark in no time. I share Mask's fear, though: that Hilary Clinton will pull out all stops to decimate the guy. He'll be smart to stay out - but how I wish he would run and prove all of us wrong!

    Posted by oneworld at 10/12/2007 @ 09:13am

  8. Posted by JOHN MAASCH 10/12/2007 @ 09:11am

    MAASCH, I was being GENEROUS to the Republicans.

    70% is the disapproval for Bush and the war. EIGHTY percent is the "the country is going in the wrong direction" number.

    If you don't believe me, how about NEWT GINGRICH? Who said just a few weeks ago that the Dems had an EIGHTY percent shot at winning in 2008.

    As for all that stuff "Bush did, Gore would be worse"....how?!??!?!

    He'd spend THREE-QUARTERS OF A TRILLION DOLLARS "off the books"? He'd get 3800+ (and rising) GIs killed? He'd "get bin Laden" LESS than Bush has?!??!? He'd let MORE New Orleaners drown?!?!??!

    Seriously, man. As I noted, what could Gore (or any Dem) do that someone could SERIOUSLY say "He's doing it worse than Bush!"

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 09:22am

  9. .take the spending of Bush and increase it and you would have Gore...

    Posted by JOHN MAASCH 10/12/2007

    clinton/gore left a balanced budget.

    Posted by frosty zoom at 10/12/2007 @ 09:24am

  10. Al Gore lied to us about Sadaam. "he is in league with terrorists and trying to build a nuclear bomb." Why should we believe him on Global Warming.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 09:25am

  11. Seriously, man. As I noted, what could Gore (or any Dem) do that someone could SERIOUSLY say "He's doing it worse than Bush!" Posted by MASK Well he could pull our troops out of Iraq and cause a HUGE humanitarian crisis. Yes even bigger than it is now!

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 09:26am

  12. Alexander Cockburn 16 July 2007 from CounterPunch:

    'The world's best-known hysteric and self promoter on the topic of man's physical and moral responsibility for global warming is Al Gore, a shill for the nuclear industry and the coal barons from the first day he stepped into Congress entrusted with the sacred duty to protect the budgetary and regulatory interests of the Tennessee Valley Authority and the Oakridge National Lab. White House "task forces" on climate change in the Clinton-Gore years were always well freighted by Gore and his adviser John Holdren with nukers like Lawrence Papay of Bechtel.

    As a denizen of Washington since his diaper years, Gore has always understood that threat inflation is the surest tool to plump up budgets and rabble-rouse the voters. By the mid-Nineties he positioned himself at the head of a strategic and tactical alliance formed around "the challenge of climate change," which had now stepped forward to take Communism's place in the threatosphere essential to all political life.

    The foot soldiers in this alliance have been the grant-guzzling climate modelers and their Internationale, the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, whose collective scientific expertise is reverently invoked by all devotees of the Greenhouse fearmongers' catechism. Aside from the fact that the graveyard of intellectual error is stuffed with the myriad tombstones of "overwhelming scientific consensus," the IPCC has the usual army of functionaries and grant farmers, and the merest sprinkling of actual scientists with the prime qualification of being climatologists or atmospheric physicists.'

    Posted by HonestLiberal at 10/12/2007 @ 09:30am

  13. "clinton/gore left a balanced budget.

    Posted by FROSTY ZOOM 10/12/2007 @ 09:24am

    Congress controls the purchase and the cash flow..or lack of it.

    Congress balanced the budget...Presidents submit budgets which are promply thrown in the trash..And Clinton had huge deficits into the future as far as the eye could see...'94 change the atmosphere and to Clintons credit, he signed the blue print..I'll givbe credit to both.

    Posted by john maasch at 10/12/2007 @ 09:32am

  14. what could Gore (or any CEPHALOPOD or NUDIBRANCH) do that someone could SERIOUSLY say "He's doing it worse than Bush!"

    Posted by frosty zoom at 10/12/2007 @ 09:35am

  15. Perhaps Honestliberal and other denizens of cloud-cuckoo land will care to explain this year's polar melt, just for starters?

    Posted by mikecope at 10/12/2007 @ 09:44am

  16. And of course the courage to risk that the Clintons don't have a secret "Gore silver bullet" file that they would use...leaked to Fox News or even the Wall Street Journal, with some juicy tidbits they gleaned from 8 years with Al as #2.

    Posted by MASK 10/12/2007 @ 09:00am

    Er, Frita, vice versa ol'girl. I'm pretty sure Al has a ton of stuff on B&H too; tons most likely.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 09:48am

  17. The biggest clue that Hillary fears an Al run is her refusal to answer Keith O on Countdown about Al enterring the race. She talked all around it and praised Al for the Nobel nom, but did not say a thing about a possible Gore run for the presidency-- and KO knew enough not press it.

    Bill C. has already said he'd like to see Al run, that it'd add another level to the conversation and debate.

    I agree, of course.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 09:58am

  18. As a Republican on the ropes, I ask Al Gore to please, please run...

    Posted by John the Sane at 10/12/2007 @ 10:00am

  19. Perhaps Honestliberal and other denizens of cloud-cuckoo land will care to explain this year's polar melt, just for starters?

    Posted by MIKECOPE 10/12/2007 @ 09:44am

    Why did it freeze? was there a shortage of carbon in the air?

    Posted by john maasch at 10/12/2007 @ 10:04am

  20. Posted by JOHN MAASCH 10/12/2007 @ 10:04am

    are you a climatologist?

    Posted by frosty zoom at 10/12/2007 @ 10:07am

  21. Posted by JOHN MAASCH 10/12/2007 @ 10:04am

    are you a climatologist?

    Posted by FROSTY ZOOM 10/12/2007 @ 10:07am |

    Same answer as other thread..

    Nope and neither is ALGORE...

    But, I did stay at a Holliday Express once..

    Posted by john maasch at 10/12/2007 @ 10:08am

  22. Perhaps Honestliberal and other denizens of cloud-cuckoo land will care to explain this year's polar melt, just for starters?

    Posted by MIKECOPE

    Right after you explain that Antartica (where 90% of the world's ice is) is actually growing at an astounding rate.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 10:08am

  23. Posted by ABELL12CT 10/12/2007 @ 10:08

    the climate is sure getting messed up.

    Posted by frosty zoom at 10/12/2007 @ 10:12am

  24. Posted by JOHN MAASCH 10/12/2007 @ 10:08am

    how many hours have you spent researching what climatologists have to say about global climate f**k up?

    Posted by frosty zoom at 10/12/2007 @ 10:14am

  25. the climate is sure getting messed up.

    Posted by FROSTY ZOOM

    Just as messed up as it has always been. Why do people automatically believe Al Gore? Weathermen can't tell you what the weather is gonna be next week yet Al Gore tells you what the weather is gonna be 30 years from now and you believe him without question.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 10:15am

  26. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

    http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/index.noshade.html

    "UPDATE: Monday, October 1, 2007 - Record SH sea ice maximum and NH sea ice minimum

    Just when you thought this season's cryosphere couldn't be more strange .... The Southern Hemisphere sea ice area narrowly surpassed the previous historic maximum of 16.03 million sq. km to 16.17 million sq. km. The observed sea ice record in the Southern Hemisphere (1979-present) is not as long as the Northern Hemisphere. Prior to the satellite era, direct observations of the SH sea ice edge were sporadic."

    Posted by HonestLiberal at 10/12/2007 @ 10:15am

  27. Ok right about now I should be getting a post about from someone who assumes that I work for an oil company.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 10:16am

  28. Posted by ABELL12CT 10/12/2007 @ 10:16am

    not at all.

    but would you want to live near a refinery?

    oil is poison.

    the sooner we leave it behind, the better off we'll be.

    if all this is nonsense, ¡¡¡¡¡excellent!!!!!

    but if that nonsense convinces us of the folly of unlimited hydrocarbon use, ¡¡¡¡¡excellenter!!!!!

    Posted by frosty zoom at 10/12/2007 @ 10:21am

  29. Posted by ABELL12CT 10/12/2007 @ 10:16am

    not at all.

    but would you want to live near a refinery?

    oil is poison.

    No and I don't want to live near ARMYJIHAD, PALESTINE, ISRAEL,RUSSIA,....OR ALGORE or Edwards either, since their big houses have jacked up all the tax rates in the area..and again, your point is?

    Posted by john maasch at 10/12/2007 @ 10:25am

  30. ABELL, I heard a politician say this a week or so back...

    Do you believe it's true?

    "global temperatures are rising and that this is caused largely by human activities."

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 10:29am

  31. Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/12/2007 @ 09:48am

    (Once more throwing pearls before swine, but ...oh well)

    HSUB, everybody already KNOWS all the stuff about the Clintons. But Gore 3.0 is supposedly "Mr Clean Jeans", righteous and pure and untained by sin as us mere mortals.

    He throws out a "Bill bopped a go-go girl last year while Hillary was in Iowa"...everybody yawns. He throws out a "Hillary got $5000 from an oil company exec"...everybody says "Yeah, so what else is new?"

    THEY come up with some juicy bit on the guy they've watched out of the corner of their eye...and Gore's stock plummets as he's painted as "just another politician" and not as Mr Nichols thinks (as do you) a "savior".

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 10:32am

  32. I have stumbled into a creative project with a great deal of social potential, something that snarking trolls, while fun, is lacking.

    Behave yourselves, kids.

    Do your homework.

    And if you have any wingers over while I'm out, you'd better clean up the mess before I get back.

    Posted by drhammer at 10/12/2007 @ 10:33am

  33. This is interesting. John Nichols wonders in his article if Algore's last stop shouln't be the Oval Office.

    Remember the last time he worked in the building where the Oval Office is? Where he was raising campaign contributions while at work (even though that is not legal) and then proclaimed there was "No controlling legal authority" to say he could not do that.

    I guess if Algore were President it would be a first. Just as JFK was the first Catholic president, Algore would be the first Village Idiot to become President.

    I apologize. I am sorry because I should not have said what I just said above. I apologize to any Village Idiots out there who I may have just offended, by saying you are like Algore.

    Posted by sjchermak at 10/12/2007 @ 10:38am

  34. Posted by MASK 10/12/2007 @ 10:32am

    Mask is of course, correct.

    When it comes to scorched earth policys in destryoing enemies, ALGORE is an ametuer in the presence of pros.

    Posted by john maasch at 10/12/2007 @ 10:39am

  35. Gore's big thing back in 1999-00, was that he wanted to stand on his own and not have a Clinton prop-up and not simply per Monica bj mania. That a rebuffed B. Clinton somewhat sabotaged Gore's campaigning did as much damage as Al's own mis-starts, but even then Al still won the majority vote. Now that Al Gore is pretty much totally out of Bill C.'s shadow, he very much has a clear decision to make without the doubts that plagued his 2000 campaign. As well, Bill C. can feel neutral, as he's still feeling a little guilty about being left out and sore, the last time Al ran-- plus he actually likes Al a lot.

    Then there's the USA citizenry. What better way to prove that everything would have been different had Jeb and the GOP Gestapo not muscled the Florida vote count leading to a 'political' not legal SCOTUS decision. I think it is not only Al that needs vindication but the USA needs to know and fix it. The big thing about the USA is the core desire to fix things, make it better; which is the antithesis of the hsuB/cHeney's GOP repub new con/dic'tator philosophy. The USA needs Al Gore as much as Al Gore needs the USA: Al gore is his own man and the USA wants to be a democracy again. Making Al Gore president would be a first step.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 10:49am

  36. HSUB, everybody already KNOWS all the stuff about the Clintons.

    Posted by MASK 10/12/2007 @ 10:32am

    No they don't.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 10:52am

  37. Antarctica ice increasing? Ha Ha. http://nsidc.org/iceshelves/ or http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Antarctic_Ice_Sheet might enlighten you, but you don't want to be enlightened. You want to continue to live in the physics-free world created by Exxon shills. Physics is not responsive to ideology. Perhaps the return of Jesus, or some other weird fantasy of the American right will save you, but there just isn't any evidence that it will.

    Posted by mikecope at 10/12/2007 @ 10:54am

  38. Posted by JOHN MAASCH 10/12/2007 @ 10:39am

    Curious if any of the anti-Hillary, pro-Gore folks REALLY don't consider that She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed wouldn't do everything in her power to destroy a primary challenge from Gore...

    or even sabotage him if he becomes the nominee out of spite?

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 10:56am

  39. No they don't.

    Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/12/2007 @ 10:52am

    Oh, okay...what else is there?

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 10:56am

  40. Frita, remeber the puplic doesn't know. You're such a nitwit.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 10:57am

  41. er, remember

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 10:58am

  42. Posted by JOHN MAASCH 10/12/2007 @ 10:25am

    oil causes wars.

    oil pollutes everything it touches.

    we are smearing the planet with smushed-up rotten plants from eons ago.

    humans are smart.

    it's time to proceed to the next level.

    Posted by frosty zoom at 10/12/2007 @ 10:59am

  43. Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/12/2007 @ 10:57am

    Well, HSUB, you said "No they don't" (Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/12/2007 @ 10:52am), so one would assume that YOU do....

    or is this just an article of faith with you and you have no proof?

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 10:59am

  44. Surely it would be a huge mistake for Gore to run, turning/using his win for starkly political purposes, diminishing the value of the prize and the focus of its message, raising the cynicism quotient even higher than it already is, opening the door to the type of political divisiveness that could give us the likes of a Guliani, and on and on. It is also less than inspiring to hear calls for a hero and savior, which seems such an old and tired approach from supposedly progressive/left-leaning folks, not to mention encouraging someone to run merely to fill out an impressive resume. If the makeup of Congress is not changed, a hero, savior, and impressive resume-holder will be tarnished and blocked in a nanosecond anyway. Gore had already written a best-selling book on the environment before he became vice-president, and his eight years in office were less than something to write home about. In some ways, a free-floating Gore with a Nobel Prize for Climate Change could provide clout in ways that haven't yet been calculated, whereas throwing his hat into the political ring at this point could turn a shining moment for the potential of action on climate change into a dismal, political mess that is decidedly unheroic. It would seem far more strategic to turn all this search for a hero and a savior into a nationwide focus on every House and Senate seat up for election.

    Posted by nova at 10/12/2007 @ 11:01am

  45. Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/12/2007 @ 10:57am

    Well, HSUB, you said "No they don't"

    or is this just an article of faith with you and you have no proof?

    Posted by MASK 10/12/2007 @ 10:59am

    Frita you said "HSUB, everybody already KNOWS all the stuff about the Clintons"

    "is this just an article of faith with you and you have no proof?"

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 11:05am

  46. Al Gore wins the Nobel Peace Prize for making a movie? You have got to be kidding. Boy has the quality of this award gone downhill quickly. Mohamed ElBaradei? Koffi Annan?

    It wasn't that long ago that those risked their own lives helping others won this prestigious award. Groups such as Doctors without borders, and individuals like Nelson Mandela, Aung Kyi, Desmond Tutu, Lech Welesa, and Martin Luther King Jr. epitimised what this award was all about.

    But please, giving it for helping finance and narrate a movie, give me a break. Then again both Yasser Arafat, and Henry Kissinger have won this thing, so I don't know what to make of it.

    Posted by Zeddmen at 10/12/2007 @ 11:15am

  47. Exposures to Criteria Air Pollutants

    See nonattainment areas in NEBRASKA where ambient concentrations of criteria air pollutants persistently exceed air quality standards.

    [ top ]

    1999 Emissions Summary of Criteria Air Pollutants

    (Expressed in tons of pollutant emitted)

    Carbon monoxide

    Nitrogen oxides

    PM-2.5 [ particulate matter, smaller and nastier ]

    PM-10 [ particulate matter, small and nasty ]

    Sulfur dioxide

    Volatile organic compounds

    Mobile Sources 590,148 172,420 49,023 275,145 17,256 60,057

    Area Sources 96,631 15,447 61,647 282,233 9,132 79,865

    Point Sources 14,985 58,306 4,028 9,472 67,743 11,443

    All sources 701,764 246,173 114,698 566,850 94,131 151,365

    full 1999 report. just imagine today.

    Posted by frosty zoom at 10/12/2007 @ 11:15am

  48. Posted by NOVA 10/12/2007 @ 11:01am

    You're somewhat right, so Al will wait some. I'd say around either the 20th or the 30th of this month to announce that he's running. However you're totally wrong about the message running for president would do to the Nobel Award. I'd say that it validates just about any decision Al makes concerning his goals to move forward with reversing CO2 as well as other wrongs commited by this hsuB/cHeney admin. I will argue that those that say the Nobel Award would be diminish simply by it being award to Gore is equilalent to you tainting or limiting Gore's future behavior because the purpose of the award was to value Gore's decisions!

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 11:19am

  49. Can no one see the grand global metaphor of Al Gore running for president to clean up the enviroment!?!?!

    Come on now-- just how dirty is the hsuB/cHeney admin. They've soiled our constitution and our world. Geeselouisa, this is big, like a JUngian archetypal-size metaphor.

    I'm not quite ready for the term 'saviour' though. President sounds more realistic and quite a hand full in itself. But the active metaphor is great.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 11:30am

  50. CounterPunch 28 / 29 April, 2007 From Papal Indulgences to Carbon Credits Is Global Warming a Sin? By ALEXANDER COCKBURN

    Now imagine two lines on a piece of graph paper. The first rises to a crest, then slopes sharply down, then levels off and rises slowly once more. The other has no undulations. It rises in a smooth, slowly increasing arc. The first, wavy line is the worldwide CO2 tonnage produced by humans burning coal, oil and natural gas. On this graph it starts in 1928, at 1.1 gigatons (i.e. 1.1 billion metric tons). It peaks in 1929 at 1.17 gigatons. The world, led by its mightiest power, the USA, plummets into the Great Depression, and by 1932 human CO2 production has fallen to 0.88 gigatons a year, a 30 per cent drop. Hard times drove a tougher bargain than all the counsels of Al Gore or the jeremiads of the IPCC (Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change). Then, in 1933 it began to climb slowly again, up to 0.9 gigatons.

    And the other line, the one ascending so evenly? That's the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere, parts per million (ppm) by volume, moving in 1928 from just under 306, hitting 306 in 1929, to 307 in 1932 and on up. Boom and bust, the line heads up steadily. These days it's at 380.There are, to be sure, seasonal variations in CO2, as measured since 1958 by the instruments on Mauna Loa, Hawai'i. (Pre-1958 measurements are of air bubbles trapped in glacial ice.) Summer and winter vary steadily by about 5 ppm, reflecting photosynthesis cycles. The two lines on that graph proclaim that a whopping 30 per cent cut in man-made CO2 emissions didn't even cause a 1 ppm drop in the atmosphere's CO2. Thus it is impossible to assert that the increase in atmospheric CO2 stems from human burning of fossil fuels.

    I met Dr. Martin Hertzberg, the man who drew that graph and those conclusions, on a Nation cruise back in 2001. He remarked that while he shared many of the Nation's editorial positions, he approved of my reservations on the issue of supposed human contributions to global warming, as outlined in columns I wrote at that time. Hertzberg was a meteorologist for three years in the U.S. Navy, an occupation which gave him a lifelong mistrust of climate modeling. Trained in chemistry and physics, a combustion research scientist for most of his career, he's retired now in Copper Mountain, Colorado, still consulting from time to time.

    Not so long ago, Hertzberg sent me some of his recent papers on the global warming hypothesis, a construct now accepted by many progressives as infallible as Papal dogma on matters of faith or doctrine. Among them was the graph described above so devastating to the hypothesis.

    As Hertzberg readily acknowledges, the carbon dioxide content of the atmosphere has increased about 21 per cent in the past century. The world has also been getting just a little bit warmer. The not very reliable data on the world's average temperature (which omit most of the world's oceans and remote regions, while over-representing urban areas) show about a 0.5C increase in average temperature between 1880 and 1980, and it's still rising, more sharply in the polar regions than elsewhere. But is CO2, at 380 parts per million in the atmosphere, playing a significant role in retaining the 94 per cent of solar radiation that's absorbed in the atmosphere, as against water vapor, also a powerful heat absorber, whose content in humid tropical atmosphere, can be as high as 2 per cent, the equivalent of 20,000 ppm. As Hertzberg says, water in the form of oceans, clouds, snow, ice cover and vapor "is overwhelming in the radiative and energy balance between the earth and the sun Carbon dioxide and the greenhouse gases are, by comparison, the equivalent of a few farts in a hurricane." And water is exactly that component of the earth's heat balance that the global warming computer models fail to account for.

    Posted by HonestLiberal at 10/12/2007 @ 11:31am

  51. From "Monty Python's Flying Circus" (joke)

    First Python: "I came here for an argument!"

    Second Python: "Oh, I thought you were here for abuse."

    First Python: "Oh no, I'm looking for an argument."

    Second Python: "But this is the room for abuse."

    First Python: "Ah."

    Second Python: "You want 12A, just down the hall."

    First Python: "Thank you."

    Second Python: "No trouble."

    Posted by HonestLiberal at 10/12/2007 @ 11:34am

  52. "USA wants to be a democracy again. Making Al Gore president would be a first step."

    Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/12/2007 @ 10:49am

    Technically, my friend, we are a republic. If we were truly a democracy, the US citizenry would be allowed to vote on every bill and proposal brought to the House and Senate floors (kinda like Town Hall Meetings). However, we have been barred from that process.

    Posted by ACook at 10/12/2007 @ 11:40am

  53. Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/12/2007 @ 11:05am

    Clinton is a philanderer, Hillary takes money from big corporations.

    Anybody NOT up-to-speed on that?

    Okay, cool...now here's HSUB with "more secret damning evidence" that Al Gore is keeping in his pocket to hit HRC and Bill back with when he announces between "either the 20th or the 30th"....

    ......????, uh, HSUB...you're up...go for it!

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 12:06pm

  54. Well take alook at this In their SciencExpress article, Curt Davis (University of Missouri-Columbia) and his collaborators used satellite radar altimetry measurements from 1992 to 2003 to determine that, on average, the elevation of about 8.5 million square kilometers of the Antarctic interior has been increasing (Figure 1). The increasing elevation was then linked to increases in snowfall, which was translated into a mass gain of 45 ± 7 billion tons per year, tying up enough moisture to lower sea level by 0.12 ± 0.02 millimeters per year.

    Or are you going to continue to live in the physics-free world created by environmentalist shills.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 12:11pm

  55. we have been barred from that process.

    Posted by ACOOK

    Thank god we are not a democracy! We are a republic. A democracy means that 51% control what happens and to hell with the 49%.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 12:13pm

  56. There are some logical programs in your article. 1. It's not smart to praise Al Gore for the Nobel Prize and then say that people don't take prizes as seriously as they did 8 years ago. 2. The environment is a very important issue, but when soldiers are dying, it takes the back seat. Talk a little more on what he would do about Iraq and Iran.

    Posted by Jesuslives at 10/12/2007 @ 12:13pm

  57. Come on now-- just how dirty is the hsuB/cHeney admin. They've soiled our constitution and our world. Geeselouisa, this is big, like a JUngian archetypal-size metaphor

    Let's see they are as corrupt as...well.. the last administration.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 12:14pm

  58. Talk a little more on what he would do about Iraq and Iran.

    Well he'd make sure that they couldn't sell oil and that would keep them impoverished for a good long time.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 12:15pm

  59. boy the neo-cons are in a tizzy over this. they just can't wrap their hands around the overwhelmingly status quo wisdom, shared by all peoples in all nations, that the bush presidency constitutes the worst disaster in our nation's history.

    just forget al gore for a minute (i personally do not care for awards, award shows, or al gore), and don't care to get into a debate with maasch or anyone else about his presidential ambitions. let's talk about climate change, shall we?

    we now know that climate change is to a large extent anthropogenic. there is no debate about this argument right now. there is simply no doubt. period.

    where this is doubt is how climate change will run its course, and in what forms it will manifest throughout the world. most intelligent people are already adapting to this looming crisis by......not driving. most nations are already adapting by finding and developing alternative sources of energy.

    and climate change doesn't even begin to address the problems of poverty, disease, and civil unrest in parts of africa and asia, all of which overlap with climate change because of resource cultivation, control, etc, etc.

    the maasch's, et al, have their head in the sand on this one, and would rather insult people like al gore, a man who, whether you like him or not, has done more to bring attention to this issue than any man or woman on earth.

    just watch this despicable fox news coverage of this:

    http://thinkprogress.org/2007/10/12/gore-nobel-attacked/

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 12:23pm

  60. Technically, my friend, we are a republic.

    Posted by ACOOK 10/12/2007 @ 11:40am

    Consider our rep's in congress aren't doing what we want-- not even.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 12:27pm

  61. i don't even know why i spend time on this website trying to convice people like maasch that they are literally living in some sort of parallel universe. go to any country, and talk to the locals. bush is evil incarnate, in their minds, and they can't fathom how such a person was elected not once, but TWICE. how could someone so stupid, so incompetent, so ridiculously out of touch with reality, become the "leader of the free world"?

    i'll tell you why: because half of this country is uneducated

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 12:29pm

  62. Uh, Algore Sr. voted against civil rights.

    Algore Jr.'s work of "ficticion" to use a Michael Moore phrase, is fraught with errors, inconsistencies, outright falshoods and lies.

    Algore tried to disenfranchise military voters. Thanks to the mainstream liberal media, Florida was erroneously called for Gore before tens of thousands of Floridians in the panhandle could vote. Republican voters in other states stayed home after hearing the Florida win for Algore. Likely, Bush would have won the popular vote.

    Gore's own military service consisted of having his own personal bodyguard.

    Yeah, draft the guy who claimed to have taken the initative and "developed" the Internet!

    Posted by viktor ramius at 10/12/2007 @ 12:30pm

  63. Hey Darla, we now know that climate change is to a large extent anthropogenic. there is no debate about this argument right now. there is simply no doubt. period.

    In Science there is always doubt. In politics there is certainty. I'll take science.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 12:32pm

  64. why is half of this country uneducated? because republicans keep cutting and cutting taxes......taking from the general fund, and weakening the public infrastructure through privatization.

    every other western country has higher taxes, a stronger middle class, and a far more educated populace. why is this? why are so many europeans fluent in at least two languages, sometimes three? why do they know american history better than americans? why do they build better planes? better cars? why do they make better music? cook better food?

    wtf is wrong with america? why are we so stupid?

    i have a theory: we are stupid because the republicans are running the show.

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 12:35pm

  65. Algore Jr.'s work of "ficticion" to use a Michael Moore phrase, is fraught with errors, inconsistencies, outright falshoods and lies.

    can you name one?

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 12:36pm

  66. In Science there is always doubt. In politics there is certainty. I'll take science.

    there is both doubt and certainty is science, you imbecile.

    take this one: the earth orbits around the sun

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 12:37pm

  67. And people were certain that the earth is flat. Nothing is certain except for your abuse of people who don't agree with you.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 12:44pm

  68. Algore Jr.'s work of "ficticion" to use a Michael Moore phrase, is fraught with errors, inconsistencies, outright falshoods and lies.

    can you name one?

    A judge in England ruled there were 9

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 12:44pm

  69. http://politosphere.com/?q=node/209

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 12:46pm

  70. I have a great idea. Let's skip all the Swiftboating ad hominems and the Margaret Carlson giggling attacks "because it's so much more fun to trash Gore" than to pull the scab off Bush's background -- and just move on to the inauguration.

    I don't know about you, but I've had enough of PeeWee Bush's great blood-gushing adventure abroad and Constitution-shredding party here at home. Al Gore stands head and shoulders above the quivering Bush clones in both parties who are flip-flopping all over the campaign trail.

    He won the presidency in 2000. It's time for the inauguaration.

    Posted by Sheep at 10/12/2007 @ 12:46pm

  71. Sheep Go back and study the constitution. Al baby didn't win and the Liberal Florida court that tried to push Al Gore on the country was rebuked by the Supreme court and was told to justify their decision. They couldn't.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 12:50pm

  72. More people die on the highway in California every day than military people in Iraq. We have got to stop those Californians from driving!

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 12:51pm

  73. Hey Darla,

    Of course, you'll disagree, but here goes a few.

    Gore presents Mt. Kilimanjaro's melting snows as proof of global warming. In fact, the snows are vanishing thanks to local factors, including deforestation.

    Gore suggests Antarctica's ice cover is melting. Most studies, including those done by NASA, say it is increasing.

    Gore shows scary graphics of cities drowning in seas that rise 7 meters, causing millions of refugees. But the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says the seas will rise at worst by 59 centimeters this century.

    Gore uses images of Hurricane Katrina and suggests it was caused by global warming. The Government's expert in this case admitted such one-of events can't be blamed on warming. (And, by the way, if it's blamed on warming, and warming is happening, where the hell are the hurricanes this year? In order to make it look like we're having a tropical storm season, they're naming subtropical systems!)

    Gore suggests ice-core evidence shows rising CO2 caused temperature rises, which ended the past seven ice ages. In fact, the CO2 rises followed temperature rises by 800 to 2000 years.

    Gore claims global warming could stop the Gulf Stream, causing an ice age in Europe. "Could." If it actually existed, or to the degree that the man who "developed" the Internet clmims!

    Gore blames global warming for species losses in coral reef bleaching. No other climatologist has shown evidence to back this claim.

    An interesting thing, too, is in Gore's movie, he doesn't want people in Western Africa to improve their lives because it would require electricity and so forth. He wants them to remain poor rather than advancing their lifestyles, in order to "save" the planet.

    But hey, go ahead and draft the guy who was the inspiration for "Love Story," the discoverer of "Love Canal," .........

    Posted by viktor ramius at 10/12/2007 @ 1:00pm

  74. Posted by ABELL12CT 10/12/2007 @ 12:32pm

    ABELL, ask again....what do you think of these comments from a high-ranking political leader--

    "...global temperatures are rising and that this is caused largely by human activities"

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 1:01pm

  75. you know better...take the spending of Bush and increase it and you would have Gore....

    You are dreaming on Gore...

    Posted by JOHN MAASCH 10/12/2007 @ 09:11am

    You are the one dreaming, JOHN. I am sick of the bs you conservatives throw out, that spending would be higher. THIS IS A LIE.

    John, it is the assholes on YOUR side of politics that are the big spenders: Reagan, Bush 1 and Bush 2. This is a FACT, supported by history of government spending.

    WHY DON'T YOU HAVE THE GUTS TO ADMIT IT???

    Posted by ILOVEPHYSICS at 10/12/2007 @ 1:02pm

  76. BTW, HSUB aside, any of you "Gore in '08" guys...

    Do you think Hillary will just lay down and let Gore have it...or do you think she's powerless to stop it...or do you trust that she won't do everything she can to stop him, or even sabotage him if he DOES get the nomination out of spite?

    Also, given, doing his best, he essentially TIED a "moron silver-spooner-legacy faux cowboy bumblemouth"....how do you think he's going to fair against HER?

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 1:12pm

  77. The second ammendment was written specifically with someone like you in mind. If such a person as you were to ever gain any power the people would need arms to counter the inevitable force you would wield against all who disobey

    actually, my opinions are shared by the vast majority of earthlings. just go visit any country. even england, our "greatest ally," can't stand us. their media gives the neo-cons a public whipping almost each and every day.

    look, we are a nation of laws, right? well, how do you explain the grotesque, blatant and arrogant lawbreaking this administration has engaged in the last 6 years? i'll give you some answers:

    *a largely complicit media

    *a largely stupid and brainwashed population, many of whom can't even located canada on a world map

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 1:15pm

  78. But hey, go ahead and draft the guy who was the inspiration for "Love Story," the discoverer of "Love Canal," .........

    Posted by VIKTOR RAMIUS 10/12/2007 @ 1:00pm

    Now, Viktor, why did you have to go and ruin what was looking like a post with some factual support with this inaccurate nonsense? Well, at least you didn't accuse Gore of claiming he invented the Internet!

    Posted by Hman23 at 10/12/2007 @ 1:18pm

  79. ABELL, ask again....what do you think of these comments from a high-ranking political leader--

    "...global temperatures are rising and that this is caused largely by human activities"

    Posted by MASK

    Sounds to me like someone is giving in to the political pressure from the Global Warming Religion.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 1:18pm

  80. And I say religion because people believe in it even though they have no facts. They have Faith that what they hear on CNN, Fox, NBC, CBS is the truth. And everyone who disagrees is a blasphemer.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 1:20pm

  81. a largely stupid and brainwashed population, many of whom can't even located canada on a world map

    Posted by DARLADOON

    That post reflects more on your ignorance than anyone else's

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 1:22pm

  82. John, it is the assholes on YOUR side of politics that are the big spenders: Reagan, Bush 1 and Bush 2. This is a FACT, supported by history of government spending.

    Are these figures based on absolute dollars or do they reflect inflation increases?

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 1:24pm

  83. Gore presents Mt. Kilimanjaro's melting snows as proof of global warming. In fact, the snows are vanishing thanks to local factors, including deforestation.

    Gore suggests Antarctica's ice cover is melting. Most studies, including those done by NASA, say it is increasing.

    Gore shows scary graphics of cities drowning in seas that rise 7 meters, causing millions of refugees. But the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says the seas will rise at worst by 59 centimeters this century.

    Gore uses images of Hurricane Katrina and suggests it was caused by global warming. The Government's expert in this case admitted such one-of events can't be blamed on warming. (And, by the way, if it's blamed on warming, and warming is happening, where the hell are the hurricanes this year? In order to make it look like we're having a tropical storm season, they're naming subtropical systems!)

    Gore suggests ice-core evidence shows rising CO2 caused temperature rises, which ended the past seven ice ages. In fact, the CO2 rises followed temperature rises by 800 to 2000 years.

    Gore claims global warming could stop the Gulf Stream, causing an ice age in Europe. "Could." If it actually existed, or to the degree that the man who "developed" the Internet clmims!

    Gore blames global warming for species losses in coral reef bleaching. No other climatologist has shown evidence to back this claim.

    An interesting thing, too, is in Gore's movie, he doesn't want people in Western Africa to improve their lives because it would require electricity and so forth. He wants them to remain poor rather than advancing their lifestyles, in order to "save" the planet.

    where does one begin countering such poorly phrased, and mostly vapid, reasoning? your very first paragraph perfectly illustrates your lack of understanding: that deforestation, as opposed to, and not in conjunction with, rising temperatures, is causing kilimanjaro's glaciers to melt. had it ever occured to you that deforestation, per se, has absolutely no direct influence on kilimanjaro's glaciers? glaciers are, first of all, above the layer of ecosystems where trees grow.

    you are only accidentally correct in claiming that deforestation causes glaciers to melt, and in doing so, prove that global warming IS the cause of melting glaciers: and that is, cutting down trees reduces rainfall, which increases desertification, and causes temperatures to rise. this is just basic scientific fact.

    indeed, deforestation is one of the leading causes of climate change, but not in the way you expressed, but in the way al gore expressed.

    the fact of the matter is, kilimanjaro's glaciers ARE dissappearing, and rapidly so. the reason? rising temperatures. that's how ice melts.

    deforestation is inherently anthropogenic, and causes rising temperatures. therefore, humans are causing the temperature to rise.

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 1:25pm

  84. Hey Darla

    What country are you from?

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 1:25pm

  85. Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/12/2007 @ 10:57am

    Well, HSUB, you said "No they don't"

    or is this just an article of faith with you and you have no proof?

    Posted by MASK 10/12/2007 @ 10:59am

    Frita you said "HSUB, everybody already KNOWS all the stuff about the Clintons"

    "is this just an article of faith with you and you have no proof?"

    Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/12/2007 @ 11:05am

    A definite clarification of Frita's faulty logic and use of a straw everybody 'device', is clearly required here to give any credibility to her argument and this is her answer:

    "Clinton is a philanderer, Hillary takes money from big corporations.

    Anybody NOT up-to-speed on that?"

    Posted by MASK 10/12/2007 @ 12:06pm

    Since it would be impossible for 'everyone' to answer Frita much less see Frita's question, Frita's answer to 'everyone' is to have 'confidence' that she alone 'knows' everything about the Clintons and that 'everything'/all of 'it' is already out, in which case she would also have to have knowledge about what is possibly not out and checked with the Clintons themselves! And I'm fairly confident that did not happen as Frita seems somewhat 'incarserated' to her keyboard... Plus she totally dismisses the fact that by her own words she deminishes one that would require 'belief' (ie., a confidence game, gaming...)-- as "an article of faith (without) no proof" what one or rather what she's saying is true when that is an impossible contention to prove to begin with; in other words-- Frita's proof is a pile of straw rendered via a typical Frita device.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 1:27pm

  86. That post reflects more on your ignorance than anyone else's

    but it's true, take a look at miss south carolina last month.

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 1:28pm

  87. er, diminishes, incarcerated,...

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 1:31pm

  88. So you are basing the intelligence of the American people on a beauty contestant? Well that's pretty dumb.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 1:31pm

  89. Darla, Can we agree that Global Warming is a theory?

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 1:33pm

  90. you can insult me as much as you want, people, but the fact of the matter is plain to all foreigners:

    americans are the brunt of every joke about stupidity thanks primarily to president shit for brains, and his band of psychotic thugs. the only country in the world which spends 1 trillion/year on the military, but can't fund good schools.

    this country is so morally bankrupt, so repulsive, so horribly pathetic, that the ONLY reason why al gore wins the nobel is because he is (seemingly) the only prominent voice of reason we have. his award is PROOF, yet again, how the USA is viewed around the world: award the guy who is SANE, and not the guy (bush) who is INSANE.

    michale moore's victory? same thing. al baradei's victory? same thing. it's the international community saying, "let's show the world that we want more al gores's running the show in america, and not george bush's"

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 1:33pm

  91. So you are basing the intelligence of the American people on a beauty contestant? Well that's pretty dumb.

    polls show that 1/5 of americans cannot locate the united states on a world map.

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 1:34pm

  92. And that since it is a theory it is not proven. If it was proven wouldn't it be the Law of Global Warming?

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 1:34pm

  93. Darla, Can we agree that Global Warming is a theory?

    global warming is not, in itself, a theory. it's an observable phenomenon. nothing more, nothing less.

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 1:35pm

  94. Because students in schools motivated by free market forces seem to be able to find Canada on a map.

    well, there you have it, plain for all eyes to see. unbelievable statement! i need to save this one.

    thanks freiheit for proving my point.....you make it so easy!

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 1:37pm

  95. Also, given, doing his best, he essentially TIED a "moron silver-spooner-legacy faux cowboy bumblemouth"....how do you think he's going to fair against HER?

    Posted by MASK 10/12/2007 @ 1:12pm

    Al Gore will do great considering the pros so greatly out-weight the cons, even if those screeching the cons babble them somewhat incoherently and make as big a spectacle of themselves as possible for attention as their arguments are so weak they can't carry themselves otherwise.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 1:38pm

  96. you wanna know what england thinks of bush? did anyone see this interview with john bolton?

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RuqNWG9sbuE

    bolton had been running the show for many years, and his ideas still flourish in foreign policy think tanks.....

    care to reneg your statement freiheit that people don't care about bush?

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 1:38pm

  97. and how do you think the iraqis feel about bush????? care to ask that question?

    you say, "oh, in china they say 'bush who?'" they know damn well who he is, and they believe, just like any rational adult, that he's a worldwide catastrophe.

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 1:39pm

  98. Now I am not saying that earth is not warming or that it is warming. I am just saying that we don't know. We need to study it. The earth's climate is affected by many things like solar activity, emissions, volcanoes etc. And to have a politician come out and say this is what's happening and there are no 2 ways about it, is just disgusting. The politicians love it because they rule by fear. And since we are moving towards a global community they need a global fear to keep us all in line.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 1:40pm

  99. Oh I'm sorry I meant the theory of Global Warming being caused by man.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 1:42pm

  100. Go talk to the Kurds in Iraq. Go talk to the people who were tortured by Sadaam. They love W

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 1:43pm

  101. But colleague Dr Douglas Hardy, from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, also US, cautioned against jumping to conclusions about global warming.

    Thompson says the Furtwangler ice wall on Kilimanjaro has undergone a massive retreat in recent years "Without diagnostic evidence, a definitive link to global warming is on thin ice," he said.

    "Evidence is mounting that human influences on climate are causing glaciers to retreat dramatically around the world, and especially at high elevations in the tropics.

    "But Kilimanjaro's glaciers have little in common with mid-latitude Alpine glaciers, and we must accept that simple explanations are not always possible.

    "Kilimanjaro is a mountain that defies expectations and shatters assumptions."

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 1:44pm

  102. WE do know. The right, those great supporters and servants of big oil want you to think otherwise. Don't fall for the reckless crap you hear on rightwing talk shows. We all know where they're coming from.

    Posted by FRANKGRITS

    Ahhh another one of the FAITHFUL. Don't believe what you hear on the media. They don't present scientific evidence. They just state things that seem like facts.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 1:46pm

  103. ave you seen Al Gores movie?

    Posted by FRANKGRIT

    Yeah I did. YAWN. He is trying to control us through fear just like the politician he is.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 1:47pm

  104. I have a friend who was in Kurdish territory and he said they loved him!

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 1:48pm

  105. Have you seen Al Gores movie?

    Posted by FRANKGRITS

    Have you actually sought ought evidence that contradicts his movie?

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 1:49pm

  106. Hey Frank, heads up, I think it's a Bill and Hillary's vast liberal dem strategy to get Al as greatly positioned as possible to win it by deflecting as much of the vast right wing bile via all the other dem candidates while Al just keeps increasing his vast international prestige before announcing.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 1:51pm

  107. Have you actually sought ought evidence that contradicts his movie? or for that matter have you sought out any evidence from scientists instead of politicians?

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 1:54pm

  108. And to have a politician come out and say this is what's happening and there are no 2 ways about it, is just disgusting.

    oh, yes, repulsive. what an asshole, that gore. trying to frame tremendously complex scientific data for lay people. what a jerk. total jerk. in fact, i hope he rots in hell.

    give me a break, man! the guy compiled hoards of established, accepted, scientific data into a documentary. something wrong with that? should he have just stayed home, and cried?

    fyi: gore is NOT a politician. he's technically unemployed by the government.

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 1:55pm

  109. Hatred and envy of America didn't start with Bush and it won't end with Bush. You don't really have a point, do you?

    it didn't start with bush, indeed, but it spread into a worldwide conflagration thanks to him.

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 1:57pm

  110. Increased CO2 is good for plants. They will become more abundant and raise the level of oxygen in the atmosphere. We should be promoting cutting down old growth forests and replenishing them with young trees. A tree acts as a sponge for Carbon Dioxide and they retain it after being cut down and being made into furniture.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 1:57pm

  111. gore is NOT a politician. he's technically unemployed by the government.

    Thanks for the laugh Darla

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 1:58pm

  112. give me a break, man! the guy compiled hoards of established, accepted, scientific data into a documentary. something wrong with that? should he have just stayed home, and cried?

    The only problem is that os not what he did. He should've presented facts and not distortions.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 1:59pm

  113. So Darla, Besides Al Gore's movie what other sources have you researched for the THEORY that Global Warming is caused by Humans?

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 2:01pm

  114. Or are you just blindly accepting what politicians say? Remember thats what got us into Iraq.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 2:03pm

  115. Darla, I have a question for you. Do you know how much cooling they expect if we follow Kyoto?

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 2:04pm

  116. Wow. I'm always surprised at just how "out there" Darla is. Present her with agreed-upon errors and inaccuracies in Gore's movie and she swats them aside with typical liberal faith, fervor and ignorance...and then attacks others for their supposed ignorance and stupidity.

    Reminds me of the line from David Spade...

    "The average person uses 10% of his brain. How much do you use? 1 1/2%. The rest is clogged with malted hops and bong resin."

    Posted by usc1 at 10/12/2007 @ 2:06pm

  117. give me a break, man! the guy compiled hoards of established, accepted, scientific data into a documentary. something wrong with that? should he have just stayed home, and cried?

    Well he cherry picked the facts. He lied to us and now he is going to lead us into an illegal war against humanity.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 2:07pm

  118. Andrea Minarcek National Geographic September 23, 2003

    According to Hardy [Douglas R. Hardy, a climatologist at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst], forest reduction in the areas surrounding Kilimanjaro, and not global warming, might be the strongest human influence on glacial recession. "Clearing for agriculture and forest fires--often caused by honey collectors trying to smoke bees out of their hives--have greatly reduced the surrounding forests," he says. The loss of foliage causes less moisture to be pumped into the atmosphere, leading to reduced cloud cover and precipitation and increased solar radiation and glacial evaporation.

    Evidence of glacial recession on Kilimanjaro is often dated from 1912, but most scientists believe tropical glaciers began receding as early as the 1850s. Stefan L. Hastenrath, a professor of atmospheric studies at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, has found clues in local reports of a dramatic drop in East African lake levels after 1880. Lake evaporation indicates a decrease in precipitation and cloudiness around Kilimanjaro.

    "Less cloud coverage lets more sunlight filter through and hit the glaciers," Hastenrath said. "That increase in sunlight then provides more energy for evaporation of the glacier."

    Posted by HonestLiberal at 10/12/2007 @ 2:11pm

  119. Sounds to me like someone is giving in to the political pressure from the Global Warming Religion.----Posted by ABELL12CT 10/12/2007 @ 1:18pm

    ABELL, explain exactly and in detail WHY Bush "gives into political pressure" on GW...

    and not Iraq?

    I'd love to hear it!

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 2:15pm

  120. Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/12/2007 @ 1:27pm

    HSUB, always appreciative of your faith in yourself and your dogma, but...

    you REALLY think that Gore, who couldn't beat a "moron faux cowboy bumblemouth", is going to beat Her Majesty and Bill.

    Not just at the "here's something you didn't know about ****", but in a primary race?

    You REALLY think Bill & Hill are just going to "collapse" under the enormity of the Gore "juggernaut"...and not do any and EVERYTHING they can to stop him...or even sabotage his Presidential bid if he did win the nomination, just for spite?

    Seems the real faith you have is...isn't so much that Gore is all-powerful and undefeatable....but in the "kindness" and "good sportsmanship" of Hillary Clinton!

    Good luck with that!

    Oh, by the way...

    21 days and counting! (no, wait you said "20th or the 30th" so it's...)

    8 or 18 days and counting, isn't it?

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 2:20pm

  121. ABELL, explain exactly and in detail WHY Bush "gives into political pressure" on GW...

    and not Iraq?

    I'd love to hear it!

    Posted by MASK

    To tell you the truth, I don't know why but I like the instillation of fear theory

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 2:24pm

  122. but I don't know where else they are going to print money except out of thin air. Currency is based on trust. Trust that the next guy will also trust in the currency. Trust that the government will still be there tomorrow.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 2:26pm

  123. Colbert should pick Gore as his running mate.

    Posted by arash at 10/12/2007 @ 2:34pm

  124. Joshua Franks on Dr. Martin Hertzberg [zmag.org]

    Posted by bwindrip at 10/12/2007 @ 2:34pm

  125. Present her with agreed-upon errors and inaccuracies in Gore's movie and she swats them aside with typical liberal faith, fervor and ignorance...and then attacks others for their supposed ignorance and stupidity

    i don't detect any substantive claims in any posts along this thread. and when i say, "substantive," i mean claims which refute both the widely accepted understanding that climate change is largely anthropogenic and the widely held belief that widespread action is necessary to deter the increase in heat-trapping carbon emissions.

    if gore is so "out there," then why did he receive the nobel prize? can someone answer this? "oh, the nobel committee are just liberal, bush-haters." right.

    and anyone who makes the following claims is.....evidently insane:

    We should be promoting cutting down old growth forests and replenishing them with young trees.

    here's a nice post, however:

    According to Hardy [Douglas R. Hardy, a climatologist at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst], forest reduction in the areas surrounding Kilimanjaro, and not global warming, might be the strongest human influence on glacial recession. "Clearing for agriculture and forest fires--often caused by honey collectors trying to smoke bees out of their hives--have greatly reduced the surrounding forests," he says. The loss of foliage causes less moisture to be pumped into the atmosphere, leading to reduced cloud cover and precipitation and increased solar radiation and glacial evaporation.

    Evidence of glacial recession on Kilimanjaro is often dated from 1912, but most scientists believe tropical glaciers began receding as early as the 1850s. Stefan L. Hastenrath, a professor of atmospheric studies at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, has found clues in local reports of a dramatic drop in East African lake levels after 1880. Lake evaporation indicates a decrease in precipitation and cloudiness around Kilimanjaro.

    "Less cloud coverage lets more sunlight filter through and hit the glaciers," Hastenrath said. "That increase in sunlight then provides more energy for evaporation of the glacier."

    again, proving my point that gore's claim of climate change being the motivator is not incorrect, as he merely bypassed explaining one of the causes of this particular recession---deforestation.

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 2:40pm

  126. I'm bent out of shape because americans can't define what the Federal Reserve is, much less explain what its true function is.

    only shallow minds think in terms of either/or. granted, not everyone can describe the function of the reserve, but shouldn't we expect more from our fellow countrymen and women in terms of locating their own country on a map? that's a sign of serious degeneration.

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 2:42pm

  127. Why should it be based on gold? Because everyone trusts that gold is valuable?

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 2:45pm

  128. and anyone who makes the following claims is.....evidently insane:

    We should be promoting cutting down old growth forests and replenishing them with young trees.

    Posted By Darla

    You should take this up with Dr. Michael Crichton.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 2:46pm

  129. And why do you have to call people insane when they don't agree with you? How do you know I mean really know that you are right?

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 2:47pm

  130. Gore is reluctant for two reasons:Climate change is one of many serious issues(many made worse by the sitting president)and he couldn't just deal with that because it's what he enjoys the most and the other is that the current president has so undermined the trust that we should have in our government that it will take all of the next four years just to repair the damage. Republicans will seek to undermine everything coming out of the Gore White House as payback for the trashing of Bush's "facts" about WMD's. They will make a sport out of disproving anything he says about climate change.

    Posted by Moshe at 10/12/2007 @ 2:47pm

  131. It is people like you who forget that science is about questioning everything and not by religiously accepting what is stated as fact

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 2:48pm

  132. How did the president make global warming worse?

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 2:50pm

  133. michale crichton is a crackpot, and has repeatedly misrepresented other people's data. he has made some valid points, but as a whole, his efforts to discredit attempts by other scientists who urge politicians to take serious action are morally reprehensible.

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 2:52pm

  134. It is people like you who forget that science is about questioning everything and not by religiously accepting what is stated as fact

    your claim here is wholly disingenuous, as nobody here has "religiously accepted as fact" everything that they have been told about climate change.

    religion and science have nothing to do with one another anyhow.

    what we DO accept as fact is that humans are largely responsible for rising temperatures.

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 2:54pm

  135. fact: last year was the hottest EVER on record. and 11 out of the last 15? same thing.

    as a people, do we keep fighting it? should we live in denial like usc1?

    or should we DO SOMETHING?

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 2:58pm

  136. From the Michael Chrichton entry in Wikipedia:

    "Al Gore is reported as having said on March 21, 2007 before a US House committee: "The planet has a fever. If your baby has a fever, you go to the doctor [...] if your doctor tells you you need to intervene here, you don't say 'Well, I read a science fiction novel that tells me it's not a problem.'"

    Posted by bwindrip at 10/12/2007 @ 3:00pm

  137. everyone do me a favor and watch this:

    http://thinkprogress.org/2007/10/12/gore-nobel-attacked/

    is this mainstream or fringe thinking?

    i mean, let's face it, these people are pretty stupid.

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 3:01pm

  138. bwindrip, gore is right in that quote. if there is even a hint of a problem, you need to address it, and many people here are simply in denial about that.....

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 3:02pm

  139. LOL

    reminds me of old rome more every day!

    as a result of the danger involved in being imperator, many late roman faction leaders were practically forced against their will to vie for the purple...

    many, of course, faked humility and finally repented under massive pressure to jump in, but it appears that many also honestly did not wish to leap into the meatgrinder of late roman politics...

    some were dragged kicking and screaming to take the purple...

    HAIL GOREGONIUS! LMAO!

    sure...fine with me...he won in 2000 and has only risen in credibility since...and though it might mean death to my man's chances at the top spot...i think he would be an excellent number two spot...so....

    HAIL GOREGONIUS!

    at least he would cut into 50 foot queeny's monolithic gigantitude and introduce blessed entropy into the process...

    Posted by ibbleblibble at 10/12/2007 @ 3:03pm

  140. required reading. this article refutes the hysteria about the british judge who ruled than al gore's film contained 'errors'.....

    http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2007/10/an_error_is_not_the_same_thing.p hp

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 3:07pm

  141. just in:

    gore is going to donate 100% of the money to climate change protection.

    take that you freaks!!!!!!!!

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 3:11pm

  142. To tell you the truth, I don't know why but I like the instillation of fear theory----Posted by ABELL12CT 10/12/2007 @ 2:24pm

    Oooooh, that's good, ABELL. You mean that Bush would take something and USE it to instill fear in people for political purposes?!?!?!?

    (BTW, you DO know we're talking about George W Bush here, and not Al Gore! BUSH was the one who said that quote!)

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 3:18pm

  143. (spirit of bipartisanship)

    gore is going to donate 100% of the money to climate change protection. ----Posted by DARLADOON 10/12/2007 @ 3:11pm

    Why shouldn't he, DD? He doesn't need the money. Generation Investment is doing well...especially with Al "buying off" his carbon footprint by re-investing in it every month!

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 3:22pm

  144. Who is this guy JOHN MAASCH. He is simply a crazy guy to say things what he is saying. He is living in the dream world of Bush Cronies and afraid of him being elected in the upcoming election if he decides to run. There is no other candidates from both parties who can even come close to him in terms understanding the world politics and environment.

    Posted by Mirror07 at 10/12/2007 @ 3:24pm

  145. Well of course I know who said it. I knew when you first made the post. ALL POLITICIANS LIE! Bill Clinton used Iraq's WMD's to instill fear. So did Bush 1 So did Reagan, Carter, Ford, Nixon,.....

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 3:25pm

  146. HSUB, always appreciative of your faith in yourself and your dogma, but...

    Posted by MASK 10/12/2007 @ 2:20pm

    Frita, I like it better than a 'straw' devicy dogma...

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 3:26pm

  147. what we DO accept as fact is that humans are largely responsible for rising temperatures.

    Posted by DARLADOON

    Too bad that that may or may not be the truth. To accept it and to say it is a fact shows that you are not interested in scientific fact. Since you didn't know the answer to the Kyoto question I asked, I'll tell you. It would reduce the temp by .04 degrees Celsius over 100 years.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 3:28pm

  148. Republicans will seek to undermine everything coming out of the Gore White House as payback for the trashing of Bush's "facts" about WMD's. They will make a sport out of disproving anything he says about climate change.

    Posted by MOSHE 10/12/2007 @ 2:47pm

    And how is that any different than what they're doing now?

    The way things are going odds are Gore would step into office with a super dem majority congress or one close to it.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 3:31pm

  149. Don't run. Gore has been able to "find himself" and engage in constructive political discourse in far more meaningful ways as a private citizen than he ever had been, or will be able, as a macro-economic pawn of our current corporatist, imperial political system. We should not forget Gore's neoliberal economic leanings while in public service that had helped multinational corporations hold sway over what remains of the American democratic experiment.

    Would Al Gore be able to get to root causes of the decline of the American Republic as an insider and truly change the landscape of the political system? I think not. Even to challenge the political discourse of the day means marginalization (eg. Dennis Kucinich). How can anyone speak of radical campaign finance reform, change the legal status of a corporation, or turn back the corporate privatization for profit everything that is human from the inside at this very critical time? If Gore was to run, he would render himself impotent for a number of reasons already cited by the usual suspects in this blog, and likely his ability to now commandier grassroots support for real change.

    I can envision Gore in drafting and promoting national public referendums for real change that may be the only way the average person has any ability to voice their issues as KV has just underscored in her editorial.

    In support of the Noble committee's decision of the award granting, Gore does indeed deserve the consideration since the major wars already being fought in this century are resource wars. If Gore's advice is taken to heart and acted upon, likely less corporate resource wars.

    Posted by steve foster at 10/12/2007 @ 3:34pm

  150. Now I am not saying that earth is not warming or that it is warming. I am just saying that we don't know. We need to study it.

    Posted by ABELL12CT 10/12/2007 @ 1:40pm

    Great idea, but you see, they already have been studying it. You just don't want to believe it.

    Posted by Hman23 at 10/12/2007 @ 3:37pm

  151. Well of course I know who said it. I knew when you first made the post. ALL POLITICIANS LIE! Bill Clinton used Iraq's WMD's to instill fear. So did Bush 1 So did Reagan, Carter, Ford, Nixon,.....

    Posted by ABELL12CT

    Let me correct myself. They all didn't use Iraq's WMDs for a source of fear. Reagan used Russia, Carter used his own inexperience in foreign affairs to threaten the people of the U.S. and the hits keep coming.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 3:38pm

  152. Great idea, but you see, they already have been studying it. You just don't want to believe it.

    Posted by HMAN23

    You mean like the Global Cooling scare of the 70's?

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 3:39pm

  153. MAASCH, you're all wet about Gore. Had the SCOTUS not interfered with its "non-precedental" presidential decision, We might still have had 9/11. But gore would have at least read the N.S.A. memo and acted upon it. And if it had still occurred as it did, OBL's worthless hide would have been stretched out along some barbed wire fence and this foolishness that is the Iraq intervention would have been non-existent, saving hundreds of thousands of lives and trillions of dollars. Think about that before you spout silliness

    Posted by The Goods at 10/12/2007 @ 3:40pm

  154. Great idea, but you see, they already have been studying it. You just don't want to believe it.

    Posted by HMAN23

    It's not that. To say that anything is 100% true and there can be no deviation sounds like the middle ages. It sounds like the people who thought the earth was flat. NOTHING in science is 100% true.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 3:41pm

  155. No, ABELL, I'm talking about the thousand or so climatologists that warn it is a problem. Many, many, many, many studies.

    Posted by Hman23 at 10/12/2007 @ 3:42pm

  156. Of course nothing in science is 100%. Does it have to be before you will accept it?

    Posted by Hman23 at 10/12/2007 @ 3:43pm

  157. MAASCH, you're all wet about Gore. Had the SCOTUS not interfered with its "non-precedental" presidential decision, We might still have had 9/11. But gore would have at least read the N.S.A. memo and acted upon it. And if it had still occurred as it did, OBL's worthless hide would have been stretched out along some barbed wire fence and this foolishness that is the Iraq intervention would have been non-existent, saving hundreds of thousands of lives and trillions of dollars. Think about that before you spout silliness

    Posted by THE GOODS

    Nothing like backseat driving. Hindsight is 20-20. Truth be told if Underdog was elected President We might still have had 9/11. But Underdog would have at least read the N.S.A. memo and acted upon it. And if it had still occurred as it did, OBL's worthless hide would have been stretched out along some barbed wire fence and this foolishness that is the Iraq intervention would have been non-existent, saving hundreds of thousands of lives and trillions of dollars. Think about that before you spout silliness

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/12/2007 @ 3:43pm

  158. Personally, I think that Al Gore got the last laugh.

    Although he didn't get the office that he should have had and that he was being groomed for, Gore managed to get something that George W. Bush will never have; the respect of that part of the world that hasn't drank the Red State Kool-Aid.

    I think that if it were a choice between being President of the United States and being a Nobel Laureate/Oscar winner/budding media mogul who gets to hang out with movie stars and be hailed as a hero when I walked into the room, I'd pick the second one. Thanks to George W. Bush, being the president of the United States is no longer a guarantee of international respect. Even most of our traditional allies are done with us thanks to our Imperial President. (although they're far too afraid we'll drop a bomb on them to say so.)

    So, I say congratulations Mr. Vice President. Well done!

    Posted by edwriter at 10/12/2007 @ 3:48pm

  159. Oh, and Al,

    Stay the hell away from Hillary. Haven't the Clinton's screwed you enough?

    Posted by edwriter at 10/12/2007 @ 3:48pm

  160. "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S."

    No hidsight or backseat driving required, ABELL.

    Foresight, yes.

    Posted by Hman23 at 10/12/2007 @ 3:50pm

  161. Too bad that that may or may not be the truth. To accept it and to say it is a fact shows that you are not interested in scientific fact. Since you didn't know the answer to the Kyoto question I asked, I'll tell you. It would reduce the temp by .04 degrees Celsius over 100 years.

    the 2nd half of this paragraph is not relevant, as i have never claimed that kyoto is the answer.

    as for the 1st part, you are such a crack up. the only know, non-partisan, inter-governmental agency, comprised of those whose role it is to determine facts, concluded this.

    do you need some other form of fact, or what?

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 3:51pm

  162. In the 1992 campaign against Bill Clinton, George H. W. Bush mocked Gore as "ozone man" and claimed:

    "This guy is so far out in the environmental extreme we'll be up to our necks in owls and outta work for every American."

    In the 2000 campaign, George W. Bush cracked that Gore "likes electric cars. He just doesn't like making electricity." The younger Bush, a classic schoolyard bully with a contempt for intellect, demanded that Gore "explain what he meant by some of the things" in his 1992 book, "Earth in the Balance"--and then unashamedly admitted that he had never read it.

    W, however, was a fan of the pulp science-fiction novel: "State of Fear," by Michael Crichton (of Congo and Jurassic Park fame). Bush was so excited by the story, which pictures global warming as a hoax perpetrated by power-mad environmentalists, that he invited the author to the Oval Office."

    http://tinyurl.com/2zjz3l

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 3:51pm

  163. Posted by ABELL12CT 10/12/2007 @ 3:25pm

    So Bush is a liar? On just global warming, or on other stuff too?

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 3:52pm

  164. Personally, I think that Al Gore got the last laugh.

    Although he didn't get the office that he should have had and that he was being groomed for, Gore managed to get something that George W. Bush will never have; the respect of that part of the world that hasn't drank the Red State Kool-Aid.

    I think that if it were a choice between being President of the United States and being a Nobel Laureate/Oscar winner/budding media mogul who gets to hang out with movie stars and be hailed as a hero when I walked into the room, I'd pick the second one. Thanks to George W. Bush, being the president of the United States is no longer a guarantee of international respect. Even most of our traditional allies are done with us thanks to our Imperial President. (although they're far too afraid we'll drop a bomb on them to say so.)

    So, I say congratulations Mr. Vice President. Well done!

    only a true american would say this. truer words have not been spoken!

    awesome post

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 3:52pm

  165. Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/12/2007 @ 3:26pm

    HSUB, just so I'm clear, which part(s) were the "straw-man"?

    The part where Hillary can't lay a glove on Gore, but he's got "secret never-before-seen damning stuff" against her and Bill?

    The part where he essentially TIED with a "moron faux cowboy bumblemouth" but will stomp a seasoned and smart and VINDICTIVE AS HELL US Senator from NY?

    or the part where you said to NOVA that Gore will announce on the 20th (8 days from now) or the 30th (18 days from now)?

    (pssst...here's where you say "all of it" and consider that enough!)

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 3:57pm

  166. Don't run. Gore has been able to "find himself" and engage in constructive political discourse in far more meaningful ways as a private citizen than he ever had been, or will be able, as a macro-economic pawn of our current corporatist, imperial political system. We should not forget Gore's neoliberal economic leanings while in public service that had helped multinational corporations hold sway over what remains of the American democratic experiment.

    Would Al Gore be able to get to root causes of the decline of the American Republic as an insider and truly change the landscape of the political system? I think not. Even to challenge the political discourse of the day means marginalization (eg. Dennis Kucinich). How can anyone speak of radical campaign finance reform, change the legal status of a corporation, or turn back the corporate privatization for profit everything that is human from the inside at this very critical time? If Gore was to run, he would render himself impotent for a number of reasons already cited by the usual suspects in this blog, and likely his ability to now commandier grassroots support for real change.

    I can envision Gore in drafting and promoting national public referendums for real change that may be the only way the average person has any ability to voice their issues as KV has just underscored in her editorial.

    In support of the Noble committee's decision of the award granting, Gore does indeed deserve the consideration since the major wars already being fought in this century are resource wars. If Gore's advice is taken to heart and acted upon, likely less corporate resource wars.

    Posted by steve foster at 10/12/2007 @ 4:04pm

  167. well spoken steve

    see, there are intelligent people around here, i was being brought down by the other guys.

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 4:20pm

  168. I don't know if Gore wants to run for President, but there is going to be a lot of pressure on him to run in this country, and, for that matter, from the world. The Republicans are starting to bad mouth him even before he makes a decision, so they are worried. Coming from the Clinton Administration, I am kind of worried that he supports "Free Trade", but I think a case can be made that "Free Trade" creates greenhouse gases with all those ships and trucks running around. It may sound funny, but it is true. He might changes his mind, if it needs changing.

    Posted by P. J. Casey at 10/12/2007 @ 4:23pm

  169. Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/12/2007 @ 3:26pm

    HSUB, just so I'm clear, which part(s) were the "straw-man"?

    The part where Hillary can't lay a glove on Gore, but he's got "secret never-before-seen damning stuff" against her and Bill?

    DING DONG DING I never said that, but you are-- in order to tear into it.

    (I said:Since it would be impossible for 'everyone' to answer Frita much less see Frita's question, Frita's answer to 'everyone' is to have 'confidence' that she alone 'knows' everything about the Clintons and that 'everything'/all of 'it' is already out, in which case she would also have to have knowledge about what is possibly not out and checked with the Clintons themselves! And I'm fairly confident that did not happen as Frita seems somewhat 'incarserated' to her keyboard... Plus she totally dismisses the fact that by her own words she deminishes one that would require 'belief' (ie., a confidence game, gaming...)-- as "an article of faith (without) no proof" what one or rather what she's saying is true when that is an impossible contention to prove to begin with; in other words-- Frita's proof is a pile of straw rendered via a typical Frita device.

    Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/12/2007 @ 1:27pm

    ___________________________________

    The part where he essentially TIED with a "moron faux cowboy bumblemouth" but will stomp a seasoned and smart and VINDICTIVE AS HELL US Senator from NY?

    DING DONG DING I never said that, but you are-- in order to tear into it.

    (I said: Al Gore will do great considering the pros so greatly out-weight the cons, even if those screeching the cons babble them somewhat incoherently and make as big a spectacle of themselves as possible for attention as their arguments are so weak they can't carry themselves otherwise.

    Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/12/2007 @ 1:38pm)

    ___________________________________

    or the part where you said to NOVA that Gore will announce on the 20th (8 days from now) or the 30th (18 days from now)?

    DONG DING DONG I said that- sorta.

    (I said: You're somewhat right, so Al will wait some. I'd say around either the 20th or the 30th of this month to announce that he's running. However you're totally wrong about the message running for president would do to the Nobel Award. I'd say that it validates just about any decision Al makes concerning his goals to move forward with reversing CO2 as well as other wrongs commited by this hsuB/cHeney admin. I will argue that those that say the Nobel Award would be diminish simply by it being award to Gore is 'equivalent' to you tainting or limiting Gore's future behavior because the purpose of the award was to value Gore's decisions!

    Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/12/2007 @ 11:19am )

    ___________________________________

    (pssst...here's where you say "all of it" and consider that enough!)

    Posted by MASK 10/12/2007 @ 3:57pm

    Poor poor Frita. Straw does that to her when she ingests it in great quantities.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 4:25pm

  170. one of the statements in the most recent IPCC report says something like "economic growth is, at a minimum, indirectly, if not directly, responsible for much of the recent (i.e. last 60 years) warming"

    yes, exponential growth is a problem for any living system. what always amuses me is that the same people who are criticizing gore are also opposed to abortion (which is the one thing we should be having more of, not less). and when i say abortion, i mean ANY aborted pregnancy or potential pregnancy (which can be mitigated with contraception).

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 4:37pm

  171. if i'm having sex with a man (gasp), and we want to pro-create, and the phone rings, which temporarily cessates the continuum towards pro-creation.....is that an abortion?

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 4:38pm

  172. these are facts and i don't even know why we're even debating this....

    1. the planet's atmosphere is warming

    2. we are causing it

    we should be asking:

    1. how bad is it going to get, and how much of a reduction in CO2 do we need, and how soon?

    folks, it's bad and you know it.....this is why i have never owned a car. i always knew it....

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 4:45pm

  173. Posted by DARLADOON 10/12/2007 @ 4:38pm

    gasp? no comment...lol...

    Posted by ibbleblibble at 10/12/2007 @ 4:47pm

  174. Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/12/2007 @ 4:25pm

    8 days and counting to First Step, HSUB (1st Gore announcement date, noted to NOVA)

    18 days until your Second Step, HSUB (2nd Gore announcment date, same)

    19 days until your Third Step, HSUB (impeachment deadline from January 2nd post)

    and 22 days until your Final Step over the Cliff, HSUB (John Nichols' own deadline for Gore announcing, the 2nd of November and cut-off for the NH primaries).

    And I'm going to enjoy every day of it watching you go absolutely wacko!

    heheh

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 4:57pm

  175. Frita, why would I go wacko? Not everyone wishes to follow your example.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 5:01pm

  176. Actually Frita, if every prediction I posted came to pass-- now that would be incentive for me to stop.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 5:05pm

  177. I for one have traveled extensively and can assure folks like Darladoon that the vast majority of European folk do not hate America, Americans, or Bush.

    Mostly just the pointy-headed Marxist elitists do.

    A great many Europeans I've spoken with have expressed disgust with their governments for not taking a stand against islamic fascism. In Manila, the Filipinos I know are well aware of the true terrorist threat that most of "Old Europe" are trying to ignore. True, quite a few Europeans and Asians I know hate Bush, but again, they're mostly the condescending leftwing types. But then, they know that "the poor" in America live as well or better than 80% of the "middle class" in Europe. When I described the new house my wife and I built (2000 sq. ft) to my European friends, jaws dropped, because, to hear them tell it, one must be a multi-millionare to build a house of that size. They mostly live in flats that need a lot of work, or inherited their modest homes. And these are professionals--architects, engineers, contractors, etc.

    And Darla, in case no one's mentioned it to you, we WASTE more money on education than most Asian countries spend on it combined. We spend more money per capita on education than any other country, and have less to show for it because of pointy-headed academic wenies who've obviously indoctrinated you well.

    Posted by viktor ramius at 10/12/2007 @ 5:05pm

  178. I for one have traveled extensively and can assure folks like Darladoon that the vast majority of European folk do not hate America, Americans, or Bush

    does one need to travel these days in order to understand the stances most western government take vis a vis the united states? in fact, every foreign government election since 2001 has elicited a decidely anti-bush resentment in public display (see mexico city, see paris, see london, see new zealand, chile, argentina, brazil, in fact every southern hemispheric nation, almost all european nations, japan, the list is never-ending). each and everyone of these displays of resistance was, in large part, a reflection of distate for american foreign policy and their own government's complicity with it (see london).

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 5:12pm

  179. But then, they know that "the poor" in America live as well or better than 80% of the "middle class" in Europ

    what a statement! and this person claims to "understand" the average european? unbelievable! i don't know a single european who doesn't regret the decision not to live abroad in the united states. many europeans believe that america, though flush with opportunities to make money, is difficult to suffer within if you see hard times. it's a risky place, america.

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 5:15pm

  180. in fact, believe or not, though america seems all fancy and nice, it's really an awful place, full of violence and suspicion, fear and anxiety, and serious depression. there are too many obese people, too many anne coulters, rush limbaughs. these people are really quite a phenomenon which many europeans and canadians don't quite understand.

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 5:18pm

  181. I don't think that the rest of the world hates America, or Americans.

    Our elected officials, however, they can do without...and for that matter, so can I.

    Posted by edwriter at 10/12/2007 @ 5:19pm

  182. We spend more money per capita on education than any other country, and have less to show for it because of pointy-headed academic wenies who've obviously indoctrinated you well.

    right, it's the teachers' fault. i knew it all along! it certainly wouldn't be the exacerbating strain exerted on the public infrastructure due to the lack of competent federal officials who govern the use of taxpayer dollars.

    who cares about the amount of money spent. it's education, not the military.

    you wanna debate how much we spend on education? fuck, what about the fucking military? 1 trillion annual? 40 billion A DAY for your failed war?

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 5:22pm

  183. Watched a science channel show the other night that says that the earths mantle heats and cools, that the results are cyclical and that they affect the climate.

    Saw another that says solar flare activity peaked about 8 years ago, and that they're cyclical, and affect the climate, too.

    We engineer types learned about something called "orders of magnitude." For example, one variable is measured with the number 1 and 22 zeroes after it, and another variable measures 1 and three zeros after it.

    You can pretty much safely ignore the factors with three zeroes in the real world. Only pointy-headed academics need worry about them. And they're getting paid to do this.

    And so it is with this "man-made global warming" nonsense. The universe is changing, the earth's own core is changing, and man's effect on climate is insignificant.

    Bottom line, we may be headed for 200 degree temperatures. Or we may have another Ice Age--who know? But there isn't a g*ddamn thing Darladoon or Algore can do to change it. (Well, Algore, pointy-headed wannabe that he is, has found a way to get rich off of suckering people into believing we can.)

    Posted by viktor ramius at 10/12/2007 @ 5:23pm

  184. The universe is changing, the earth's own core is changing, and man's effect on climate is insignificant

    there's one problem with this line of reasoning: we have no prior anthropological precedent. the industrial revolution gave rise to the largest population surge this planet has ever seen. and we're not dinosaurs. we have enormous energy expenditures, which are made up heat trapping gases. these gases are known to be forcing unprecedented rises in temperature. and this rise in temperature has caused observable problems.

    how useful is it to debate what we already see all around us? melting icebergs the size of california and texas? massive deforestation and species depletion in africa? massive wildfires almost all year now in california?

    we can, and must, mitigate climate change because we owe it to our children, who will only be saddled with worsening problems, many of which we are seeing every day, especially in the south pacific. it is, in fact, a gesture of love to our brothers and sisters who will come after us.

    and that is why mr. gore deserves this award. he is a truly noble man.

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 5:31pm

  185. "I will be doing everything I can to try to understand how to best use the honour and recognition of this award as a way of speeding up the change in awareness, and the change in urgency.

    "I'm going back to work right now. This is just the beginning," he said, walking out of the room after less than five minutes, and without taking questions."

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 5:44pm

  186. (5:23 pm) The world according to "Viktor Ramius":

    Watched a science channel show the other night that says that the earths mantle heats and cools, that the results are cyclical and that they affect the climate.

    ~Very kooky, Viktor. Any journal citations?

    We engineer types learned about something called "orders of magnitude."

    ~If you're an engineer let me know who you work for so I can make sure not to be near anything you engineer.

    Bottom line, we may be headed for 200 degree temperatures. Or we may have another Ice Age--who know?

    ~Who know. We might even be headed for auto extinction due to ignorance and stupidity on a scale of unprecedented magnitude.

    Posted by b_kool_66 at 10/12/2007 @ 5:48pm

  187. Re Viktor Ramius' post.

    "Watched a science channel show the other night that says that the earths mantle heats and cools, that the results are cyclical and that they affect the climate."

    Actually this statement, though not stated clearly or accurately, has some truth in it. Large volcanic eruptions do affect global climate. But in the context of current global warming trends --which are pronounced and unprecedented-- mantle effects are not a measurable contributing factor.

    Posted by b_kool_66 at 10/12/2007 @ 5:59pm

  188. We might even be headed for auto extinction due to ignorance and stupidity on a scale of unprecedented magnitude.

    classic!

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 6:02pm

  189. because we owe it to our children,

    by DARLADOON 10/12/2007 @ 5:31pm

    because we owe it to ourselves

    Posted by frosty zoom at 10/12/2007 @ 6:07pm

  190. Posted by VIKTOR RAMIUS 10/12/2007 @ 5:23pm

    well...guess that settles it! whew....

    so its solar flares, earth's mantle warming,

    BUT YOU IN ALL YOUR ENGINEERING WISDOM ARE POSITIVE WE SHAVED APES HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH THIS?

    there is no doubt natural processes are at work, but the precipitous rise is unprecedented...

    Posted by ibbleblibble at 10/12/2007 @ 6:15pm

  191. fox news is now displaying preposterous levels of propaganda in response to gore winning the nobel prize.

    this really has to be seen to be believed. i can't believe my eyes, and kafka could not have scripted this better....

    if you wish, please spread around. i have to go and throw up now....i'm not kidding

    http://thinkprogress.org/2007/10/12/gore-petraeus-fox/

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 6:18pm

  192. go shopping! take a vacation! buy stuff and drive around in your hummer and watch a movie!

    lol...

    baffin island real estate is looking sweet!

    Posted by ibbleblibble at 10/12/2007 @ 6:20pm

  193. baffin island real estate is looking sweet!

    Posted by IBBLEBLIBBLE 10/12/2007 @ 6:20pm

    book your ocean-view lot now!

    Posted by frosty zoom at 10/12/2007 @ 6:23pm

  194. Posted by DARLADOON 10/12/2007 @ 4:38pm

    ain't no phone never stopped us!

    Posted by frosty zoom at 10/12/2007 @ 6:30pm

  195. National polling can be rather deceptive as to the real momentum a candidate can generate depending on the way a question is asked. When people are told to vote as though Al Gore 'is' a candidate, the numbers increase. 1st/2nd choice recalculations is another way. Here's a sample. But I do believe Al Gore's poll numbers will pop once he announces.

    EPIC/MRA for The Detroit News WXYZ TV 8/11/2007 Michigan

    Al Gore ________36%

    Hillary Clinton ___32%

    Barack Obama __ 16%

    John Edwards ____8%

    Joe Biden _______ 1%

    Bill Richardson ___ 1%

    Dennis Kucinich __ 1%

    Wesley Clark _____1%

    Unsure _________4%

    ______________________

    Greg Smith & Associates w/Gore 7/12/2007 Idaho

    Al Gore ________ 31%

    Hillary Clinton ___ 23%

    Barack Obama ___22%

    John Edwards ___ 10%

    Unsure __________8%

    Other ___________6%

    ______________________

    The Field Poll. 3/26/2007 California

    Hillary Clinton ___31%

    Al Gore ________25%

    Barack Obama __ 21%

    John Edwards ____8%

    Bill Richardson ___ 3%

    Joe Biden _______ 2%

    Dennis Kucinich __ 1%

    Unsure _________9%

    ______________________

    Democrat Polls Quinnipiac University Poll 6/29/2007 New-Jersey

    Hillary Clinton ___37%

    Al Gore ________18%

    Barack Obama __ 15%

    John Edwards ____6%

    Bill Richardson ___ 4%

    Joe Biden _______ 2%

    Chris Dodd ______1%

    Unsure ________13%

    Other __________2%

    Wouldn't Vote ____2%

    ______________________

    Siena College Poll 6/20/2007 New-York

    Hillary Clinton ___ 43%

    Al Gore ________19%

    Barack Obama __ 11%

    John Edwards ____9%

    Joe Biden _______ 2%

    Bill Richardson ___ 1%

    Chris Dodd ______1%

    Dennis Kucinich __ 1%

    Unsure ________13%

    ______________________

    Arizona State University/KAET TV Poll 9/22/2007 Arizona

    Hillary Clinton ___38%

    Barack Obama __ 18%

    Al Gore ________18%

    John Edwards ___10%

    Bill Richardson ____5%

    Unsure ________11%

    ______________________

    Quinnipiac University Poll 6/22/2007 Pennsylvania

    Hillary Clinton ___32%

    Barack Obama __ 18%

    Al Gore ________16%

    John Edwards ____7%

    Joe Biden _______ 5%

    Bill Richardson ___ 2%

    Chris Dodd ______1%

    Dennis Kucinich __1%

    Unsure _______ 15%

    Other __________2%

    Wouldn't Vote ___ 2%

    ______________________

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/12/2007 @ 6:36pm

  196. this really has to be seen to be believed. i can't believe my eyes, and kafka could not have scripted this better....

    if you wish, please spread around. i have to go and throw up now....i'm not kidding

    http://thinkprogress.org/2007/10/12/gore-petraeus-fox/

    Posted by DARLADOON 10/12/2007 @ 6:18pm

    Lipsky in the clip is from the NY Sun. This excerpt is from a recent Eric Alterman column, "Potemkin Paper?":

    The Sun is supported by many famously savvy and unsentimental investors, including Richard Gilder, Roger Hertog, Michael Steinhardt, Bruce Kovner and Thomas Tisch (though its most prominent one, Conrad Black, is now on trial for myriad varieties of fraud). I'm sure one of them would be smart enough to explain why it's so hard to actually obtain one of their newspapers, but during the Sun's high-profile 2002 launch, none was able to offer a convincing commercial rationale for creating a conservative highbrow newspaper in a liberal city that already had two highbrow papers and at least two conservative ones (depending on how you measure these things).

    When its guiding spirit, Seth Lipsky, tried to explain the paper's raison d'être to Sherman, he found himself not only ignoring Rupert Murdoch's New York Post--which may be understandable, given its addiction to sleaze--but also the Wall Street Journal, which, while published in New York City, with an enormous New York-based staff and readership, Lipsky says is something other than a New York newspaper. Lipsky was also compelled to place the prowar Daily News, whose extremely involved owner-editor, Mortimer Zuckerman, is one of America's most prominent supporters of the Israeli government and voted for George W. Bush in 2004, on the left side of the spectrum.

    Given such contortions, it should surprise no one that so much of the Sun appears to exist only in its owners' and editors' neoconservative imaginations. Indeed, its investors--together with Lipsky, a refugee from Bob Bartley's Wall Street Journal editorial page, and the founder of the English-language version of the Jewish Forward--appear to have little interest in publishing a newspaper in the traditional sense. Back in 2002, Daily News editor in chief Ed Kosner called the Sun "an intellectual vanity publication" with "a very small niche, the niche of weekly and monthly journals." But Dissent could run for a hundred years on what these machers are paying for the Sun. Why go to the enormous trouble and expense of publishing a multimillion-dollar daily newspaper that (apparently) reaches next to no one, at a moment when investors are eagerly shedding their newspaper holdings and privately owned papers are just as eagerly shedding staffers? The answer, obviously, has nothing to do with profits or even readers; advertisers are not stupid enough to put their faith (and money) into imaginary circulation figures. But journalists are. And there's the rub.

    Lipsky quotes his mentor Bartley that it requires "seventy-five editorials to get a law passed." It's not clear whether those editorials require actual readers who care what they say. In the case of the Sun, which mimics Murdoch's technique of blending editorials and news coverage in the same story, the intent is less to pass legislation than create tsuris for people and places of which it disapproves. Sherman aptly described the paper's primary function as that of "a journalistic SWAT team against individuals and institutions seen as hostile to Israel." During its first five years, these have included the Ford Foundation, which it accused of aiding Palestinian terrorism; Columbia University, accused of creating an atmosphere unfriendly to Jews; Kofi Annan's office at the UN, accused of rampant corruption; and Harvard University's Kennedy School, publisher of the famous Walt-Mearsheimer paper, likened to a David Duke neo-Nazi screed. It matters little that few sensible people would concur with the Sun's wild charges. (This is, after all, a paper whose editorial board thinks Dick Cheney should run for President in 2008.) What matters is the political value to the neoconservative agenda of creating the appearance of smoke, regardless of whether it's connected to fire.

    But I don't want to harp on the Jewish-media-moguls-supporting-Israel angle, which hews a little too close to traditional anti-Semitic stereotypes for my taste. While it may explain the Sun's rise, it obscures the more salient fact that countless conservative propaganda factories are supported in America by literally billions in ideological investment. Their success in swaying gullible reporters in the MSM and elsewhere accounts, in significant measure, for the widespread misperception that the public has moved rightward in recent decades. (The past four decades of public opinion polling show exactly the opposite: The public has moved leftward as the political system has moved rightward.) The beauty of this operation is that all this can be accomplished--as the Sun demonstrates--without the participation of any actual readers.

    It's a strange universe we've created here in Disneyla.......um, America.

    Posted by b_kool_66 at 10/12/2007 @ 6:52pm

  197. A powerful are always hated and resented by the vanquished, by the losers, by the incompetent. Which boss or foreman does not have the biggest bunglers, sticking out their tongues behind his back? And the more those losers are helped out of their hole, the deeper their ressentiment and envy. So too the jerks around here. Their defeats and failures have turned them into 24/7 fountains of bitching and wailing. That is the standard melody of rabble. The way to answer to such scum, in Europe and here, is to spit them in the eye.

    Posted by MARKCANYON 10/12/2007 @ 6:51pm

    Difficult to discern any intelligent discourse here. Time for your dirt nap, perhaps?

    Posted by b_kool_66 at 10/12/2007 @ 6:57pm

  198. That is ignorant and false. Schroeder and Chirac were anti Bush, but Schroeder lost his election and Chirac left office with lower popularity figures than Bush, and in disgrace

    the reason chirac left office in disgraces is because he wasn't liberal enough for the french. yes, sarkozy won to replace him, but that doesn't necessarily mean that there aren't enough french (the election was very, very close) who really, really despise US imperialism and arrogance.

    as for schroeader, whatever. merckl is decidely tougher on bush than schroeder....and she hasn't been shy in voicing her strong opinions about bush....she's about 100000000 times smarter than bush.....

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 7:15pm

  199. the french demand support from their government, as they pay very high taxes, but they also expect complete transparency, competence, and accountability.

    if bush had tried to govern the french? oh, man. you don't even wanna go there!

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 7:17pm

  200. mr. canyon focussed on TWO nations only: germany and france. he can't even attempt to refute all of latin america.....as decidely anti-bush.

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 7:18pm

  201. Posted by FROSTY ZOOM 10/12/2007 @ 10:59am

    Technically its not plants so much as the time and temp modified exudates of single-celled algae...but I get the point.

    To the Flat Earth crowd

    Can we stop acting like humans don't have a significant effect on climate now?

    Posted by leftofcenter at 10/12/2007 @ 7:27pm

  202. Posted by MARKCANYON 10/12/2007 @ 6:51pm

    Hey, MARKGOEBBELS, curious...what do you think Gore's take on Jews would be?

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 7:29pm

  203. To those not familiar with MARKRISTALNACH, allow me to introduce you...from "Prison Reformers Finally Set Free" by Matthew Blake...

    "You ask: WTF are you implying? "It's all the jews fault"? Correct this presumption, (created by reading you post), if you can/ desire to.

    I'm not implying nothing, I'm saying it straight out you dolt. ----Posted by MARKCANYON 10/07/2007 @ 11:10am

    He also thought they were "finally getting the right people sent to Death Row" in Germany in the 30s!

    Yep, he's an honest-to-Gosh neo-Nazi anti-semite leftist. It's like discovering a Tasmanian wolf or a dodo bird in your backyard!

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 7:36pm

  204. ALGORE will only run if begged to by Dem Voters, his considerable ego won't allow him to be bothered with actually competing for the Dem nomination again....

    With that said, he would be a much better president than any of the other Dem candidates..(Grabbing throat, choking)...

    There, I said it...

    Posted by davebarlett at 10/12/2007 @ 7:44pm

  205. Gore should run for president.Name me any good thing Hillary has done,nothing.

    Posted by the libertine at 10/12/2007 @ 8:13pm

  206. MarkCanyon: I'm trying to get the logic of your post on the powerful. Is it that the powerful are warranted (after all they "won") and the vanquished are wrong (they did not "win); that if you have a dissenting position than that of a hierarchy you should be violently shunned (spitting in the eye and all that)? Sounds a little Machiavellian to me. I could very well be wrong about you and I'm sorry if I am. But, you may be more comfortable in america the empire than the america that has struggled from our inception to meet the lofty goals demanded by our declaration of independence from empire.

    America the empire is hated for good reason.

    Posted by steve foster at 10/12/2007 @ 8:13pm

  207. I have a feeling that some of this Gore bashing.Is coming from the Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton camps.

    Posted by the libertine at 10/12/2007 @ 8:26pm

  208. your entire rant on Bush's global popularity only serves to show your naivete (sorry, I don't know how to put that little french thingy on the e in that word ;-). But I've always liked kooky people like you.

    it isn't about popularity, it's about competence. it's about whether or not bush has exceeded the permissable level of gross misconduct and negligence.

    come on, starting a war, based on lies, continued with lies, and the overwhelming complicity of a largely uninfluential congress and subservient media apparatus.

    Posted by darladoon at 10/12/2007 @ 8:27pm

  209. Posted by THE LIBERTINE 10/12/2007 @ 8:26pm

    I have a feeling that some of these new posters are from the nascent Gore camp!

    heheh

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 9:03pm

  210. DARLA, kiddo...unless you WANT to get mad, ignore Major Hochstedter (MARKCANYON).

    He's LITERALLY a Nazi sympathizer and anti-Semite. Not just "anti-Zionist" or "anti-Israel"....the guy has LAUDED the Holocaust, while being a quasi "leftist".

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 10:24pm

  211. BTW, 'lest anybody doubt me---

    "Prison Reformers Finally Set Free" by Matthew Black

    "For one bright moment that came to view well enough in Europe when there were no people of color to confuse the picture. Then the right people, for once, were locked up, and put on Death Row, and sent to gas chamber. For a short moment the picture was clear and honest folks knew what to do.

    That gave the crooks a fright......

    Working people must come to their senses. We must defend the innocent against the true enemy. We need a prisoner exchange: Blacks out, Jews in."----Posted by MARKCANYON 10/06/2007 @ 1:15pm

    Posted by Mask at 10/12/2007 @ 10:29pm

  212. Perhaps this is a trivial matter compared to the momentous issues involved, but Al Gore is not an Academy Award winner.

    "An Inconvenient Truth" won two Oscars. One went to Melissa Etheredge for Best Song. The other, as is always the case with the Best Feature Documentary prize, went to the film's director, Davis Guggenheim, who also did some shooting and editing on the picture.

    When I saw "An Inconvenient Truth," one of my reactions was that if Al Gore had conducted himself during his presidential campaign with the skill that he displays in the film, he would have become President easily no matter what happened in Florida. It seems more than possible that, despite Gore's long experience in delivering his global warming presentation around the world, Guggenheim must have helped him not to be the stiff, wooden Gore who was so prominent during the campaign.

    So maybe this isn't such a trivial matter after all.

    Posted by mfed at 10/13/2007 @ 02:04am

  213. I am very pleased with this moral victory for Al Gore and with him of all the environmentalist movement. I wish him the best in his elected fight for a better world.

    As for his political perspectives, I really don't know. In the rest of the world, a citizen annointed with the Peace Nobel Prize would be extremely respected, even revered. Here Jimmy Carter's moral voice is largely ignored.

    As for the guy that says: "this is irrelevant, or will he retain his medal and money when his predictions get debunked..." Well, I am really sorry for that person. He who believes only in brutal force has no sensitivity, morals, nor even a rich inner life. I wonder why he just don't stop making such negative remarks and goes to his friends at the "Weekly Standard". Those pals that think is too expensive to give health insurance to the kids. And the answer is this: he -and some others- are participating here not on free expression of ideas, but to mock progressive ideas, promote hatred and make a circus of this that should be a serious channel of discussion. They don't have the minimal intention of searching for the truth but only want to discredit this. We shall and will discredit him instead on every posture he makes.

    Finally, Al Gore is not a looser by any means. Whether some significant effects of global warming are felt in 20 or 120 years, he is leaving a message of respect for nature and rational use of resources that is beyond our differences in evaluation of global warming and states what should had always been our approach to management of economic growth. Of course that person that discredits him only understands quantity, not quality; dollars, not well being and as said brutal force, not intelligence.

    Posted by Frank42 at 10/13/2007 @ 02:10am

  214. Nichols, is so correct on most issues. Like myself he is hopeful, maybe to extreme optimism, like a true left of center patriot. But Gore doesn't have the money nor the support at the moment except from us hopeful idealists. The "Norwegian Primary" isn't an US one, and Ms. Clinton does have an edge with the moneyed class which is why even Republicans are now singing her praises.

    We need to only look to the past to see how Democracy has been derailed in the US. The corrupt Nixon taking on a patriot like McGovern and winning in a landslide, or Carter getting overwhelmed by another corrupt corporate goon like Reagan (head propagandist for GE for so many years). Gore is scary to the corporate heads as he has a moral core and a will to tell the truth. Ms. Clinton scares us but hopefully her moral core will come out as I think she has one...although I am not sure if it's Republican or Democrat. Her background is upper class and very proper. But she seems at least to care more about us average folks than any Republican out there.

    The Democratic Party elite is afraid of a primary fight and seems to want a woman at last to run for President as the largest constituency of the Dems is female. I can vouch for their desire for at last a female President.

    I think either Giulani or Romney could give her a real test or any other Dem including Gore. Don't count out the Repugs, as the Dems always show a desire to lose it seems. It's scary that both Romney and Ms. Clinton have the same plan for health care....penalize the lower middle class and give more breaks for the rich with their plan to force Americans to pay for private health insurance which only benefits the very wealthy who pay very low percentage of their income for the best care possible while the majority of Americans get substandard care for unbelievable costs.. (for example Republicans want the "poster child" family of the Democrats, the Frost family of average means 45 K a year. to be forced to pay $1200 a month for health insurance... that is the Republican solution...over a quarter of one's income to an already bloated medical industry monopoly)

    Thanks for keeping an open forum here even if Right wingers abuse it. Again few if any Right wing forums allow debate as does the Nation.

    Posted by data2dave at 10/13/2007 @ 04:23am

  215. Have we noticed that the CATO institute is less and less well received on Public Radio? Maybe their endorsement of continued pollution and Global Warming Denial (equivalent to Holocaust Denial) has undercut any argument they have.

    No Doubt the Club for Growth is still powerful (another vestige of CATO and other Libertarian Right Wingnut hysteria) but Gore's victory for environmentalism is something to be hopeful about....but then most Americans are afraid of downsizing and losing their hope for financial security which in a pinch could offset doing the best thing for future generations.

    Notice all the denial folks like antiEnvironmentalist Micheal Crighton are eating their words now....We need to remind people who got us in this mess: Mobil Oil's at the top of the list! And what a cretin Michael Crighton is: his book State of Fear tops the list of hysterical badly written "top of the NYTimes list" crapola...now to be found on remander lists for discount bins....take a peak for example of how extreme rightwingers can get..but don't buy the trash....his book was accusing environmentalists of being 'terrorists'. Of course, El Salvador's rightwing govt. is doing just that and Bush would like to follow suit.

    Posted by data2dave at 10/13/2007 @ 04:43am

  216. With such a great "resume" (including Senator & VP) how was it that Gore's Inconv Truth Documentary was so conventional? He could have exposed the dynamics of Washington that lead to and prevent the solution of Global Warming. Large established corporations (who--unlike The People--are only concerned with profit, and disporportionaly control government policy) are willing to make everyone share a bit, or alot, of suffering (it doesn't really matter how much since those figures don't go into the accounting books) in order to post enormous profits.

    Why didn't Gore mention anything about why, despite the fact that we've know about Global Warming for decades, and why, despite the fact the public views the environment as one of the most important issues of our day--why has nothing been done yet? After a long resume of serving in positions of power, Gore knows why--why not tell us? I would call THAT movie An Inconvenient Truth. The movie he DID make, however, should have been called Fairly Conventional Knowledge.

    As president would Gore be willing to confront the corporations that impede solutions to Global Warming? It's easy to court favor by passionately tellng everyone what they already know--but when you're in power, people will expect results. And to get result in preventing environmental catastrophy, Gore would have to atack the powers he refused to expose in his movie...and I imagine he'd rather keep on their good side instead.

    Posted by Nikancuole at 10/13/2007 @ 06:11am

  217. TOPOFF 4 and Vigilant Shield 08: Nuclear Dictatorship: The Portland Plan

    http://www.amfirstbooks.com/IntroPages/ToolBarTopics/Articles/Featured_A uthors/may,_captain_eric/May_works/May_2007_07-12/Capt._Eric_H._May_2007 1008-LStar_Nuclear_Dictatorship_The_Portland_Plan.html

    Captain May is a former Army military intelligence and public affairs officer, as well as a former NBC editorial writer. His political and military analyses have appeared in The Wall Street Journal, The Houston Chronicle and Military Intelligence Magazine. He is the leader of the Portland Nuclear Inquest, a group of concerned citizens monitoring and discussing the TOPOFF / Vigilant Shield terror exercises. Interested readers can join at: http://ca.groups.yahoo.com/group/Portland-Nuclear-Inquest.

    It's hard to know what's scarier: the idea of responding to a terrorist attack in Portland or the idea that the government is using a drill as a pretext to seize power, declare martial law and, possibly, attack Iran. –"Different shades of unthinkable" -- Editorial, The Oregonian, Oct. 2, 2007 http://luminaria.wordpress.com/2007/10/11/bushs-nuclear-dictatorship/

    News – TOPOFF 4 (short for "top officials") is an exercise that simulates (we hope) the detonation of a "dirty bomb" near Portland's Steel Bridge. Vigilant Shield 08 simulates (we hope) imposition of martial law to control the civilian population in the aftermath of the radiological event. http://news.propeller.com/story/2007/10/08/topoff-4-and-vigilant-shield- 08-a-view-from-the-feverish-fringe http://www.freepressinternational.com/?p=318 http://mikeinmanila.info/?p=91

    On September 11th 2001, several military drills were taking place that removed vital air defenses from the area and caused confusion as the exercises went "live". In London on July 7th, 2005, Visor Corporation was conducting drills of the exact events that transpired that day, in the same locations at the same time. On October 15th, NORTHCOM is engaging in another drill. This time simulating a "dirty" bomb and the implementation of Martial Law in Portland, Oregon. Only our awareness of the plan can stop them, just like it stopped them in Charleston in August 2005. http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_ginny_ro_070914_here_s_the_drill _3a_aw.htm

    It is vital that we all become aware of the fact that, six years ago, numerous civil and military exercises set the stage for the "live" events that occurred on September 11, 2001. That is, some of the drills before and during 9/11 simulated the actual events that took place on that day, including a plane-into-building exercise and a live-fly hijacking. This "coincidence" (assuming one is a coincidence theorist) caused an intentional paralysis or defacto stand down of our forces. Unless you believe in astronomical improbabilities, it is impossible that the "live" events simulated by these drills were a mere coincidence and not connected in any way to the drills' planning and execution. (It is important to note that a simulation of the exact bombings that occurred in London on July 7, 2005 was underway just before the live "terrorist" events took place.)

    http://georgewashington.blogspot.com/2005/12/introduction-to-false-flag- terror.html

    Posted by plunger at 10/13/2007 @ 07:39am

  218. Posted by LEFTOFCENTER 10/12/2007 @ 7:27pm

    thanks for the update!

    Posted by frosty zoom at 10/13/2007 @ 09:13am

  219. Posted by MARKCANYON 10/12/2007 @ 10:34pm

    Read some of your posts. You're high as a kite.

    Posted by FRANKGRITS 10/12/2007 @ 10:43pm

    i'd say as low as a dung heap.

    Posted by frosty zoom at 10/13/2007 @ 09:14am

  220. Anybody else think there is the slightest, infinitesimal, microscopic, sub-atomic possibility that some of these new posters might be from....

    DraftGore.com???

    heheh

    Posted by Mask at 10/13/2007 @ 09:20am

  221. Having spent a number of years in Latin America, I cannot but see the United States as a "politically third-world" country. A number of people have noted of late that there is now more political corruption in the first world than in the third world. Could Mr. Gore make a difference in all this? Possibly. Could an honest man succeed in a politically underdeveloped country? Worth a try.

    Posted by mcleave at 10/13/2007 @ 11:59am

  222. Takes one to know one aye...

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/13/2007 @ 2:06pm

  223. Hey Frita, it's better than listening to the screeching right wing repub new con servicers of dic'tator philosophy/corporate sychophantic greed-induced belly-aching...

    And yes, I do recognize screeching when I hear it.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/13/2007 @ 2:17pm

  224. Thank you. Yes, indeed, Mr. Gore knows he can do greater good inside the White House to solve this and the other crisis. The Corporate and other Political Pundits can try to spin it, ... as they did 7 years ago, opposite of reality, that doesn't make it so.

    Time for a COOL change, Gore 2008

    Posted by LDP at 10/13/2007 @ 3:08pm

  225. For Al Gore? Here's one that tracked his schedule and pointed out that Al has hardly anything scheduled for after the Nobel Award announcement, late October onward... speculating that it's because Al's to decide then one way or the other and needs an open calendar to do so.

    http://fink.dailykos.com/

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/13/2007 @ 3:12pm

  226. Large established corporations (who--unlike The People--are only concerned with profit, and disporportionaly control government policy) are willing to make everyone share a bit, or alot, of suffering (it doesn't really matter how much since those figures don't go into the accounting books) in order to post enormous profits.

    Would those "established corporations that are only concerned with profit, and disproportionately control government policy" also apply to a candidate for POTUS who set up a firm to sell carbon credits?? The same candidate who said and did nothing about GW as the VPOTUS for 8 years?

    Al's not running, neither today, nor next year. After hanging out with Bon Jovi, hosting global concerts and schmoozing with Hollywood, not to mention all the lefty "awards", being POTUS would be quite boring by comparison.

    I've noticed that people here speak as though Al has actually increased the number of people who would vote for him since 2000, yet have ignored the possibility that he may have actually lost favor with those who did. I actually voted for him in 2000, but I think he's lost his marbles since then.

    Posted by Sliver at 10/13/2007 @ 4:57pm

  227. Posted by DARLADOON 10/12/2007 @ 12:35pm

    A democracy (yes, actually a democratic republic in our case) requires an informed electorate. The last thing our "handlers" want is a well-informed citizenry of critical-thinking voters.

    Posted by Radscal at 10/13/2007 @ 6:00pm

  228. Posted by ABELL12CT 10/12/2007 @ 12:50pm

    The Florida Constitution REQUIRES a full recount in close elections. I am still amused that the "party of States' Rights" ran to the Federal Supreme Court to stop a State from exercising it's Rights.

    Posted by Radscal at 10/13/2007 @ 6:05pm

  229. Posted by RIO BRAVO 10/13/2007 @ 1:27pm

    So the Nobel organization hands out medals to idiots these days? Hmmmm. Maybe you should apply...

    Posted by RADSCAL 10/13/2007 @ 6:05pm

    Astute observation

    Posted by leftofcenter at 10/13/2007 @ 7:13pm

  230. Posted by LEFTOFCENTER 10/13/2007 @ 7:13pm

    [blush]

    Full Disclosure Statement: I campaigned for Nader in both '96 and '00. Last week, I started collecting signatures to get Gore on the CA Primary Ballot. I love irony.

    Posted by Radscal at 10/13/2007 @ 7:29pm

  231. I think that you "Draft Gore" guys are over-looking one Inconvenient Truth (pun intended).

    Are one of the prerequisites for becoming a good President that the candidate DOESN'T want to be President? (Should Torre have pitched to save his job?)

    Posted by Sliver at 10/13/2007 @ 7:35pm

  232. John, thank you for this commentary. I am one of the one who has still not gotten over 2000 and am waiting with baited breath for him to announce; i think he absolutely wipes the floor on foreign policy and the environment, but I would be interested to know his recent positions on universal healthcare and civil rights for gay americans before throwing the full weight of my support behind him; specifically, i would want to know that he was more in line with progressive values than senators clinton and obama on these issues

    Posted by cronot7 at 10/13/2007 @ 8:33pm

  233. Al Gore and Yessar Arafat Nobel Peace winners----Figures

    Posted by Len Mosse at 10/13/2007 @ 8:37pm

  234. Besides the knee jerk "Ha! Run that loser, we'll stomp him again" Repub/right wing reaction to a Gore candidacy...there should be one OTHER, quite subtle ENCOURAGING indicator of it to our GOP friends....it means support for ANY of the other Top Tier Democratic candidates is shallow as ditch.

    Think about it. What's the claim of the DraftGore guys, on WHERE Gore will get his support? Not "lots of new voters" or "disenchanted voters now sitting it out", but "he'll draw away Edwards, Obama, even Hillary voters that have already been polled on who they want!" (as if they were all "second choice compared to Al", not truly "good" candidates)

    He'd have to...because even in most of HSUB's foolishly optimistic polls, Hillary is still beating Gore by 10-20%. Which means unless HER voters drop away, Gore can't win.

    But...if her voters are "just sitting around waiting for Al to come back" and don't really care that much for Her Nibs....then where's the energy for her (or Obama or Edwards) that would have carried them to the General Election.

    In other words, if Gore DOESN'T enter the race, according to the Draft Gore guys, Hillary's support is so weak as to be easily surmounted by her GOP rival!

    Posted by Mask at 10/13/2007 @ 8:40pm

  235. BTW, not really interested in doing it myself....but it'd be interesting to see if most (or even ANY) of these NEW posters here on THIS thread about a Draft Gore move....

    show up on OTHER threads with opinions?

    I kinda doubt it...I figure we've been targetted by the DG guys.

    Posted by Mask at 10/13/2007 @ 8:42pm

  236. My miscellaneous comments:

    DARLADOON was concerned about military spending instead of education. The enlightened John F. Kerry proclaimed we need to "invest" in education. The American taxpayer may want to ask the question - Where has the money we have been "investing" so far all these years(paying school taxes) gone, if that amount is no good? John F. Kerry doesn't concern himself with that. School spending is local, and in some localities a lot of it gets wasted in the school bureaucracy. When the money gets to the schools, it goes where teachers can not be paid by merit, but by union rules instead, and they do not discipline the kids anymore, and some teach that 2 + 2 = 5 is OK because you tried or is the correct answer because it shows the childs' creativity, etc. When you see this, you see that military spending has noting to do with causing this mess. And then, when one proposes vouchers for kids so they can get a decent education (as former District mayor Anthony Williams (a Democrat) did) they get condemned for trying to destroy public education.

    There have been a lot of comments about climate change and praise for Algore. Instead, why don't we let the scientific community hash out if this is really a problem, what degree of a problem, and what causes it to begin with. As you all know, or should know, there are many scientists who do not agree with what people such as Algore promote as absolute. And no, they are not all being paid by oil companies in Alberta, which is what I will get back in response as I am condemned as a "Global Warming Denier"

    DARLADOON says ".......if bush had tried to govern the french? oh, man. you don't even wanna go there!....." Of course not, DARLADOON, I certainly do not want to go to France! Si je veux faire l'expérience de la culture française, je voudrais aller à Montréal. (If I want to experience French culture, I would go to Montreal.) If I was in Europe and wanted a job, I would go to Ireland, where the government has established a business-friendly climate with low taxes that has prompted considerable economic growth. Ireland is booming, France is the opposite with high unemployment despite the requirement to only work 35 hours so as to prevent unemployment (see how great socialist theory works!!).

    DARLADOON then continues "......come on, starting a war, based on lies, continued with lies, and the overwhelming complicity of a largely uninfluential congress and subservient media apparatus....." Good lord, how many times have we been through this? You know full well there were no lies, most people in the world believed Saddam had WMD, even countries that opposed the Iraq war believed he had WMD, Saddams own generals believed he had WMD, we could not determine the exact situation because of Saddam's refusal to comply with what the UN demanded (completely describing his WMD program or if there were none left where did they go? - not just letting inspectors in to places Saddam knew there were no more WMD anyway), the UN was never going to make him comply, we do not know to this day what happened to the WMD and when, I remember myself news reports during the 90's of WMD being found, if the inspections had continued Saddam would have been declared free of WMD, and thus free to go back making it again, his own people have said so, he likely would have sold it to terrorists, they may have killed millions of us with it. Phew!!! I could discuss this all day, but all this ground has been plowed over and over again in the public domain, why DARLADOON do you proclaim there were lies when there were not??

    FRANKGRITS then hops in and says (talking about George W. Bush) ".....considered to be an idiot everywhere in the world except in Crawford Texas......." Well, I do not live in Crawford, Texas and I do not consider him an idiot. He is one of the greatest Presidents we have ever had. And Tony Blair is one of the greatest Prime Minister the U.K. has ever had. There is no point in me not saying this, because God only knows what diatribe I will get back if I imply it, so I might as well say it directly. It may well be that only two people in this country, myself and Laura Bush, are willing to support the President no matter what, but so be it, that is the way it is.

    But FRANKGRITS doesn't stop there. He then comes up with the oldie but goody, ".....Al Gore was the choice of the people of America to be President in 2000. The Supreme Court's rightwing element had other ideas and won the day........" Uh, FRANKGRITS, you are aware that Algore kept losing the recounts, recounts that were to his specification, anyway, and that no disenfranchisement has ever been proven, so when Florida law specified it was time to end the recounts the recounts should end. The Florida Supreme Court ruled they could continue, which is re-writing law after the fact, and the U.S. Supreme Court negated that ruling. The purpose of the judicial branch is to rule on the legality or constitutionality of a law, not to make law, and that is according to the Constitution of the United States. (not Algore's living breathing version, either). And studies have shown that had Algore been granted his recount, George W. Bush would have won anyway. Would we still be counting today, fishing for an Algore victory? How would you feel if you entered the voting booth knowing that depending on the outcome, the election law can be re-written and your selection may mean nothing? I know, the wrong question to ask you because you think it is ok. The correct answer is it is NOT OK.

    FRANK42 says ".......Here Jimmy Carter's moral voice is largely ignored........" That is the proper thing to do, since Carter's voice is, as we know now, anti-Semetic and biased to the wrong side of the equation in the Middle East. His voice on humanitarian issues somehow always missed concerning himself with these issues in communist countries, and his voice was heard praising thugs and murders like Yasir Arafat. His voice was heard (or his written words) by some world leaders before the Gulf War in 1991, when he was lobbying foreign leaders to oppose us when the first President Bush was working to build the coalition to kick Saddam out of Kuwait. At the time the U.S. didn't know about this until Prime Minister Brian Mulroney of Canada contacted our government to ask what Carter was up to. I don't think Mr. Mulroney thought much of Carter's "voice" and I agree with the former Prime Minister, and not with you.

    I will get back the standard stuff that I am delusional, I am telling lies, I am a kool-aid "winger" pushing propaganda from the "neocon chickenhawks" supplied to me via Fox News and Rush Limbaugh, etc. So be it.

    Posted by sjchermak at 10/13/2007 @ 10:43pm

  237. I kinda doubt it...I figure we've been targetted by the DG guys.

    Posted by MASK 10/13/2007 @ 8:42pm

    Only Raymond Babitt would care.

    Posted by Sliver at 10/13/2007 @ 10:48pm

  238. Posted by SLIVER 10/13/2007 @ 10:48pm

    Just found it interesting all the "new names".

    BTW, again, to throw more cold water on this....shouldn't we remember that the author of this article, John Nichols, is the same man who has been touting impeachment as just around the corner for two years?

    One wonders if his skills at prognostication (like his eternal booster, HSUB) are any better at predicting Gore's electoral moves...as they were at predicting John Conyers' and Russ Feingolds' 180s on impeachment?

    Posted by Mask at 10/13/2007 @ 11:02pm

  239. Posted by MASK 10/13/2007 @ 11:02pm

    They seemed to have come out of the woodwork.

    Wouldn't it be a pisser if RADSCAL had turned out to be FRANKGRITS until after the primaries? ...He could be the Nation's version of Racer X.

    Posted by Sliver at 10/13/2007 @ 11:22pm

  240. Hehehe Who is that "Masked" man, Silver?

    Posted by Radscal at 10/14/2007 @ 01:15am

  241. Hehehe Who is that "Masked" man, Silver?

    Posted by Radscal at 10/14/2007 @ 01:18am

  242. Posted by SJCHERMAK 10/13/2007 @ 10:43pm

    You are a rare voice of sanity, my friend. But you are here in the fever swamps of the far left, inhabited by the sullen and wrathful, and your voice will fall on deaf ears. Take people like DARLA and FRANK for what they are, intellectual circus freaks, good for their bizarre amusement and horrification value only.

    Posted by pontificus at 10/14/2007 @ 05:07am

  243. The comments that General Sanchez made that the media didn't tell you about:

    Given the near instantaneous ability to report actions on the ground, the responsibility to accurately and truthfully report takes on an unprecedented importance. The speculative and often uninformed initial reporting that characterizes our media appears to be rapidly becoming the standard of the industry. An Arab proverb states - "Four things come not back: the spoken word, the spent arrow, the past, the neglected opportunity." Once reported, your assessments become conventional wisdom and nearly impossible to change. Other major challenges are your willingness to be manipulated by "high level officials" who leak stories and by lawyers who use hyperbole to strengthen their arguments. Your unwillingness to accurately and prominently correct your mistakes and your agenda driven biases contribute to this corrosive environment. All of these challenges combined create a media environment that does a tremendous disservice to America.

    Any wonder that major newspapers and broadcast networks are in (hopefully fatal) decline?

    Posted by pontificus at 10/14/2007 @ 05:23am

  244. One other interesting snippet of General Sanchez' speech that the media DIDN'T report (in line with the NYT's motto, 'all the news that fits, we print'):

    My assessment is that your profession, to some extent, has strayed from these ethical standards and allowed external agendas to manipulate what the american public sees on tv, what they read in our newspapers and what they see on the web. For some of you, just like some of our politicians, the truth is of little to no value if it does not fit your own preconceived notions, biases and agendas.

    Posted by pontificus at 10/14/2007 @ 05:43am

  245. I know I shouldn't visit these lefty sites it's not good for my political antenna but seeing Mask and Fools would like to vote for him would someone..anyone please tell me that the following article by A. Cockburn is just more lefty bullshit. If not I'll be joining your mob and rooting (not Aussie style of course) for him as your next pressie. I reckon he should be even better at it than my present hero W.

    "In early January, 1993, Thomas Friedman interviewed president elect Clinton and asked about Saddam. Clinton amiably responded, "I always tell everybody, I'm a Baptist. I believe in deathbed conversions. If he wants a different relationship with the US and UN, all he has to do is change his behavior." This elicited cries of outrage from the national security establishment, and its prime representative, vice president-elect Gore, who announced that there could never be normal relations with Iraq so long as Saddam remained in power. He reiterated the call for a coup, if not by the Iraqi military then by the CIA (which in point of fact had been in receipt of a 'presidential finding' from Bush, three months after the guns of the Gulf War fell silent, authorizing it 'to create conditions for the removal of Saddam Hussein from power').

    Vice president Al Gore was then given authority in the Clinton Administration for Iraq policy. On April 14, 1993, Bush went to Kuwait, whose regime duly arrested 17 people charged with plotting to kill Bush with a bomb placed in a Toyota Landcruiser.

    Again the national security establishment mustered in support of a plan to hold Saddam accountable and bombard Baghdad, a plan hotly advocated by Gore and his national security advisor, Leon Feurth. The two individuals most reluctant to endorse this plan were Bill Clinton and George Bush Sr. "Do we have to take this action?" Clinton muttered to his national security team as the cruise missiles on two carriers in the Persian Gulf were being programmed.

    Eight of the 23 missiles hit the residential Mansour suburb of Baghdad, one of them killing Leila al-Attar, a prominent Iraqi artist. According to Clinton's pollster Stan Greenberg, the bombing of Baghdad caused an uptick of 11 points in Clinton's popularity, a lesson Clinton and Gore did not forget. Years later, in the 2000 campaign, Gore out-hawked George Bush Jr on the subject of finishing the job in Iraq.

    On June 29, 2000, Gore was in Chicago to talk about "energy policy incentives for cities". Danny Muller of Voices in the Wilderness went to Navy Pier, where the event was being held. Gore was at the podium amid wild ovations. Muller remembers the scene: "I raised my voice and asked 'Mr. Gore, why should anyone vote for an administration that kills 5,000 innocent children a month through sanctions in Iraq?' Gore stopped. And he laughed. He actually laughed. He said he would discuss this later in the day. I responded by saying that every ten minutes a child dies in Iraq due to sanctions and we do not have the time to wait."

    Muller was still protesting as Gore's security goons hauled him off."

    Now that sounds to me like a US president we could all love.

    Posted by lrjones4 at 10/14/2007 @ 08:26am

  246. If it hasn't been already linked

    http://www.smh.com.au/news/environment/gore-gets-a-cold-shoulder/2007/10 /13/1191696238792.html

    Posted by usc1 at 10/14/2007 @ 09:24am

  247. Posted by LRJONES4 10/14/2007 @ 08:26am

    Ah, but LR, what you don't understand is...that was Al Gore vers. 2.0 (maybe the transitional prototype vers. 2.5).

    NOW we have Gore 3.0, the fully "progressive" "no more DLC" Gore who is Kucinich with all of Clinton's smoothness. No more "stiff Al", no more "pro-NAFTA Al, and certainly not the "pro-life" or "pro-MX missile" Al that was vers. 1.0.

    To the Gore'nauts, this is the Gore that has ALWAYS been, rarely do they even acknowledge that the previous incarnations even existed... in other words...

    "Oceania is at war with EastAsia, Oceania has always been at war with EastAsia!"

    Posted by Mask at 10/14/2007 @ 09:48am

  248. He'd have to...because even in most of HSUB's foolishly optimistic polls, Hillary is still beating Gore by 10-20%. Which means unless HER voters drop away, Gore can't win.

    Posted by MASK 10/13/2007 @ 8:40pm

    Not so Frita. I already posted previously two state polls that show Al leading and that would happen a lot more if the polling question were posed with the conveat/pre-understanding-- 'if' Al was also running, numbers put him ahead. Most polls do the opposite.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/14/2007 @ 11:14am

  249. I think it's telling that vast majority of MSM is stating no way that Al Gore will/could conceivably run. Considering how wromg they were about Al last time he ran, how wrong they were about hsuB/cHeney, how wrong they were about the drum beat up to and going to war in Iraq,... A Gore presidency would be a slap on their face, a wollup of the MSM, exposing them for the weak kneed amoral glam/bought out machine they are. MSM has little cred today and will do whatever it can to try and convince Al not to run for said reasons.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/14/2007 @ 11:22am

  250. Wouldn't it be a pisser if RADSCAL had turned out to be FRANKGRITS until after the primaries? ...He could be the Nation's version of Racer X.

    Posted by SLIVER 10/13/2007 @ 11:22pm

    I don't know why my response to this ended up listed BEFORE this comment in the thread, but I'll restate it now:

    Hehehe... Who was that Masked Many, Silver?

    Posted by Radscal at 10/14/2007 @ 11:28am

  251. Posted by MASK 10/14/2007 @ 09:48am

    And Frita, if the truth be told, a lot of the misdirection of info you and the far right new con supporters, servicers of dic'tator philosophy are trying to use to blame Al for should really lay on the 12 years of repub controlled congressional defunding of the oversight programs that would have made the initiatives like NAFTA work to the benefit of workers rights/income and the environment. Very misleading propaganda for those that refuse to take their heads out of the sand and do the research into why good ideas went south.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/14/2007 @ 11:30am

  252. Posted by LRJONES4 10/14/2007 @ 08:26am

    Yup! You've cited some of the many reasons I campaigned AGAINST Gore in 2000 (and against Clinton in 1996). In addition to the inhumane sanctions, during the Clinton Administration the U.S. bombed Iraqi "targets" nearly weekly.

    NAFTA and the creation of the WTO that subvert democratically elected governments to the betterment of international corporations, the gutting of Welfare programs, reductions in school spending and increases in military spending (after campaigning to "reinvest the war surplus" were other reasons.

    Less widely known is the largely successful campaign to make abortions impossible to obtain during the Clinton Administration. That is, failing to absolutely ban abortion, the xian right's terrorist attacks caused many clinics to close and many practitioners to stop offering them. By 2000, abortions were not available in 85% of U.S. counties. Clinton/Gore may not have supported these terrorists, but they sure didn't do much to stop them either.

    I didn't see any substantial differences between the Re-putrid-cans and Demon-ocrats - and frankly, don't see much difference in this election cycle's candidates either.

    However, after seeing the startling amount of damage Duhbya has done, I've decided to do whatever I can to keep the Re-putrid-cans out of the White House. I think Gore has a better chance of winning the general election than any of the Dem candidates, so.....

    Posted by Radscal at 10/14/2007 @ 11:31am

  253. Oh and I forgot-- no oversight of repub/corporate war profiteering shannigans for 12 years of the repub controlled congress... But all that is really Al Gore's fault. SSSssssuuuuuurrrreee.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/14/2007 @ 11:36am

  254. Remember if Al Gore would have been president 2000-- no 9/11, no out of control spending, no Iraq war, a better economy, a functioning constitution, better CAFE and environmentally progressive programs, more open and reliable news, ...

    But no, it's easier to blame Al for all the ills of the repubs, more profitable, $$$$$ talks and buys.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/14/2007 @ 11:47am

  255. Sometimes from the mouths of babes...

    Posted by PONTIFICUS 10/14/2007 @ 05:23am

    Posted by PONTIFICUS 10/14/2007 @ 05:43am

    It seems that PONTI is over his Maoist phase of praising Pol Pot, prancing around in black pajamas and wistfully nostalgizing for Year Zero -- and, like a teenager shifting his allegiance from hip-hop most ghetto to hard core techno at the drop of a beat, PONTI has now self-re-invented an orthodox Chomskian leftist. To wit:

    PONTI,

    You do realize that the quotes you are approvingly citing from Ricardo Sanchez are ones that (1) a committed left-of-center militant such as myself agrees with 110%; that (2) could have even been scripted for Sanchez by Noam Chomsky himself for their uncannily Chomsky-Herman "Propaganda Model"-styled indictment of the privately-contolled MSM as stenographers to state and corporate authority; and specifcally (3) can readily be read as Sanchez attacking the MSM coverage of Iraq for having been so "embededded" up-the-ass so as to have eggregiosuly failed in their ostensible mission of informing the public and discomforting the power elite.

    You are aware of all this, yes?

    Anyway, for as long as your allegiances reside here, keep up the Unswerving Effort for the Cause of Good, PONTI!

    Posted by John_Shaft at 10/14/2007 @ 1:49pm

  256. Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/14/2007 @ 11:14am

    HSUB, I know "basic understanding of the reality of the Universe" isn't your strong suit, but READING COMPREHENSION should be ...I said "because even in most of HSUB's foolishly optimistic polls, Hillary is still beating Gore by 10-20%."

    Go back and look at the polls you posted. Yes, TWO of them showed Gore winning, but MOST of them showed him trailing Hillary by 10-20%. Or do you think even what YOU post is a "straw dildo" now???

    second---Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/14/2007 @ 11:30am

    So you saying that the same Gore who was "pro-life" (letter to constituent July 1984) and supported Reagan building the MX missile....is the same as the Gore today?

    Posted by Mask at 10/14/2007 @ 2:10pm

  257. Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/14/2007 @ 11:47am

    Here, ya go, HSUB or anybody else, if you want to know what it would have been like! [youtube.com]

    Posted by Mask at 10/14/2007 @ 2:14pm

  258. Uh, FRANKGRITS, you are aware that Algore kept losing the recounts, recounts that were to his specification,

    I will get back the standard stuff that I am delusional, I am telling lies, I am a kool-aid 'winger' pushing propaganda from the 'neocon chickenhawks' supplied to me via Fox News and Rush Limbaugh, etc. So be it.

    Posted by SJCHERMAK 10/13/2007 @ 10:43pm |

    CHERMAK, or whatever this thing is called, is in fact "delusional...telling lies...a kool-aid 'winger' pushing propaganda from the 'neocon chickenhawks' supplied...via Fox News and Rush Limbaugh, etc." Indeed, CHERMAK is a creature with no brain left for having had that organ scrubbed and intellectually cleansed so relentlessly by the entitites that CHERMAK names above, to whom it is now a devoted, if retarded, pet.

    There are not hours in the day to dismantle the drivel from the TV set and radio that CHERMAK apes on cue, but we will just take one instance where this cretinoid cypher with a doofy name mindlessly (necessarily, as it has no mind) mouths what POX News tells it to. Namely, There were no hand recounts that were completed in the Florida counties, to Gore's or any one else's standards, hence none were "won" or "lost". This is because in a very short, pithy note the SCOTUS bull-dozed in to intervene on Saturday, 8 December to halt all the recounts that the Florida court mandated until the SCOTUS would hear the case brought by Bush on the following Monday.

    The first of the lawsuits over Florida's electoral votes was initiated by the Bush's lavishly funded campaign and then Bush v. Gore before the SCOTUS was the last of the court cases; a case argued before the Bush-Reagan appointess (O'Connor, Scalia, Kennedy, Uncle Thomas), some of whom had serious conflicts of interest in judging what was before them (Scalia's son worked for lead Bush lawyer Theodore Olson's firm, the helpless porn-addict Uncle Thomas' wife worked for the Bush transition). And, enabled by the cadres of lawyers that the Bush campaign had parachutted into the electoral arena, the SCOTUS Gang of Five finished the federal stampede over "state's rights" and "local authority". They invoked a logic they had never favoured before ("14th Ammendment", equal protection) to hand the office over to life-long Affirmative-Action-For-The-Millionaire's-Kid case, George W. Loser.

    That is only ONE point in CHERMAK (or whatever it's name is)'s post of mindless drippy, runny fecal matter most foul. I did not waste my time reading more than a few sentences but the whole post is an embarrassing case of bowel-exploding volcanic diahrea of the keyboard from a creature, CHERMAK, that can no longer claim its brain or its soul as its own.

    "So be it", indeed.

    Posted by John_Shaft at 10/14/2007 @ 2:19pm

  259. I think General Sanchez was talking about the Right Wing Dominated Press. Most of the Media supported GWBush's policies and certainly went along with the canard that a few bad eggs did the torture at Abu Gurab (however one spells it?). And General Sanchez too took a hit for what GWBush, Cheney, and Rumsfeld wanted. Torture. I hope we at least get a Democrat in next Presidential and hit exorates all the little people caught up in the 'torture' problems and throws the above three principle endorsers of torture in jail. Bush, Cheney, and Rumsfeld all wanted third parties to participate in torturing Iraqis. They should stop their lying and resign themselves to the dustbin of history.

    Posted by data2dave at 10/14/2007 @ 4:53pm

  260. Posted by DATA2DAVE 10/14/2007 @ 4:53pm

    I think General Sanchez was talking about the Right Wing Dominated Press.

    I think you're delusional. Any else among you left wingers who believe this fantasy?

    Posted by pontificus at 10/14/2007 @ 6:13pm

  261. Posted by DATA2DAVE 10/14/2007 @ 4:53pm

    I mean for God's sake, DATADAVE, I haven't even checked but I'm sure it would be easy enough to get all the clarification you need to show that you're dead wrong. And then, of course, when that is proven, you'll determine that 'of course he believes that, he's Bush's man' or some such. But by all means, ask and I'll prove it for you, and you can go about your predictable rationalizations.

    Posted by pontificus at 10/14/2007 @ 6:16pm

  262. Posted by PONTIFICUS 10/14/2007 @ 6:16pm

    "... I haven't even checked but I'm sure..."

    "... But by all means, ask and I'll prove it for you..."

    OK. I'm asking. This ought to be good. I am wondering how I possibly came to such a conclusion, myself, beyond having actually watched an extensive amount of said coverage.

    You do realize, that alot of us are not 'johnny come lately' to this idea that the war was based on lies and the media was either useless or complicit. Some of us were screaming "liar" at our TVs and asking each other why the MSM was not following up on the facts, long before we went to "war".

    So, please do...enlighten us.

    Eric

    Posted by Malcontent at 10/14/2007 @ 6:47pm

  263. Hello John_Shaft,

    Excellent post, you did not disappoint. Your discourse is what you on the left are all about.

    As far as Florida 2000, I guess in your world state courts CAN make law from the bench, and federal courts are NOT to interfere! But you have to stop looking at the law according to Algore. You also didn't mention how the Algore camp did not want 19,000 military ballots counted, nor did you mention how Algore operatives descended upon the state to push this to the maximum extent possible.

    However, there is something else in here I noticed.

    You said above ".......a case argued before the Bush-Reagan appointees (O'Connor, Scalia, Kennedy, Uncle Thomas)......."

    Huh? I recognize three of the names, current or former Justices, but the fourth I do not recognize. Who is Uncle Thomas?

    I know there is a Justice Clarence Thomas on the Supreme Court, is that who you mean?

    You are a racist, John_Shaft. The link below explains why, and I have copied/pasted in 3 paragraphs from that article:

    =================

    http://www.ferris.edu/jimcrow/tom/

    In many African American communities "Uncle Tom" is a slur used to disparage a Black person who is humiliatingly subservient or deferential to White people.

    "Uncle Tom," unlike most anti-Black slurs, is primarily used by Blacks against Blacks. Its synonyms include "oreo," "sell-out," "uncle," "race-traitor," and "White man's negro."

    Black political conservatives, especially Republicans, are often labeled "Uncle Toms" or "Toms." Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas; Alan Keyes, the Republican presidential candidate; Shelby Steele, the professor and author; Thomas Sowell, the economist; and Walter Williams, the neighborhood activist, have all been publicly called "Uncle Toms." They are accused of being White-identified opportunists. Their motives are impugned. The November 1996 issue of Emerge magazine had a cover with Justice Thomas dressed as a lawn jockey and these words: "Uncle Thomas, Lawn Jockey for the Far Right." Inside the magazine a grinning Justice Thomas shines Associate Justice Antonin Scalia's shoes.17

    © Dr. David Pilgrim, Professor of Sociology Ferris State University Dec., 2000

    ====================

    I did happen to notice that none of the other three justices had their name "adjusted" by you in your posting. You on the left are amazing, you proclaim how you are for diversity, fight all the wrongs, etc., yet you have your moments, don't you?

    I don't know if you are Black or White, but it does not matter. If you are Black, you are racist to slur Clarence Thomas because his politics lean to the right and thus you say he is less of a Black person than you, the Black liberal. If you are White, then you are racist because you the White liberal look down on African Americans with fawning condescension and fake compassion, and expect and demand they toe the line and be liberals, I guess because you expect them to be grateful for what you think you provide for them that you do not believe they are capable of doing for themselves.

    Side note to the author of the original article, John Nichols:

    In the beginning of your column, you proclaim "......Every day in every city and town across America, progressives get up in the morning and go about the work of fighting racism and homophobia, defending the environment, organizing trade unions and tackling corporate hegemony........"

    Uh, maybe not, Mr. Nichols. I think you ought to examine your fellow libs (excuse me, "progressives") more carefully, because some of them are not fighting racism but spreading racism.

    Posted by sjchermak at 10/14/2007 @ 7:13pm

  264. Posted by MALCONTENT 10/14/2007 @ 6:47pm

    OK. I'm asking. This ought to be good. I am wondering how I possibly came to such a conclusion, myself, beyond having actually watched an extensive amount of said coverage.

    Eric, you came to that conclusion because you're a lefty nutcase who only hears things he wants to hear. And when people say things you don't want to hear, you, like most of the left, automatically categorize said people as evil or stupid, and of course you're much better and smarter than evil and stupid people, so obviously what they're saying is evil and stupid. Sounds ridiculous, I know, but that's the way you people really think.

    You do realize, that alot of us are not 'johnny come lately' to this idea that the war was based on lies and the media was either useless or complicit. Some of us were screaming "liar" at our TVs and asking each other why the MSM was not following up on the facts, long before we went to "war".

    Gee, and you wonder why I categorize you as a lefty nutcase? What superior knowledge were you privy to that made you know what 90 percent of the politicians were wrong about WMD in Iraq? You didn't have any? I didn't think so. You've never been guided by anything other than your preconceptions and paranoia, so why should anyone believe you're guided by anything else now?

    So, please do...enlighten us.

    Okay. Sanchez made specific reference to the media's overkill and fixation on the Abu Ghraib story as an example of dishonest journalism. The exact quote is:

    I HAVE ISSUED ULTIMATUMS TO SOME OF YOU FOR UNSCRUPULOUS REPORTING THAT WAS SOLELY FOCUSED ON SUPPORTING YOUR AGENDA AND PRECONCIEVED NOTIONS OF WHAT OUR MILITARY HAD DONE. I ALSO REFUSED TO TALK TO THE EUROPEAN STARS AND STRIPES FOR THE LAST TWO YEARS OF MY COMMAND IN GERMANY FOR THEIR EXTREME BIAS AND SINGLE MINDED FOCUS ON ABU GHARAIB.

    Complaining that the media over-emphasized Abu Ghraib hardly sounds like he's complaining about a 'right wing' press now, does it? You may either now proceed with the Sanchez bashing, or continue to misinterpret his comments so that they fit your preconceptiosn.

    Eric

    Posted by pontificus at 10/14/2007 @ 7:20pm

  265. Hello DATA2DAVE and also MALCONTENT (Eric?),

    For your enlightenment on how DATA2DAVEs contention that the media is right wing is a bunch of what Col. Potter on M*A*S*H used to call "horse-hockey", check out the following link.

    http://www.mediaresearch.org/

    This is the Media Research Center, a site dedicated to exposing the leftist bias in the news media. Because of the nature of the site, you will disregard it.

    Did you ever read the book, Bias, by Bernard Goldberg? Just to let you know ahead of time, the book exposes lib bias in the media, so now that you know that, you can and I am sure will ignore that too!

    Malcontent (Eric ?) above says, "......OK. I'm asking. This ought to be good. I am wondering how I possibly came to such a conclusion, myself, beyond having actually watched an extensive amount of said coverage. You do realize, that a lot of us are not 'johnny come lately' to this idea that the war was based on lies and the media was either useless or complicit. Some of us were screaming "liar" at our TVs and asking each other why the MSM was not following up on the facts, long before we went to "war". So, please do...enlighten us. ........"

    Already done, Malcontent (Eric ?). Read my posting a couple of pages back, explaining why there were no "lies".

    And when you said "....This ought to be good...." , well, I didn't disappoint you. My comments were good! Thanks for the compliment!

    Posted by sjchermak at 10/14/2007 @ 7:32pm

  266. Posted by SJCHERMAK 10/14/2007 @ 7:32pm

    SJCHERMAK, curious...if you cite Media Research (Brent Bozell, right?)...

    then in fairness, you allow liberals to cite Media Matters or FAIR with equal authority, correct?

    Posted by Mask at 10/14/2007 @ 8:12pm

  267. Hi Mask,

    Why are you asking me if I "allow" liberals to cite something? It is not up to me what a complete stranger does.

    That's the liberal in you, showing through. I am not a lib, so I do not have the mindset that I have power to "allow" or not "allow" somebody to do something.

    You do know, however, that surveys have shown that most people feel the media tends to lean left. And no, MASK, I do not have the links to these right now, I have seen them before, and I am not going to bother searching them just to indulge you because you can look them up as well as I can.

    Remember, MASK, I have seen lib bias in my own local media as well. And it is bias that I noticed by myself, not bias that I was coached ahead of time to be on the lookout for, nor bias that I only thought to be bias after someone else commented on it. So I know it is real, and it takes many forms.

    You on the left proclaim the media is biased towards the right because you feel the job of the media is to promote the leftist agenda, not the news. The media does do this, but as Bernard Goldberg said in his book, most of the time inadvertantly, it is just part of who they are. He said if you were to hook up Dan Rather or Tom Brokaw to a lie detector and ask if they were biased they would say no, and the machine would not detect lying. They really believe that they represent the "mainstream" American view.

    You on the left want the bias to be more overt. You are so convinced you are correct about things that you are incapable of understanding why the news media does not engage in a 24/7 effort to take down the Bush administration.

    As far as the Iraq war, as I remember it the news media was reporting the events as they were unfolding, in terms of who was doing what or saying what, etc. I do not remember any "rah-rah drumbeat" or whatever many libs may have called it, where the media they contend was trying to rally support before the war, for the war. That just did not happen, I did not see it and I would have remembered it if it has been there.

    You are so convinced there were "lies" you think the media was negligent in not reporting them. A couple of pages back in this "thread" I explained how there were no lies.

    You need to remember, MASK, that the news media is not obligated to promote your personal opinion.

    Posted by sjchermak at 10/14/2007 @ 8:40pm

  268. You need to remember, MASK, that the news media is not obligated to promote your personal opinion.----Posted by SJCHERMAK 10/14/2007 @ 8:40pm

    After all the previous stuff, at the end and complaining about the "liberal bias of the Media"....

    you say they're "not obligated to promote your personal opinion"?!!??!? Well, that would mean YOURS too, right?

    BTW, two points-

    1. I think the Media is moderately liberal, but easily cowed by what they perceive the public wants. Just like the Democrats. They're not "hard-core Lefties", and now that you have Fox News, you have a conservative voice (quite popular one I'm Nielsened to believe) which influences the others.

    BTW, I don't believe there ever is or ever was..."un-biased reporting". It was more subdued in the 50s, 60s, and 70s, but dating back to Hearst and Pulitzer, even the newspapers of the early 19th Century...."objective journalism" has barely existed.

    2. The reason I asked about Media Matters and FAIR is...you cited Media Research, Bozell's outfit. So, if in fairness we accept YOUR "media watchdog", then in fairness, we must accept the Left's "media watchdogs" with EQUAL authority.

    Posted by Mask at 10/14/2007 @ 9:19pm

  269. Posted by SJCHERMAK 10/14/2007 @ 8:40pm |

    Oh, and by the way....I'm anti-affirmative action, fearful of "universal health care", pro-low taxes, and don't want the Pentagon turned into public housing or whatever silly pacifist cliche there is...and I think the animal rights guys are hypocrites, as I do Al Gore 3.0 and his "carbon credits".

    So, define me how you wish.

    Posted by Mask at 10/14/2007 @ 9:24pm

  270. Hi Mask (continued),

    I thought of another very important aspect to this whole thing. Lib organizations such as Media Matters seem to have a lot to say about people such as Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter, Bill O'Reilly, etc.

    Excuse me, but I was not aware these people were broadcasting the news!

    These people are talk show hosts, and they do not hide what their opinions are, and everybody who listens knows what the opinions of the host are and what the purpose of the program is.

    What the Media Research Center focuses on primarily, and what the axe to grind that Conservatives have regarding this, is that the regular news media, supposedly just delivering straight news, is delivering it in a biased manner.

    Not everybody in this country is focused on politics, they do have beliefs but they do not live and breathe it through active political participation, or employment as a columnist or radio host, or people such as us who are "blogging" on political sites. And thus they are more suceptable to believing what they see on the news as just straight news. I said that most people perceive the media leans left, but still too much biased information gets though accepted as straight news.

    People are free to promote their opinions in the public domain, no matter which side of the political fence they are on, but is it too much to ask that people who are reporting the news do just that, and let the people decide. This, after all, is what journalism is supposed to be, newspeople informing citizens about what is going on in a free society, not newspeople entering the profession to "make a difference". Citizens armed with knowledge in a free society "make a difference". When you hear a journalist wanting to "make a difference", then that is a signal too much political belief is creeping into what they do. If they want to promote a political belief, then they should change careers and go into politics.

    And, as I said before, a lot of liberal belief is based on "theory" and the promotion of the belief that the news media is guilty by omission, because it has not done what a liberal thinks they should do.

    On the other hand, an organization like the Media Research Center has actual evidence of bias in the media by continual examples of supposedly unbiased newspeople acting in a bias manner, the transcript of which is what actually happened on the NEWS and available elsewhere in the public domain.

    As regards Fox News, I get a kick out of that. You have one major news organization that does not lean left, and it drives you liberals nuts! It really gets under your skin! You want 100% compliance of the news media to the left agenda, and can not stand it when it is only 99%

    Posted by sjchermak at 10/14/2007 @ 9:34pm

  271. Hello again Mask,

    You have thrown the penalty flag for how I defined you. I have to confess I get a little tired of this.

    OK, you may not fit the classic definition of a liberal, maybe not even a liberal at all.

    On a site such as this, when comments are made by a blogger, they are meant for the whole audience, and not just an individual response even if they are directed specifically.

    We are not swapping emails back and forth, nor talking on the phone nor face to face. And I have no idea who you are and only started blogging (recently) on this site in the last week or so. So I do not know who you are.

    I see a comment that appears coming from an obvious leftist, then my comment is structured accordingly. Unfortunately, when one does this eventually one will run into, as I must just have, somebody promoting a certain belief that does not fit the whole mold.

    Then the penalty flags fly, "You can not label me, you can not make generalizations, I do read conservatives, etc"

    After a while this gets ridiculous, you need to understand the environment in which we are operating. It would be different if I personally knew you.

    Posted by sjchermak at 10/14/2007 @ 9:43pm

  272. One more thing, MASK,

    You said above "..................you say they're "not obligated to promote your personal opinion"?!!??!? Well, that would mean YOURS too, right?..........."

    Right. I do not want newspeople to promote my personal opinion, that is not their job. Their job is to report the news. I just want them to report the news.

    Posted by sjchermak at 10/14/2007 @ 9:50pm

  273. well, MOST of the Press is very Right Wing with Fox Network at the head of the list. Where is this myth of a "liberal media'...maybe only here at the Nation? Or the American Prospect. About the only two left of center "respectable" Left of Center media's left. I don't think he was talking about the Nation. Do you?

    I suspect you have a point about the fact that some reporters found 'negativity' in the Iraq Theater. Whoop'd'do! Remember they were mostly 'Embedded' and those cozy with the Troops. And I suspect General Sanchez was very conservative....but he ultimately doesn't blame the Press for the fiasco in Iraq. He's pointing at the Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld/Wolfowitz leadership for failures in Iraq.

    I suspect however that his statements are of little worry to either the right or left as he was implicated in the torture session problems too. And was left out to dry for that. A little bitterness, eh?

    Posted by data2dave at 10/14/2007 @ 10:37pm

  274. Posted by SJCHERMAK 10/14/2007 @ 9:34pm

    First, Fox News doesn't "drive me nuts". I accept them, but accept them for what they are...admittedly (the way you want CBS, CNN, ABC, etc. to be) supporting a political agenda.

    Second, as for Media Matters, you don't go to their website much, do you? Sure they go after the Limbaughs and Coulters (they're EASY...as in when Ms Coulter spouts off about "perfected Jews" or calls Edwards a "faggot", in order to get progressives railing against her, in order to get media attention, in order to sell books to people who think 'poor Ann is being persecuted by the liberals'.)

    But they also go after the Mainstream Guys, including Fox, for basic errors or an agenda in their broadcasts, with THE SAME SUBJECTIVE EYE as Brent and Media Research.

    My point is BOTH Bozell and David Brock have an agenda with their "watch-doggedness". You like one, dislike the other...fair enough. I see that neither are objective critics...nor their targets objective journalism.

    Posted by SJCHERMAK 10/14/2007 @ 9:43pm

    As for my "label"...I always considered it realistic, even pragmatic LIBERTARIAN. Pro-gay rights (cuz there's nothing in the Constitution about homosexuality...or marriage...just "equal protection")....anti-Drug War (cuz it's been a waste of time and effort)...and pro-choice (cuz technology has surpassed the ABILITY of the State to enforce an abortion ban, much less should have any say over it). In other words, opposition to the Statism of the Right and Religious Right.

    And I oppose the Statism of the Left as well. Massive welfare, "free health care", "free college" (a pet project of Ms vanden Heuvel), "taxing the evil rich", or phoney environmentalists who are rich enough to supposedly "pay off" their lavish lifestyles, but want to curtail OURS.

    And of course I oppose stupid, wasteful, and fiscally disasterous wars that have the opposite geo-political effect of what their proponents claimed for them. Which of course was our first major conflict.

    Posted by Mask at 10/14/2007 @ 10:38pm

  275. And I oppose the Statism of the Left as well. Massive welfare, "free health care", "free college" (a pet project of Ms vanden Heuvel), "taxing the evil rich", or phoney environmentalists who are rich enough to supposedly "pay off" their lavish lifestyles, but want to curtail OURS.

    Posted by MASK 10/14/2007 @ 10:38pm

    massive welfare -- no way. time to plant trees!

    free health care -- no way. i pay taxes. god forbid, however, that it becomes for profit.

    free college -- no way. i pay taxes. god forbid, however, that it becomes for profit.

    taxing the evil rich -- no way. tax the nice ones, too.

    phoney environmentalists -- assholes.

    real environmentalists -- this should be the #1 priority of any government. happiness is a lot easier to achieve in a clean house.

    Posted by frosty zoom at 10/14/2007 @ 11:14pm

  276. ....General Sanchezbut....doesn't blame the Press for the fiasco in Iraq.....

    Posted by DATA2DAVE 10/14/2007 @ 10:37pm

    One has to wonder why he skewers the media for being agenda-driven, furthering the divisiveness of our country, fingering the media for blowing Abu Ghraib out-of-proportion, for endangering our soldiers' lives.........

    Posted by Happy at 10/15/2007 @ 12:39am

  277. Go back and look at the polls you posted. Yes, TWO of them showed Gore winning, but MOST of them showed him trailing Hillary by 10-20%.

    Posted by MASK 10/14/2007 @ 2:10pm

    As I said-- the state polls that Al is beating Hillary are the ones that ask the question as 'if' Al 'is' a candidate that 'is' running-- the other polls do not and thus the lower polling for Al and the reason for my statement that you are wrong.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 01:35am

  278. So you saying that the same Gore who was "pro-life" (letter to constituent July 1984) and supported Reagan building the MX missile....is the same as the Gore today?

    Posted by MASK 10/14/2007 @ 2:10pm

    I do believe the year is rather ironic, but be it as it may, the letter if I recall correctly stated his personal feelings. I myself am against abortion yet am for choice. Is it a contradiction because I don't force my views down anyones elses throat? No, yet a few decades ago I would have felt justified in doing so. Abortion is a hot button issue for that reason.

    As for having a strong defense, yet only using it to counter an attack, would be a hard one to make stick as a negative...

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 01:51am

  279. NYT's motto, 'all the news that fits, we print' Posted by PONTIFICUS 10/14/2007 @ 05:43am

    Ummm... actually, the moto is "All the news that's fit to print," as in, they won't print "indecent" news.

    Nonetheless, I'm concerned about any medium deciding what constitutes "news," and which "news" gets how much coverage.

    egs.) 1996 - Monica? Big News. Communications Act which essentially gave away the airwaves to mega media corporations? Not so much. 2007 - Britney's allegedly decadent lifestye? Big News. Public roads being "privatized?" Not so much.

    Diversion, my friends. It's all about diversion.

    Posted by Radscal at 10/15/2007 @ 01:59am

  280. Job Candidates:

    George Bush

    versus

    Al Gore, Jr.

    Al Gore, Jr. (not hired)

    Won Nobel Peace Prize for three decades of work on the climate crisis

    Won Spain's 2007 Prince of Asturias Award for International Cooperation

    Won an Oscar for the film "An Inconvenient Truth"

    Won an Emmy for co-founding innovative cable channel "Current"

    Wrote the best seller, "The Assault on Reason" (2007)

    Wrote and starred in the documentary film, "An Inconvenient Truth"(2006)

    Co-authored with Tipper Gore the best-selling book, "Joined at the Heart" (2002)

    Wrote the best selling book, "Earth in the Balance: Ecology and the Human Spirit" (2000)

    George Bush (appointed):

    Invaded Iraq on false pretenses

    Presided over the worst security failure in US history

    Spent the largest U.S. surplus in history and shattered the record for the biggest annual deficit in history

    Set the all-time record for 15 million people worldwide simultaneously protesting against any person in the history of mankind

    Dissolved more international treaties than any president in US history

    Obliterated more freedoms and civil liberties for Americans than any other president in US history.

    http://pbrla.blogspot.com/

    http://tinyurl.com/296cq

    http://www.monkeydyne.com/bushresume/early.html

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 02:26am

  281. Congrats, Al. With all those US$ 500 billion or up to $1 btrillion that Bush's spent on Iraq and Afganistan, Al certainly saves the Earth. I pray for you.

    Posted by HelenDAO at 10/15/2007 @ 03:41am

  282. Re: Algore's Nobel Prize:

    "It's As Ridiculous As If They'd Given Goebbels One in 1938" http://www.counterpunch.com/

    Okay, here are just a few cites that refute the man who did indeed claim to have "[taken] the initiative and developed the Internet." (Yeah, he didn't claim to have invented it!)

    http://www.smh.com.au/news/environment/gore-gets-a-cold-shoulder/2007/10 /13/1191696238792.html

    http://nov55.com/gbwm.html

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/07/18/wsun18.x ml

    http://www.mcculloughsite.net/stingray/2006/06/13/al-gore-and-some-incon venient-truths-about-global-warming.php

    And now something completely different!

    Who's the real environmentalist?

    HOUSE # 1:

    A 20-room mansion (not including 8 bathrooms) heated by natural gas. Add on a pool (and a pool house) and a separate guest house, all heated by gas. In ONE MONTH ALONE this mansion consumes more energy than the average American household in an ENTIRE YEAR. The average bill for electricity and natural gas runs over $2,400.00 per month. In natural gas alone, this property consumes more than 20 times the national average for an American home. This house is not in the northern or Midwestern "snow belt." It's in the South.

    HOUSE # 2:

    Designed by an architecture professor, this house incorporates every "green" feature current home construction can provide. The house contains only 4,000 square feet (4 bedrooms) and is nestled on arid-high prairie in the American southwest. A central closet in the house holds geothermal heat pumps drawing ground water through pipes sunk 300 feet into the ground. The water (usually 67 degrees F.) heats the house in winter and cools it in summer. The system uses no fossil fuels--such as oil or natural gas--and it consumes 25% of the electricity required for a conventional heating/cooling system. Rainwater from the roof is collected and funneled into a 25,000 gallon underground cistern. Wastewater from showers, sinks and toilets goes into underground purifying tanks and then into the cistern. The collected water then irrigates the land surrounding the house. Flowers and shrubs native to the area blend the property into the surrounding rural landscape.

    HOUSE # 1 is outside of Nashville, Tennessee. It is the abode of that renowned "environmentalist" (and propaganda filmmaker), Dr. Algore.

    HOUSE # 2 is on a ranch near Crawford, Texas. It is the private residence of the President of the United States, George W. Bush.

    Posted by viktor ramius at 10/15/2007 @ 07:16am

  283. I don't think a Gore run accomplishes much of anything...it is clear he has found his voice in the arena of climate change and enjoys doing it, and has multiple honors to show for it...who needs the BS of a campaign and all the garbage that goes with it? He has staked a good place for him to be, and seems genuinely happy with it...ignoring the draft campaign would be a wise move.

    Posted by MCE337 at 10/15/2007 @ 07:30am

  284. Alexander Cockburn 16 July 2007 from CounterPunch

    The Cockburn screed reads like a page from an Exxon attack on him...Cockburn, like fellow curmudgeon Christopher Hitchens, has lost his marbles. Whatever drivel he cites to discredit the global consensus is routed in pure poppycock.

    Posted by MCE337 at 10/15/2007 @ 07:33am

  285. I for one would love to, for once in the past decade, have a man in office who I can respect. Nobel Peace Prize or National Guard? Successful businessman or failed oil man? Polling at 10% w/o declaring is awfully good. I think the country now knows, if you look at the polling numbers, what happens when you elect an idiot son of a powerful father to the presidency and it would be nice to see a man who has succeeded on his own merits in life be president. Oh, and before you point it out, I know his father was a politician, but Gore is clearly successful in life, while Bush somehow managed to stumble into becoming The Decider.

    Posted by roszelj at 10/15/2007 @ 08:35am

  286. Typical of far-out right new con supporters, servicers of dic'tator philosophy, they goes ape-shit per Al's green powered higher additional thousand dollar energy cost in order to support more green power-- but totally disregard their hsuB ruler's swanderring of trillions of their children's future wealth and millions of lost lives. All too standard product of a repub lizard mentality.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 08:38am

  287. er, ah, they go...

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 08:40am

  288. er, duh, squandering

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 08:52am

  289. I just can imagine the shrill reactionaries who have taken up residency here:

    But, but, but, even if the AWOL Bush idiot, legacy Yalie, pathetic failed businessman is universally despised as the worst (illegitimate) president in history, at least ya can have a beer with him (while he sticks you dumbed-down masses and panders to his class--his true base).

    Posted by Lil at 10/15/2007 @ 10:00am

  290. NYT's motto, 'all the news that fits, we print' Posted by PONTIFICUS 10/14/2007 @ 05:43am

    Ummm... actually, the moto is "All the news that's fit to print," as in, they won't print "indecent" news.

    Nonetheless, I'm concerned about any medium deciding what constitutes "news," and which "news" gets how much coverage.

    Posted by Radscal at 10/15/2007 @ 10:29am

  291. I was thinking the 'Fair and Balanced' constatly repetitious blurb, said as a conditioning devise by Box Noize, should tack on the additional clarification: "Fair and Balanced 'for Reptiles'"...

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 11:22am

  292. er, constantly

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 11:23am

  293. "It's abundantly clear that, less than four months before the onslaught of decisive primaries and caucuses, many Democratic voters have just not made up their minds. "Of those that would speak to us, almost all were undecided," reports correspondent Phoebe Love who followed the Obama canvass through Ballard, Washington. She is echoed by contributor Ethan Hova in Studio City, a middle-class Democratic suburban stronghold in Los Angeles: "The vast majority of voters were very much undecided and expressed reluctance to engage in debate without conducting research on their own." Daniel Macht, following the Obama campaign in Brooklyn, New York noted the same hesitation: "They were all undecided, save one Edwards supporter." Perhaps most importantly, correspondent Beverly Davis reports from Des Moines, "Smith [ an Obama volunteer] knocks on Dan Arply's door and launches into his opening rap but Arply soon interrupts by saying, 'Thanks for stopping by, but I haven't decided on supporting anyone yet.' Arply is a typical Iowan."

    It's difficult to draw hard and fast conclusions from such anecdotal material but it might suggest that the slew of recent polls giving Hillary Clinton a commanding lead in the race for the nomination may be of limited utility. Correspondent Hova found widespread indifference toward Clinton as he went door-to-door with the Obama canvassers: "This was a fairly affluent suburb north of Los Angeles and I was really surprised not to find a single Hillary supporter in the neighborhood."

    It's possible that numerous Democrats who have declared for Clinton to a pollster are like the shopper who hoists a likely candidate from the pumpkin bin inside the supermarket door. Maybe a keeper, maybe not, for there's the possibility of a better find further along in produce."

    http://tinyurl.com/ywce3j

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 11:24am

  294. "Just days after former Vice President Al Gore received the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts on global warming, the United States Supreme Court handed Mr. Gore a stunning reversal, stripping him of his Nobel and awarding it to President George W. Bush instead.

    For Mr. Gore, who basked in the adulation of the Nobel committee and the world, the high court's decision to give his prize to President Bush was a cruel twist of fate, to say the least.

    But in a 5-4 decision, the justices made it clear that they had taken the unprecedented step of stripping Mr. Gore of his Nobel because President Bush deserved it more.

    "It is true that Al Gore has done a lot of talking about global warming," wrote Justice Antonin Scalia, writing for the majority. "But President Bush has actually helped create global warming."

    http://tinyurl.com/yrnzln

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 11:56am

  295. ""What is it about Mr. Gore that drives right-wingers insane?"

    Partly it's a reaction to what happened in 2000, when the American people chose Mr. Gore but his opponent somehow ended up in the White House. Both the personality cult the right tried to build around President Bush and the often hysterical denigration of Mr. Gore were, I believe, largely motivated by the desire to expunge the stain of illegitimacy from the Bush administration.

    And now that Mr. Bush has proved himself utterly the wrong man for the job -- to be, in fact, the best president Al Qaeda's recruiters could have hoped for -- the symptoms of Gore derangement syndrome have grown even more extreme.

    The worst thing about Mr. Gore, from the conservative point of view, is that he keeps being right. In 1992, George H. W. Bush mocked him as the "ozone man," but three years later the scientists who discovered the threat to the ozone layer won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. In 2002 he warned that if we invaded Iraq, "the resulting chaos could easily pose a far greater danger to the United States than we presently face from Saddam." And so it has proved.

    But that's only part of it. Those on the right aren't just angry because they're wrong; they're angry because their smear didn't work.

    [I]f science says that we have a big problem that can't be solved with tax cuts or bombs -- well, the science must be rejected, and the scientists must be slimed. For example, Investor's Business Daily recently declared that the prominence of James Hansen, the NASA researcher who first made climate change a national issue two decades ago, is actually due to the nefarious schemes of -- who else? -- George Soros.

    Which brings us to the biggest reason the right hates Mr. Gore: in his case the smear campaign has failed. He's taken everything they could throw at him, and emerged more respected, and more credible, than ever. And it drives them crazy."

    http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/13235.html

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 12:06pm

  296. Cool:

    "The headline on Krugman's piece is entirely appropriate: "Gore Derangement Syndrome." The whole "derangement syndrome" phenomenon stems from an increasingly common problem -- when contempt for a leader strays from simple political opposition to irrational, reflexive antagonism. If so-and-so says "day," I'll say "night," even if the sun is shining. It's more important to fight the perceived opponent than to make sense.

    And for far too long, that's exactly how the right has approached Gore and the science on global warming. The evidence must be wrong, because Gore believes it. The Nobel Peace Prize must be worthless, because Gore won it.

    These aren't arguments. They're sad and nonsensical temper-tantrums."

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 12:08pm

  297. Posted by VIKTOR RAMIUS 10/15/2007 @ 07:16am

    doesn't surprise me at all.

    bush is still worse, though.

    Posted by frosty zoom at 10/15/2007 @ 12:10pm

  298. HSUBFOOLS or as you should be called, HEADUPGORESASS,

    You need to read "At Any Cost: How Al(g)ore Tried to Steal the Presidency" by Bill Sammons.

    Read what Gore was willing to do to the environment just for a photo-op. And how his lawyers high-fived each other when military absentee ballots were discounted. And how even the Teamsters stopped returning his calls for help with hired thugs.

    I'll make it clear that I have no love for GWB, but positively despise Algore for his hypocrisy on the environment, willingness to sell us a Kyoto Treaty aimed at doing NOTHING to stop the global warming he claims to care about, but would essentially decimate the U.S. economy.

    You lobotomized leftists can swallow his garbage, just as you can ignore the facts put out by Cockburn about Gore.

    (Anybody else remember how Gore, in the run-up to the first Gulf War, went to the Senate Democrats and asked them how much television time they'd give him to OPPOSE the war, then went to theSenate Republicans and asked them the same question? Well, Algore went live on CSPANII and demanded we go to war against Saddam in Kuwait--siding against his own party--for personal gain vis-a-vis television airtime.

    The man's a sellout. To his "principles," his party, his country and his planet.

    *******************

    To SJCHERMACK,

    Guess ol' Matty had enough of open debate, huh?

    S

    Posted by viktor ramius at 10/15/2007 @ 12:29pm

  299. Al should be thinking about a small square room with padded walls instead of an oval office.

    Posted by abell12ct at 10/15/2007 @ 12:46pm

  300. Take the quiz:

    http://www.globalwarmingheartland.org/GWQuiz/Testindex.html

    Science-based.

    I scored 90. Gore would score zero.

    Posted by viktor ramius at 10/15/2007 @ 12:51pm

  301. This is a transition time in our history; it is a time to take stock and ask ourselves who we really are, not only in relationship nationally to each other, but to the rest of the world. We cannot move ahead, cannot protect our Constitution, our democracy, if we continue with divisive politics based on fear at home or abroad. We cannot continue to wage war without accepting the responsibility for the Veterans we so casually make. We cannot accept convenient definitions of what torture is. The current candidates are all playing partisan politics - weighing campaign words, rather than weighing who we are and where we need to go. At this point in our transition, hopefully back to who we really are, Gore would be a stabilizing, forward looking leader with concerns for life at all levels. It is a lot to ask of him - but there does come a time when we must accept the path laid out before us. It appears that this is a possible time for him to do that.

    Posted by mamaremy at 10/15/2007 @ 12:52pm

  302. I want whatever you're smoking!

    Posted by viktor ramius at 10/15/2007 @ 12:53pm

  303. Posted by VIKTOR RAMIUS 10/15/2007 @ 07:16am

    Talk about propaganda-- It's funny that the comparison of Al's 'mansion' and only four bedrooms of hsuB's compound in Crawford are compared when Al's includes living quarters for family, guests, employees, security,...etc. Now where does everyone in hsuB/cHeney/Condi's security detail sleep? Out in tents no doubt. What about visiting dignitaries, out in tents too... Oh I see, bunk beds!?!?! What a pile of BS. And the WH has become a lot more efficient/economical since hsuB took over-- Bwahahahahahahah.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 1:25pm

  304. Posted by VIKTOR RAMIUS 10/15/2007 @ 12:53pm

    Sounds like VR needs to suspend his unreality...

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 1:33pm

  305. Transcript of Al Gore's Speech "Iraq and the War On Terrorism" Monday, September 23rd, 2002

    2:12 PM PST

    (Remarks as prepared)

    INTRODUCTION

    Like all Americans I have been wrestling with the question of what our country needs to do to defend itself from the kind of intense, focused and enabled hatred that brought about September 11th, and which at this moment must be presumed to be gathering force for yet another attack. I'm speaking today in an effort to recommend a specific course of action for our country which I believe would be preferable to the course recommended by President Bush. Specifically, I am deeply concerned that the policy we are presently following with respect to Iraq has the potential to seriously damage our ability to win the war against terrorism and to weaken our ability to lead the world in this new century.

    FIRST THING FIRST: WAR ON TERRORISM

    To begin with, I believe we should focus our efforts first and foremost against those who attacked us on September 11th and have thus far gotten away with it. The vast majority of those who sponsored, planned and implemented the cold blooded murder of more than 3,000 Americans are still at large, still neither located nor apprehended, much less punished and neutralized. I do not believe that we should allow ourselves to be distracted from this urgent task simply because it is proving to be more difficult and lengthy than predicted. Great nations persevere and then prevail. They do not jump from one unfinished task to another.

    We are perfectly capable of staying the course in our war against Osama Bin Laden and his terrorist network, while simultaneously taking those steps necessary to build an international coalition to join us in taking on Saddam Hussein in a timely fashion.

    I don't think that we should allow anything to diminish our focus on avenging the 3,000 Americans who were murdered and dismantling the network of terrorists who we know to be responsible for it. The fact that we don't know where they are should not cause us to focus instead on some other enemy whose location may be easier to identify.

    Nevertheless, President Bush is telling us that the most urgent requirement of the moment - - right now - - is not to redouble our efforts against Al Qaeda, not to stabilize the nation of Afghanistan after driving his host government from power, but instead to shift our focus and concentrate on immediately launching a new war against Saddam Hussein. And he is proclaiming a new, uniquely American right to pre-emptively attack whomsoever he may deem represents a potential future threat.

    Moreover, he is demanding in this high political season that Congress speedily affirm that he has the necessary authority to proceed immediately against Iraq and for that matter any other nation in the region, regardless of subsequent developments or circumstances. The timing of this sudden burst of urgency to take up this cause as America's new top priority, displacing the war against Osama Bin Laden, was explained by the White House Chief of Staff in his now well known statement that "from an advertising point of view, you don't launch a new product line until after labor day."

    Nevertheless, Iraq does pose a serious threat to the stability of the Persian Gulf and we should organize an international coalition to eliminate his access to weapons of mass destruction. Iraq's search for weapons of mass destruction has proven impossible to completely deter and we should assume that it will continue for as long as Saddam is in power. Moreover, no international law can prevent the United States from taking actions to protect its vital interests, when it is manifestly clear that there is a choice to be made between law and survival. I believe, however, that such a choice is not presented in the case of Iraq. Indeed, should we decide to proceed, that action can be justified within the framework of international law rather than outside it. In fact, though a new UN resolution may be helpful in building international consensus, the existing resolutions from 1991 are sufficient from a legal standpoint.

    We also need to look at the relationship between our national goal of regime change in Iraq and our goal of victory in the war against terror. In the case of Iraq, it would be more difficult for the United States to succeed alone, but still possible. By contrast, the war against terror manifestly requires broad and continuous international cooperation. Our ability to secure this kind of cooperation can be severely damaged by unilateral action against Iraq. If the Administration has reason to believe otherwise, it ought to share those reasons with the Congress - - since it is asking Congress to endorse action that might well impair a more urgent task: continuing to disrupt and destroy the international terror network.

    I was one of the few Democrats in the U.S. Senate who supported the war resolution in 1991. And I felt betrayed by the first Bush administration's hasty departure from the battlefield, even as Saddam began to renew his persecution of the Kurds of the North and the Shiites of the South - - groups we had encouraged to rise up against Saddam. It is worth noting, however, that the conditions in 1991 when that resolution was debated in Congress were very different from the conditions this year as Congress prepares to debate a new resolution. Then, Saddam had sent his armies across an international border to invade Kuwait and annex its territory. This year, 11 years later, there is no such invasion; instead we are prepared to cross an international border to change the government of Iraq. However justified our proposed action may be, this change in role nevertheless has consequences for world opinion and can affect the war against terrorism if we proceed unilaterally.

    Secondly, in 1991, the first President Bush patiently and skillfully built a broad international coalition. His task was easier than that confronted his son, in part because of Saddam's invasion of Kuwait. Nevertheless, every Arab nation except Jordan supported our military efforts and some of them supplied troops. Our allies in Europe and Asia supported the coalition without exception. Yet this year, by contrast, many of our allies in Europe and Asia are thus far opposed to what President Bush is doing and the few who support us condition their support on the passage of a new U.N. resolution.

    Third, in 1991, a strong United Nations resolution was in place before the Congressional debate ever began; this year although we have residual authority based on resolutions dating back to the first war in Iraq, we have nevertheless begun to seek a new United Nations resolution and have thus far failed to secure one.

    Fourth, the coalition assembled in 1991 paid all of the significant costs of the war, while this time, the American taxpayers will be asked to shoulder hundreds of billions of dollars in costs on our own.

    Fifth, President George H. W. Bush purposely waited until after the mid-term elections of 1990 to push for a vote at the beginning of the new Congress in January of 1991. President George W. Bush, by contrast, is pushing for a vote in this Congress immediately before the election. Rather than making efforts to dispel concern at home an abroad about the role of politics in the timing of his policy, the President is publicly taunting Democrats with the political consequences of a "no" vote - - even as the Republican National Committee runs pre-packaged advertising based on the same theme - - in keeping with the political strategy clearly described in a White House aide's misplaced computer disk, which advised Republican operatives that their principal game plan for success in the election a few weeks away was to "focus on the war." Vice President Cheney, meanwhile indignantly described suggestions of political motivation "reprehensible." The following week he took his discussion of war strategy to the Rush Limbaugh show.

    The foreshortening of deliberation in the Congress robs the country of the time it needs for careful analysis of what may lie before it. Such consideration is all the more important because of the Administration's failure thus far to lay out an assessment of how it thinks the course of a war will run - - even while it has given free run to persons both within and close to the administration to suggest that this will be an easy conquest. Neither has the Administration said much to clarify its idea of what is to follow regime change or of the degree of engagement it is prepared to accept for the United States in Iraq in the months and years after a regime change has taken place.

    By shifting from his early focus after September 11th on war against terrorism to war against Iraq, the President has manifestly disposed of the sympathy, good will and solidarity compiled by America and transformed it into a sense of deep misgiving and even hostility. In just one year, the President has somehow squandered the international outpouring of sympathy, goodwill and solidarity that followed the attacks of September 11th and converted it into anger and apprehension aimed much more at the United States than at the terrorist network - - much as we manage to squander in one year's time the largest budget surpluses in history and convert them into massive fiscal deficits. He has compounded this by asserting a new doctrine - - of preemption.

    The doctrine of preemption is based on the idea that in the era of proliferating WMD, and against the background of a sophisticated terrorist threat, the United States cannot wait for proof of a fully established mortal threat, but should rather act at any point to cut that short.

    The problem with preemption is that in the first instance it is not needed in order to give the United States the means to act in its own defense against terrorism in general or Iraq in particular. But that is a relatively minor issue compared to the longer-term consequences that can be foreseen for this doctrine. To begin with, the doctrine is presented in open-ended terms, which means that if Iraq if the first point of application, it is not necessarily the last. In fact, the very logic of the concept suggests a string of military engagements against a succession of sovereign states: Syria, Libya, North Korea, Iran, etc., wherever the combination exists of an interest in weapons of mass destruction together with an ongoing role as host to or participant in terrorist operations. It means also that if the Congress approves the Iraq resolution just proposed by the Administration it is simultaneously creating the precedent for preemptive action anywhere, anytime this or any future president so decides.

    The Bush Administration may now be realizing that national and international cohesion are strategic assets. But it is a lesson long delayed and clearly not uniformly and consistently accepted by senior members of the cabinet. From the outset, the Administration has operated in a manner calculated to please the portion of its base that occupies the far right, at the expense of solidarity among Americans and between America and her allies.

    On the domestic front, the Administration, having delayed many months before conceding the need to create an institution outside the White House to manage homeland defense, has been willing to see progress on the new department held up, for the sake of an effort to coerce the Congress into stripping civil service protections from tens of thousands of federal employees.

    Far more damaging, however, is the Administration's attack on fundamental constitutional rights. The idea that an American citizen can be imprisoned without recourse to judicial process or remedies, and that this can be done on the say-so of the President or those acting in his name, is beyond the pale.

    Regarding other countries, the Administration's disdain for the views of others is well documented and need not be reviewed here. It is more important to note the consequences of an emerging national strategy that not only celebrates American strengths, but appears to be glorifying the notion of dominance. If what America represents to the world is leadership in a commonwealth of equals, then our friends are legion; if what we represent to the world is empire, then it is our enemies who will be legion.

    At this fateful juncture in our history it is vital that we see clearly who are our enemies, and that we deal with them. It is also important, however, that in the process we preserve not only ourselves as individuals, but our nature as a people dedicated to the rule of law.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 1:46pm

  306. DANGERS OF ABANDONING IRAQ

    Moreover, if we quickly succeed in a war against the weakened and depleted fourth rate military of Iraq and then quickly abandon that nation as President Bush has abandoned Afghanistan after quickly defeating a fifth rate military there, the resulting chaos could easily pose a far greater danger to the United States than we presently face from Saddam. We know that he has stored secret supplies of biological and chemical weapons throughout his country.

    We have no evidence, however, that he has shared any of those weapons with terrorist group. However, if Iraq came to resemble Afghanistan - - with no central authority but instead local and regional warlords with porous borders and infiltrating members of Al Qaeda than these widely dispersed supplies of weapons of mass destruction might well come into the hands of terrorist groups.

    If we end the war in Iraq, the way we ended the war in Afghanistan, we could easily be worse off than we are today. When Secretary Rumsfield was asked recently about what our responsibility for restabilizing Iraq would be in an aftermath of an invasion, he said, "that's for the Iraqis to come together and decide."

    During one of the campaign debates in 2000 when then Governor Bush was asked if America should engage in any sort of "nation building" in the aftermath of a war in which we have involved our troops, he stated gave the purist expression of what is now a Bush doctrine: "I don't think so. I think what we need to do is convince people who live in the lands they live in to build the nations. Maybe I'm missing something here. We're going to have a kind of nation building corps in America? Absolutely not."

    The events of the last 85 years provide ample evidence that our approach to winning the peace that follows war is almost as important as winning the war itself. The absence of enlightened nation building after World War I led directly to the conditions which made Germany vulnerable to fascism and the rise to Adolph Hitler and made all of Europe vulnerable to his evil designs. By contrast the enlightened vision embodied in the Marshall plan, NATO, and the other nation building efforts in the aftermath of World War II led directly to the conditions that fostered prosperity and peace for most the years since this city gave birth to the United Nations.

    Two decades ago, when the Soviet Union claimed the right to launch a pre-emptive war in Afghanistan, we properly encouraged and then supported the resistance movement which, a decade later, succeeded in defeating the Soviet Army's efforts. Unfortunately, when the Russians left, we abandoned the Afghans and the lack of any coherent nation building program led directly to the conditions which fostered Al Qaeda terrorist bases and Osama Bin Laden's plotting against the World Trade Center. Incredibly, after defeating the Taliban rather easily, and despite pledges from President Bush that we would never again abandon Afghanistan we have done precisely that. And now the Taliban and Al Qaeda are quickly moving back to take up residence there again. A mere two years after we abandoned Afghanistan the first time, Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait. Following a brilliant military campaign, the U.S. abandoned the effort to destroy Saddam's military prematurely and allowed him to remain in power.

    What is a potentially even more serious consequence of this push to begin a new war as quickly as possible is the damage it can do not just to America's prospects to winning the war against terrorism but to America's prospects for continuing the historic leadership we began providing to the world 57 years ago, right here in this city by the bay.

    WHAT CONGRESS SHOULD DO

    I believe, therefore, that the resolution that the President has asked Congress to pass is much too broad in the authorities it grants, and needs to be narrowed. The President should be authorized to take action to deal with Saddam Hussein as being in material breach of the terms of the truce and therefore a continuing threat to the security of the region. To this should be added that his continued pursuit of weapons of mass destruction is potentially a threat to the vital interests of the United States. But Congress should also urge the President to make every effort to obtain a fresh demand from the Security Council for prompt, unconditional compliance by Iraq within a definite period of time. If the Council will not provide such language, then other choices remain open, but in any event the President should be urged to take the time to assemble the broadest possible international support for his course of action. Anticipating that the President will still move toward unilateral action, the Congress should establish now what the administration's thinking is regarding the aftermath of a US attack for the purpose of regime change.

    Specifically, Congress should establish why the president believes that unilateral action will not severely damage the fight against terrorist networks, and that preparations are in place to deal with the effects of chemical and biological attacks against our allies, our forces in the field, and even the home-front. The resolution should also require commitments from the President that action in Iraq will not be permitted to distract from continuing and improving work to reconstruct Afghanistan, an that the United States will commit to stay the course for the reconstruction of Iraq.

    The Congressional resolution should make explicitly clear that authorities for taking these actions are to be presented as derivatives from existing Security Council resolutions and from international law: not requiring any formal new doctrine of pre-emption, which remains to be discussed subsequently in view of its gravity.

    PRE-EMPTION DOCTRINE

    Last week President Bush added a troubling new element to this debate by proposing a broad new strategic doctrine that goes far beyond issues related to Iraq and would effect the basic relationship between the United States and the rest of the world community. Article 51 of the United Nations charter recognizes the right of any nation to defend itself, including the right in some circumstances to take pre-emptive actions in order to deal with imminent threats. President Bush now asserts that we will take pre-emptive action even if we take the threat we perceive is not imminent. If other nations assert the same right then the rule of law will quickly be replaced by the reign of fear - - any nation that perceives circumstances that could eventually lead to an imminent threat would be justified under this approach in taking military action against another nation. An unspoken part of this new doctrine appears to be that we claim this right for ourselves - - and only for ourselves. It is, in that sense, part of a broader strategy to replace ideas like deterrence and containment with what some in the administration "dominance."

    This is because President Bush is presenting us with a proposition that contains within itself one of the most fateful decisions in our history: a decision to abandon what we have thought was America's mission in the world - - a world in which nations are guided by a common ethic codified in the form of international law - - if we want to survive.

    AMERICA'S MISSION IN THE WORLD

    We have faced such a choice once before, at the end of the second World War. At that moment, America's power in comparison to the rest of the world was if anything greater than it is now, and the temptation was clearly to use that power to assure ourselves that there would be no competitor and no threat to our security for the foreseeable future. The choice we made, however, was to become a co-founder of what we now think of as the post-war era, based on the concepts of collective security and defense, manifested first of all in the United Nations. Through all the dangerous years that followed, when we understood that the defense of freedom required the readiness to put the existence of the nation itself into the balance, we never abandoned our belief that what we were struggling to achieve was not bounded by our own physical security, but extended to the unmet hopes of humankind. The issue before us is whether we now face circumstances so dire and so novel that we must choose one objective over the other.

    So it is reasonable to conclude that we face a problem that is severe, chronic, and likely to become worse over time.

    But is a general doctrine of pre-emption necessary in order to deal with this problem? With respect to weapons of mass destruction, the answer is clearly not. The Clinton Administration launched a massive series of air strikes against Iraq for the state purpose of setting back his capacity to pursue weapons of mass destruction. There was no perceived need for new doctrine or new authorities to do so. The limiting factor was the state of our knowledge concerning the whereabouts of some assets, and a concern for limiting consequences to the civilian populace, which in some instances might well have suffered greatly.

    Does Saddam Hussein present an imminent threat, and if he did would the United States be free to act without international permission? If he presents an imminent threat we would be free to act under generally accepted understandings of article 51 of the UN Charter which reserves for member states the right to act in self-defense.

    If Saddam Hussein does not present an imminent threat, then is it justifiable for the Administration to be seeking by every means to precipitate a confrontation, to find a cause for war, and to attack? There is a case to be made that further delay only works to Saddam Hussein's advantage, and that the clock should be seen to have been running on the issue of compliance for a decade: therefore not needing to be reset again to the starting point. But to the extent that we have any concern for international support, whether for its political or material value, hurrying the process will be costly. Even those who now agree that Saddam Hussein must go, may divide deeply over the wisdom of presenting the United States as impatient for war.

    At the same time, the concept of pre-emption is accessible to other countries. There are plenty of potential imitators: India/Pakistan; China/Taiwan; not to forget Israel/Iraq or Israel/Iran. Russia has already cited it in anticipation of a possible military push into Georgia, on grounds that this state has not done enough to block the operations of Chechen rebels. What this doctrine does is to destroy the goal of a world in which states consider themselves subject to law, particularly in the matter of standards for the use of violence against each other. That concept would be displaced by the notion that there is no law but the discretion of the President of the United States.

    I believe that we can effectively defend ourselves abroad and at home without dimming our principles. Indeed, I believe that our success in defending ourselves depends precisely on not giving up what we stand for.

    http://tinyurl.com/2da66j

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 1:47pm

  307. Posted by VIKTOR RAMIUS 10/15/2007 @ 12:29pm

    VR, does your unreality come at the price of all that's not reptilian of your brain becoming faith based speculation? You do seem to be proving it beyond any doubt.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 1:53pm

  308. Posted by VIKTOR RAMIUS 10/15/2007 @ 12:29pm

    Bwahahahahahahah--- VR is soooo full of BS. Check it out:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9JE48XHKG64

    Al Gore going after Raygun and Bush I for aiding and abedding Saddam.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 2:09pm

  309. Take the quiz:

    http://www.globalwarmingheartland.org/GWQuiz/Testindex.html

    Science-based.

    I scored 90. Gore would score zero.

    Posted by VIKTOR RAMIUS 10/15/2007 @ 12:51pm

    Heartland Institute

    Exxon Funding ExxonSecrets lists Heartland as having received $561,500 (unadjusted for inflation) from ExxonMobil between 1998 and 2005. [24]

    Contributions include:

    $30,000 in 1998; $115,000 in 2000; $90,000 in 2001; $15,000 in 2002; $85,000 for General Operating Support and $7,500 for their 19th Aniversary Benefit Dinner in 2003;

    85,000 for General Operating Support and $15,000 for Climate Change Efforts in 2004; and $109,000 in 2005.

    [edit] Tobacco Industry Funding

    The tobacco industry has also been a regular funder. According to a 1995 internal report by Philip Morris USA on its corporate contributions budget, the company uses its contributions "as a strategic tool to promote our overall business objectives and to advance our government affairs agenda," in particular by supporting "the work of free market 'think tanks' and other public policy groups whose philosophy is consistent with our point of view. ... [W]e have given general support over the years to such groups as the Heritage Foundation, Heartland Institute, Americans for Tax Reform, Citizens for a Sound Economy, Washington Legal Foundation and a variety of other organizations that help provide information about the ultimate course of legislation, regulation and public opinion through their studies, papers, op-ed pieces and conferences." [25] Internal company documents show the following contributions from Philip Morris to Heartland (probably an incomplete list): $25,000 in 1993 [26] $65,000 in 1995 [27] $50,000 in 1996 [28] $50,000 in 1997 [29] $50,000 in 1998 (proposed) [30] [31] [edit]

    http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Heartland_Institute#Secrecy_o n_Funding_Sources

    time to quiz yourself

    Posted by frosty zoom at 10/15/2007 @ 2:15pm

  310. NAACP SLAPS DOWN CHERMAK'S ASSERTION THAT HE AND HIS REPULSIVE PARTY ARE SAVIOURS TO AFRICAN-AMERICANS (EVEN IF, PARADOX OF PARDOX OF PARADOXES, THEY DON'T KNOW RECOGNIZE THEIR SAVIOURS AS SUCH!!!)

    CHERMAK, or whatever it's called, goes Dittohead to assure all that there was no basis of complaint over the conduct of the 2000 election -and- that he is especially appointed spokesperson for any racial grevience.

    The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People begs to disagree.

    A VERY BREIF excerpt from: http://rules.senate.gov/hearings/2001/031401shelton.htm

    Testimony of HILARY O. SHELTON DIRECTOR, WASHINGTON BUREAU

    of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People On Voting Irregularities in the November, 2000 election and Proposals for Change

    MARCH 14, 2001

    Good morning, Chairman McConnell, Senator Dodd and distinguished members of the Committee on Rules and Administration. Thank you for the opportunity to come before you this morning on behalf of the National Association For The Advancement of Colored People and our 1700 Branches in 50 states, the District of Columbia, Italy, Germany, Japan and Korea.

    The NAACP is deeply appreciative of the U.S. Senate Committee on Rules and Administration for convening this hearing to look into the issue of voting irregularities with respect to last year's Presidential election.

    We believe that this is a matter of grave concern for our nation and our people.

    We also believe that perhaps tens of thousands of voters were denied their basic right to cast a free vote and to have that vote counted. While our concerns encompass the electoral process in all 50 states, for the purpose of today's hearing I shall confine my remarks to what occurred or did not occur in the state of Florida and why it was particularly discomforting.

    There was, as best as we have been able to determine, substantial unresolved allegations throughout that state of massive voter disenfranchisement in African American, Haitian American and Jewish communities.

    The election appeared to have been conducted in such a manner that many of those same communities now believe unequivocally that it was unfair, illegal, immoral and certainly undemocratic.

    The specter of these allegations alone indisputably require that the record be made complete in terms of what did and did not happen during the election in Florida.

    As the nation's oldest and largest civil rights organization, the NAACP was appalled and outraged by much of what we saw unfold the weekend before the election, at polling places on election day and at Boards of Elections throughout the state in the days and weeks that followed.

    Because the right to vote is the most sacred franchise in our democracy, these hearings, as uncomfortable as they might be to some, must challenge all Americans to focus again on the thorny issue of equal protection under law and whether or not such a protection was afford to duly registered voters who went to the polls on election day in Florida.

    Every survey of fact that was conducted after the election has shown that the greater the percentage of black voters in a precinct the greater was the likelihood that a significant number of the ballots of those voters were never counted.

    There was also a greater likelihood that computer equipment, when available at such polling places, was not adequate or on par with what was available and in use at polling places in precincts that had a relatively low or inconsequential number of African American voters.

    Ask the thousands upon thousands of people who saw that fundamental right violated, often because of the color of their skin, and they will tell you without hesitation that they feel violated and robbed.

    The national response to this has been a flurry of legislative initiatives announced and undertaken by conscientious members of the House and Senate on both sides of the aisle. If anything, the bi-partisan nature alone of the response thus far has been encouraging. However, the real test will be to see what if anything of substance emerges and is signed into law under the rubric of voting and electoral reform.

    The NAACP also has a set of well developed out ideas and recommendations designed to avoid similar Election Day debacles in the future. We don't seek pride of authorship of those or any other ideas. What we do seek however is a reasonable expectation that the distinguished men and women of both chambers of congress will work in earnest to move our nation closer toward a universal and uniform system of casting and counting ballots.

    Before I offer our twelve recommendations let me begin with what took place on and around November 7, 2000.

    The weekend prior to the election, the NAACP began receiving calls alerting us to the fact that a person or persons were making electronic phone calls into predominately black households, claiming to represent the NAACP, in support of Republican candidate George W. Bush. These calls were apparently taking place in the key battleground states of Michigan and Florida. Specifically, the caller was identifying him- or herself as a representative of the NAACP, saying that the organization endorsed and supported the Republican candidate for President, and urged the recipient of the call to go to the polls on Tuesday and to vote accordingly.

    In response to the blatantly false and extremely illegal calls, the NAACP moved quickly to make sure that the U.S. Department of Justice, as well as the Attorneys General of each state was also notified. Unable to secure a cease and desist order we used public service time on local radio stations over the next 48 hours to alert voters of the false nature of the calls.

    CHERMAK, surely you have another 10,000 words of indignant drivel and Dittohead rants to break-dance around the evidence of what your party stands for? (heh heh heh, this is going to be a laff riot) ...

    Posted by John_Shaft at 10/15/2007 @ 2:38pm

  311. JUST FOR THE FUN OF SEEING A DITTOHEAD BRAINWASHED WINGER SLOBBER AT THE KEYBOARD, 11 QUESTIONS FOR CHERMAK.

    It writes, in part:

    As far as Florida 2000, I guess in your world state courts CAN make law from the bench, and federal courts are NOT to interfere! But you have to stop looking at the law according to Algore. You also didn't mention how the Algore camp did not want 19,000 military ballots counted, nor did you mention how Algore operatives descended upon the state to push this to the maximum extent possible...You are a racist, John_Shaft. The link below explains why...

    1. Just how is that the Florida Supreme Court was making law and not judging a dispute over what the law says when its being contested?

    Be specific. What I suggest with this question is that CHERMAK does not know the case or its (proverbial) ass from its elbow and is just repeating things that the drug addled, zonked-out-of-his- mind Rush has intoned gravely into the microphone.

    2. Do you agree with Scalia's insistence that there is no right to vote in the US? Elaborate.

    3. How can anyone but the most dizzied dittohead say that the Gore campaign was "supressing" the military ballots when Joseph I. Lieberman (the VP candidate was part of the campaign, yes?) GOT ON NATIONAL TV and said they should be counted. Jake Tapper reports on this in his book DOWN & DIRTY, as well as the subsequent votes faxed in and postmarked after the deadline.

    Again, be specific in explaining how Lieberman was not on the (cough, ahem) ... was not on the GORE-LIEBERMAN ticket.

    4, 5 & 6. If Gore operatives were descending all over the state of FL ... howcum the figures that each camapign reported to the Internal Revenue Service indicate that Bush's "post-election" operation in FL spent $13.8 million which was MORE THAN FOUR TIMES the sum ($3.2 million) spent by Gore?

    Could it be that FOUR TIMES as many Bush operatives were there? Maybe Rush knows the answer, eh?

    7 & 8. Was Clarence "Uncle" Thomas nominated by George H.W. Bush for the SCOTUS beacuse he is an African-American? Do ya' R-E-A-L-L-Y think he would have been nominated if he was white, with that wafer thin resume?

    8 & 9. When Uncle Thomas was accused of sexual harasssment by "a little bit nutty, a little bit slutty" Anita Hill, did the defense he made of himself on national TV hinge on the fact that he is ... black? In other words, does Uncle Thomas play the race card to the hilt and in public when it suits him?

    10 & 11. If Uncle Thomas was rated as minimally qualified to be a SCOTUS justice by his own professional guild (as was the case) but was nominated for the court anyway, how is this something other than -- what is that phrase again? -- the "soft bigotry of low expectations" being dumped on Uncle Thomas?

    So, shall I apolgize for calling him Uncle Thomas? (Teeter teeter) Fuck no. This is a guy who made his career trading on guilt as it coincides with the colour of his skin, hitting that button over and over and over again and expecting Politically Correct Pieties as he does so. One can that Uncle Thomas literally wrote A book on it. Thus, I shall not enable this appalling behaviour because that shit is broke and I expect more from other people. My heart is pure so I can say what I really think -- ergo, Clarence IS Uncle Thomas.

    My sympathy is fully with the hard-working disenfranchised in FL whom, with the usual level of hideously non-existent dittohead informational acuity, CHERMAK waves away with the typical, standard issue spasms of rightwing nonsense and drivel.

    Posted by John_Shaft at 10/15/2007 @ 3:16pm

  312. Consider for a moment, if Al Gore were to seriously be in a quandry about whether or not to run, would he honestly put it out there that he was thinking about it if there was the slightest chance he'd not do it-- considering the negative consequences of the majority of dems that would like him to at least enter into the conversation/debate in order to better judge the other candidates against. However if Al Gore says honestly that he's not (currently) thinking about running but then decides to definitely run-- consider the positive vibe from the pro-Al dem base and those that'd like the benefit of the hieghtened and expanded conversation when Al and the other dem candidates discuss the issues vital to our national interests. Definitely the most prudent and compassionate approach.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 4:05pm

  313. Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/15/2007 @ 01:51am

    Here' HSUB, I'll quote it...to avoid any "straw" charges---

    "It is my deep personal conviction that abortion is wrong. I hope that some day we will see the current outrageously large number of abortions drop sharply. . . . Let me assure you that I share your belief that innocent human life must be protected . . ." (Letter from Rep. Al Gore to a Constituent, 7/18/84)

    Now, when a politician says human life "must be protected"...doesn't sound like it's just personal and not a bit of POLICY as well.

    Posted by Mask at 10/15/2007 @ 4:29pm

  314. Oh, by the way, HSUB....

    5 days and counting until Step One....

    Posted by Mask at 10/15/2007 @ 4:32pm

  315. "It is my deep personal conviction that abortion is wrong. I hope that some day we will see the current outrageously large number of abortions drop sharply. . . . Let me assure you that I share your belief that innocent human life must be protected . . ." (Letter from Rep. Al Gore to a Constituent, 7/18/84)

    Posted by MASK 10/15/2007 @ 4:29pm

    Why but Frita, it says exactly what I said-- 'I'm against abortion' and I also wish the number would drop, but noway would I shove my beliefs down anyone's throat... Are you reading that into what Al is saying? That he want to shove his beliefs down everyone's throat? I know he's clarified that he wouldn't, that it's a personal belief over and over again.

    I'd be like saying if, 'I have a deep belief in Christ', and then assume that it means then that I also want to convert all other people away from their religion. That would be a weak if not totally false assumption.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 4:42pm

  316. Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/15/2007 @ 4:42pm

    So what did he mean by "human life must be protected", HSUB?

    That he'd go around and try CONVINCE women not to have an abortion? Maybe he made some movie ("Inconvenient Baby") and everybody missed it!?!?....heheh

    BTW, I will have to save this--

    Consider for a moment, if Al Gore were to seriously be in a quandry about whether or not to run, would he honestly put it out there that he was thinking about it if there was the slightest chance he'd not do it-- considering the negative consequences of the majority of dems that would like him to at least enter into the conversation/debate in order to better judge the other candidates against.---Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/15/2007 @ 4:05pm

    When (sorry..."if") Gore doesn't run now...you just accused him of dishonesty and screwing over his supporters like you!

    Gonna LOVE seeing you explain that away come November 2nd!...LOL!

    Posted by Mask at 10/15/2007 @ 4:51pm

  317. So what did he mean by "human life must be protected", HSUB?

    Posted by MASK 10/15/2007 @ 4:51pm

    Well Frita, that's a big DUH. Why would anyone be against abortion... Think about it. Otherwise one would not care.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 5:04pm

  318. Consider for a moment, if Al Gore were to seriously be in a quandry ...---Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/15/2007 @ 4:05pm

    When (sorry..."if") Gore doesn't run now...you just accused him of dishonesty and screwing over his supporters like you!

    Posted by MASK 10/15/2007 @ 4:51pm

    Frita you're such a dumbass sometimes-- the whole quandry was a big "IF"

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 5:08pm

  319. Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/15/2007 @ 5:04pm

    So Gore thought "human life should be protected"...but as a staunch never-was-"pro-life" PRO-CHOICE person...he'd never actually DO anything about it as a Congressman?

    Good to know, he only SAYS stuff...but doesn't really mean to enact legislation to back it up!

    Posted by Mask at 10/15/2007 @ 9:07pm

  320. Posted by VIKTOR RAMIUS 10/15/2007 @ 12:51pm

    Took the "test".

    Gutter science.

    I knew the twist on every question (i.e. The 'expected' answer vs. the teaser and the argument that I would see after I cleared the java pop-up box).

    Maybe that would "inform" the un-informed and unlearned, but the prognosis stands. Gutter science.

    Ever wonder why anyone would try so hard to provide such a misleading "test"...oh yea, Frosty already told you.

    Question? Do you have an agenda of your own to push, or are you actually that easily led?

    Eric

    Posted by Malcontent at 10/15/2007 @ 9:08pm

  321. Posted by MALCONTENT 10/15/2007 @ 9:08pm

    ya gotta be suspicious when it's called "heartland" or "freedom" or "patriot" something..............

    Posted by frosty zoom at 10/15/2007 @ 9:46pm

  322. Posted by MALCONTENT 10/15/2007 @ 9:08pm

    FROSTY's right, Eric. Plus sort of a tip-off that they get half a mill from Exxon-Mobil, no?

    Seriously, I wish had gone into university level professorship in meteorology. You could clean up by becoming a fervant anti-GW critic...

    and watching Exxon write a check to you from the "Americans For Energy Independence" "non-partisan research group"!

    heheh

    Posted by Mask at 10/15/2007 @ 9:56pm

  323. Posted by MASK 10/15/2007 @ 9:56pm

    THE PATRIOT'S COALITION FOR FREEDOM AIR

    Posted by frosty zoom at 10/15/2007 @ 10:00pm

  324. HEARTLAND COMMISSION FOR ENERGY CONSUMPTION

    Posted by frosty zoom at 10/15/2007 @ 10:02pm

  325. Hi John_Shaft,

    You have come through again! Excellent display of lib anger and rage.

    I have to admit, you are good at what you do. You are serious about the absolute correctness of what you believe, and condemn anybody who has opposite beliefs with fits and spasms of hate and disgust.

    What you come short on, though, are actual facts. The three links below take apart your contentions about Florida 2000. The disenfranchisement myth has been disproven, as I said, and you will note that Algore's legal team could never substantiate why ballots needed to be counted by hand.

    http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0884144.html

    http://archives.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/stories/12/13/got.here/index.ht ml

    http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/lott200312100915.asp

    These links are not from Fox News or Rush Limbaugh or Karl Rove, etc. but you will no doubt declare them invalid anyway.

    As far as Justice Thomas, your comment about ".....with that wafer thin resume? ......" - that is your opinion, one which you share with others, but many others do not agree with you.

    There are politicians I do not like, such as Algore, Slick Willie, and Mr. Peanut (Jimmy Carter). My negative slurs towards them by using those names do not carry any connotation other than my dislike of them, your slur towards Justice Thomas carries much more. You, of course, believe your racist slur is justified, so great is your lib anger and hate and sense of moral superiority.

    Have a good day, racist John_Shaft, but while you are foaming at the mouth as you are on the Internet, make sure you keep the foam out of your keyboard, or you may short-circuit the device and lose your ability to spew your rage.

    Posted by sjchermak at 10/15/2007 @ 10:02pm

  326. So Gore thought "human life should be protected"...but as a staunch never-was-"pro-life" PRO-CHOICE person...he'd never actually DO anything about it as a Congressman?

    Good to know, he only SAYS stuff...but doesn't really mean to enact legislation to back it up!

    Posted by MASK 10/15/2007 @ 9:07pm

    So Frita, would you like legislation requiring that every woman 'must' have at least one abortion since you're so religiously pro-abortion?

    Or perhaps Frita's argument is that the far right nut job abortion clinic bombers/terrorists are right for taking action as there's that pesky thing called our US Constitution getting the way. Frita's argument seems equivalent to saying Ann Coulter is right or perhaps even she 'isn't' going far enough in perfecting Jews ala Jesus conversion-- isn't the Messiah-niac next step not Jesus but rather Mohammed? Religious belief is linear, un-retractable and nonnegotiable with any other thought or human activity such as democratic law, even mere logic or science. Thus to follow Frita's type of faulty logic to her pro-Coulter thinking conclusively, everyone must convert to Islam to bring peace to the world or be killed. Just like her believe that Al Gore must 'do' something about his 'personal' religious belief about abortion being wrong-- and thus trump his belief in our constitution, separation of church and state,... or he's a hypocrite or just lying.

    Frita's thinking is oh so screwed up.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/15/2007 @ 11:38pm

  327. ¬v¬ has been eating more DU, his favorite food. No wonder his denial of reality is so strong, his senses are rot with Depleated Uranium thus all that is left is his reptile core of reactionary hate.

    Here ¬v¬ just for your condition, a second run:

    "The headline on Krugman's piece is entirely appropriate: "Gore Derangement Syndrome." The whole "derangement syndrome" phenomenon stems from an increasingly common problem -- when contempt for a leader strays from simple political opposition to irrational, reflexive antagonism. If so-and-so says "day," I'll say "night," even if the sun is shining. It's more important to fight the perceived opponent than to make sense.

    And for far too long, that's exactly how the right has approached Gore and the science on global warming. The evidence must be wrong, because Gore believes it. The Nobel Peace Prize must be worthless, because Gore won it.

    These aren't arguments. They're sad and nonsensical temper-tantrums."

    "What is it about Mr. Gore that drives right-wingers insane?"

    Partly it's a reaction to what happened in 2000, when the American people chose Mr. Gore but his opponent somehow ended up in the White House. Both the personality cult the right tried to build around President Bush and the often hysterical denigration of Mr. Gore were, I believe, largely motivated by the desire to expunge the stain of illegitimacy from the Bush administration.

    And now that Mr. Bush has proved himself utterly the wrong man for the job -- to be, in fact, the best president Al Qaeda's recruiters could have hoped for -- the symptoms of Gore derangement syndrome have grown even more extreme.

    The worst thing about Mr. Gore, from the conservative point of view, is that he keeps being right. In 1992, George H. W. Bush mocked him as the "ozone man," but three years later the scientists who discovered the threat to the ozone layer won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. In 2002 he warned that if we invaded Iraq, "the resulting chaos could easily pose a far greater danger to the United States than we presently face from Saddam." And so it has proved.

    But that's only part of it. Those on the right aren't just angry because they're wrong; they're angry because their smear didn't work.

    [I]f science says that we have a big problem that can't be solved with tax cuts or bombs -- well, the science must be rejected, and the scientists must be slimed. For example, Investor's Business Daily recently declared that the prominence of James Hansen, the NASA researcher who first made climate change a national issue two decades ago, is actually due to the nefarious schemes of -- who else? -- George Soros.

    Which brings us to the biggest reason the right hates Mr. Gore: in his case the smear campaign has failed. He's taken everything they could throw at him, and emerged more respected, and more credible, than ever. And it drives them crazy."

    http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/13235.html

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/16/2007 @ 01:51am

  328. Here's another good one:

    "A careful look at the dynamics of the 2008 election, and of the current policy environment, suggests that the case for Gore to join the race is quite powerful, both from his own perspective and that of the Democratic Party."

    http://tinyurl.com/2zjhbe

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/16/2007 @ 01:59am

  329. Here's one for Frita, fairly like minded doubts, but clear about the old anti-Gore guard out there:

    "The Nobel Peace Prize going to Al Gore has set off a new spasm of talk about the possibility that Gore might yet save us and run for president. Even hardcore progressive activists are hoping he joins the race.

    In an AlterNet readers' poll last year (in which Noam Chomsky won the MVP for "Most Valuable Progressive"), Gore was far and away the preferred Democratic candidate."

    http://tinyurl.com/29rush

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/16/2007 @ 02:10am

  330. Gore wins the Oslo primaries? Well, the trouble with the Nation's editors is that they try to win things in cheap ways. Hey, ask yourselves, what is more important: the Earth or the people. I mean, Gore's great. However, I would prefer someone who could stop all this madness in Iraq and spend US$200 billion at home rather than some Maliki (spelling?), who's been doing a worse job than Saddam in keeping his subjects safe.

    Posted by HelenDAO at 10/16/2007 @ 03:36am

  331. Not to worry. I see Nichols is back to whoring for Clinton again in his latest offering. That's the problem with these upscale liberals--they are subject to whoring as if there wasn't an ethical bone in their body to keep them upright.

    Posted by Lil at 10/16/2007 @ 10:05am

  332. That's the problem with these upscale liberals--they are subject to whoring

    LIL, it is not the liberals with the problem. If as you say, Liberals don't have an ethical bone, maybe that isn't what America needs. America needs it's credibilty, prestige, influence, stature, honor, integrity, BACK. Not an ethical bone - America needs to get the hell out of Iraq - not an ethical bone. You Conservatives go ahead and enjoy having an ethical bone up your ass, Americans are angry with Conservatives, Americans are tired of Conservatives.

    Posted by conshame at 10/16/2007 @ 10:25am

  333. LIL's trying to talk about, "Oh you know the problem with Liberals, they don't have an ethical bone in their body. These Liberals, why, they are subject to whoring".

    Liberals were RIGHT, about Iraq. Liberals were RIGHT, about Bush. Not 10 years later, not 20 years later, but before he ever took office. Liberals did not vote for the idiot George Bush.

    Liberals are not the one defending the idiot George Bush's policies.

    Liberals are not the ones denying the Armenian Genocide. Liberals are not the ones out trying to defend Turkey, a country where you can be put in a Turkish Prison, for NOT denying the Genocide.

    Liberals are not the ones running around, saying "Waterboarding isn't a big deal, waterboarding isn't torture, we need to waterboard people", and backing that up with a bunch of non-thought-out, non-thinking, non-intelligent, SILLY excuses. America was a proud country, we used to leave the torture to our allies in the South Vietnamese government, the new Iraqi government tortures people - but George Bush wouldn't trust them with it. George Bush said we need to have BlackWater carry out interrogations, so we can train them to become monsters and turn them against Americans. The military officials have come forward and told the truth, long after their "service" (harming America), was up. The military made a mistake when it started promulgating the Conservative idiology in it's ranks. Look what it has done. The Iraq war was based on lies, and Osama roams free.

    Posted by conshame at 10/16/2007 @ 10:35am

  334. Posted by LIL 10/16/2007 @ 10:05am

    "whoring"?

    Oh, my gosh...LIL is....MRS LEN MOSSE!

    LOL!

    Posted by Mask at 10/16/2007 @ 10:36am

  335. CONSHAME, there's no such thing as a "liberal"...you said so-

    BLOG | Posted 07/31/2007 @ 07:21am Comments for "Vitter's Close Call" by David Corn

    Mask, what do you want? Alright. Nobody is a "Conservative". Conservative is an abstract concept. For a real Conservative to exist, that person would have to agree 100 with a set of principles that can not be fully and specifically defined. The same for a Liberal. ----Posted by CONSHAME 08/01/2007 @ 6:17pm

    Posted by Mask at 10/16/2007 @ 10:37am

  336. Actually "liberals" aren't doing a damn thing about any of that, conshame. Ask Pelosi, ask Reid. They are either busy conjuring up the latest excuse for not doing anything or attacking anti-war activists. Damn straight, not an ethical bone in their spineless opposition is actually a mild rebuke considering the greater liklihood that they are simply complicit. Hard pill to swallow for partisan types who can't see--or are unwilling to acknowlege they are all in it together- because they enjoy the team sports angle of it more than anything- R vs D.

    Posted by Lil at 10/16/2007 @ 10:50am

  337. Posted by LIL 10/16/2007 @ 10:50am

    Crybaby.

    Posted by Dr Decibels at 10/16/2007 @ 10:56am

  338. Great:

    Stephen Colbert looks at Al Gore's recent Nobel win and rather ingeniously suggests that all the Gore Derangement Syndrome may be disguising Gore's guilt in hogging the most precious resource of all: good will and the global prizescape.

    "Clearly, anti-Bush sentiment is fueling Al Gore's rampant and wanton destruction of the global prizescape. Nation, if we want to preserve the splendor of congratulatory pageantry of generations, it is our sacred task to conserve hatred of President Bush, measured in BHUs, or Bush Hate Units."

    http://tinyurl.com/3cu5he

    Funny when considering that hsuB 'gave out' lots of metals for major screw-ups too... which I guess increases his BHU's--- BBwahahahahahah

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/16/2007 @ 1:43pm

  339. Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/16/2007 @ 1:43pm

    4....14....17.

    4 days until HSUB's first or earliest prediction that Gore will announce (October 20th).

    14 days until HSUB's second or latest prediction that Gore will announce (October 30th).

    17 days until the November 2nd deadline for the New Hampshire primary, that Mr Nichols mentioned as the last day Gore CAN announce.

    (Any error in that calender of events, HSUB?)

    Posted by Mask at 10/16/2007 @ 1:48pm

  340. Hey Frita, do they still make things like you the size of a quarter that one can stick in ones vest pocket attached to a chain?

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/16/2007 @ 2:24pm

  341. I feel like I'm pulling Frita's chain every time she pops up spouting what time it is... I musta tramatized her at some point continually hitting her over her with facts that contradicted her made up straw for her to be so enthused. Glad she now has an outlet or her head would explode.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/16/2007 @ 2:29pm

  342. No Frita, I don't need to wind you up.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/16/2007 @ 2:30pm

  343. HSUB, notice you didn't answer...

    Was there ANY error in that run down of calender events as predicted by you (to NOVA) or as mentioned by John Nichols in this article?

    any?

    Posted by Mask at 10/16/2007 @ 2:32pm

  344. er, Frita, saying I don't need to wind you up-- means 'yes' you're keeping time. DUH.

    I know you only play dumb for effect, right?

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/16/2007 @ 2:37pm

  345. Isn't it time the hamsters set up an international prize that they might actually have a chance at winning?

    It could be headquartered in midland texas and they could spell it wrong.

    Posted by Will C. at 10/16/2007 @ 3:04pm

  346. and maybe even mis-pronounce it

    Posted by Will C. at 10/16/2007 @ 3:04pm

  347. Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/16/2007 @ 2:37pm

    Gee, HSUB, I didn't realize that re-stating what YOU have stated (Gore announcing on the 20th or 30th) or what John Nichols says, is...

    "playing dumb"!?!??!

    heheh

    Posted by Mask at 10/16/2007 @ 3:28pm

  348. right you're not playing

    Posted by Will C. at 10/16/2007 @ 3:36pm

  349. 4....14....17.

    (Any error in that ...

    Posted by MASK 10/16/2007 @ 1:48pm

    No Frita, I don't need to wind you up.

    Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/16/2007 @ 2:30pm

    HSUB, notice you didn't answer...

    Posted by MASK 10/16/2007 @ 2:32pm

    I don't need to wind you up-- means 'yes' you're keeping time. DUH.

    Posted by HSUBFOOLS 10/16/2007 @ 2:37pm

    Gee, HSUB, I didn't realize that re-stating what YOU have stated... is...

    "playing dumb"!?!??!

    Posted by MASK 10/16/2007 @ 3:28pm

    Well yes it is, kinda like Daffy Duck, er, Woody Wood Pecker, er, Elmer Fudd, naw he just stutters, There's gots to be an example of some cartoon character that just keeps repeating exactly what they just a few minutes before said over and over again. Granted they are usually brain damaged and don't do it on purpose like you do but then that's why I said you were playing dumb and not really just dumb. Although that too is a possibility.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/16/2007 @ 3:43pm

  350. ¬v¬, oh duh, saving 'humanity' from global extinction-- HELLO.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/16/2007 @ 6:56pm

  351. But then again that is what ¬v¬ wants-- extinction; so no way to convince ¬v¬ of life except via death. Ergo his love of DU.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/16/2007 @ 7:00pm

  352. Posted by LVLIBERTY1 10/16/2007 @ 7:40pm

    HSUB has an answer for that...

    "But that will all change when Gore decides to run!"

    Which of course explains it away....huh?!??!!??!

    Posted by Mask at 10/16/2007 @ 9:23pm

  353. ¬v¬, Frita,

    As Gomer always used to say: Surprise, surprise, surprise, LvL and Frita teaming up for a round of playing or actually being stupid.

    Simultaneous with the 'old' and ongoing poll that asks participants that assume Al's not running per asking them to commit to one of those that are first-- if they'd like Al to run, oh duh-- another poll shows that Hillary would run neck and neck with Guili 47-49% per CNN---- while Gore would beat Guili by 52%. So I guess what Frita only suggests as someone else's faulty logic is in reality her own unresearched faulty logic. And what can one say about ¬v¬ that hasn't already been said about someone so wrong about so much.

    CNN/Opinion Research Corporation Poll. Oct. 12-14, 2007. N=927 registered voters nationwide. MoE ± 3.

    "If [see below] were the Democratic Party's candidate and [see below] were the Republican Party's candidate, who would you be more likely to vote for: [see below], the Democrat, or [see below], the Republican?" If unsure: "As of today, who do you lean more toward?" Names rotated

    Date____________Giuliani (R)__Clinton (D)__Neither__Other__Unsure

    10/12-14/07 _______47 ________49 _________3______-______1

    9/7-9/07 __________46 ________50 _________3______-______1

    Date____________Giuliani (R)__Gore (D)___Neither__Other__Unsure

    10/12-14/07 _______46 ________52 _________2______-______1

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/17/2007 @ 08:44am

  354. Well, well, well...

    USA Today/Gallup Poll. Oct. 12-14, 2007. N=1,009 adults nationwide. MoE ± 3.

    "Next, we'd like to get your overall opinion of some people in the news. As I read each name, please say if you have a favorable or unfavorable opinion of these people -- or if you have never heard of them. How about:

    Al Gore

    Date________Favorable__Unfavorable__Unsure

    10/12-14/07_____58 _______37 _________5

    Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-New York)

    10/12-14/07_____53 _______44 _________2

    Rudolph Giuliani

    Date________Favorable__Unfavorable__Unsure__Never Heard Of

    10/12-14/07_____49 _______39 _________6 _______6

    Sen. Barack Obama (D-Illinois)

    10/12-14/07_____53 _______32 _________9 _______6

    John Edwards (D-North Carolina)

    10/12-14/07_____48 _______34 ________10 _______8

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/17/2007 @ 1:10pm

  355. Next tack-on the candidates 'Unsure' and 'Never Heard Of' onto their 'Unfavorable'-- now who's still on top?

    Posted by hsuBfools at 10/17/2007 @ 1:20pm

  356. Wow, this is my first visit. John, you make such an excellent arguement here. Ever since I saw the film I've been hoping he would run. I read his "Assault on Reason," and it really gave me the chutzpah to start talking about my convictions. It is an eloquent piece of writing.

    I'm unexcited about Hillary. I'm unclear about Edwards and Obama. I fully embrace the platform of Kusinich, but I can't afford to throw my vote away on him. The resume that you posted shows that this man has reached the point of being a true statesman. I really really want him to run.

    PS: I admire your writing style.

    Posted by wildgoat at 10/17/2007 @ 7:56pm

  357. What has Al Gore done with his movie and speeches to meet Alfred Nobel's criteria for the Nobel peace prize?

    Posted by LVLIBERTY1 10/16/2007 @ 6:38pm | ignore this person

    Poor Leave Liberty...so blinded by his 'Gore hate' he can't see the obvious...

    ...the only people who can possibly make that assessment are The Norwegian Nobel Committee...

    "The Nobel Committee is completely independent. In its assessment of nominations for awards, it receives no instructions or directives. According to the statutes of the Nobel Foundation, there must be no mention in the minutes of any Nobel Committee meetings of the contents of discussions relating to choices of candidates for the various awards, nor must any differences of opinion in committees be divulged in other ways. For that reason, committee members take no part in the public debates which follow the announcement of decisions. "

    And, to state the obvious, I believe they've already weighed in with their decision.

    Posted by Lillian at 10/18/2007 @ 8:38pm

John Nichols John Nichols

Breaking news and analysis on political, social, economic and cultural activism that mainstream media commonly ignore.

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