Steve Jobs: "(Al Gore's) The Guy. Like many others, I have tried my best to convince him. So far, no luck."



Ideally we'd like to believe that former Vice Presdent Al Gore is waiting in the tall grass. Should Obama injure Hillary in her run for the Democratic nomination for the American Presidency, Gore could, in September, swoop in and take the whole damn thing for himself. He has the stature and the cachet (Hell, some might say he never even lost in 2000). Then -- for political junkies, geeks and grinds -- McCain would pick Lieberman; Gore: Obama; and the four would have a serious series of Lincoln-Douglas style debates in each geographical region in the United States, fixing our injured Democracy and fractured red-state-blue state/ white: black National divide.

But then, there are all those unconfortable stories of how Al Gore is happier now than he's ever been (Exaggerated cough suggesting feigned detachment), richer than he's ever been (Averted Gaze), and deeper in love with Tipper than he has ever been. And, as living, breathing human beings who have been around the block, we are happy for him, anything to let him get over the pain of being so goddam close to his lifelong ambition of the Presidency.

But as Americans, we are beside ourselves with the angst that any lesser man take up the mantle of President after what Bush hath wrought.

The world is an unbelievably dangerous place as a result of the recklessness of Bush the Younger. We need Gore. Gore is the only American with the sufficient international stature and gravitas to bring us back from the brink -- with Lebanon, Palestine and the Middle East, with Russia, with South America, with North Korea, and, while he's at it, keep us ahead of China and solve gloibal warming. Than k you. From Time:

"The former Vice President just doesn't seem interested. He says he has "fallen out of love with politics," which is shorthand for both his general disgust with the process and the pain he still feels over the hard blow of the 2000 election, when he became only the fourth man in U.S. history to win the popular vote but lose a presidential election. In the face of wrenching disappointment, he showed enormous discipline—waking up every day knowing he came so close, believing the Supreme Court was dead wrong to shut down the Florida recount but never talking about it publicly because he didn't want Americans to lose faith in their system. That changes a man forever.

"It changed Gore for the better. He dedicated himself to a larger cause, doing everything in his power to sound the alarm about the climate crisis, and that decision helped transform the way Americans think about global warming and carried Gore to a new state of grace. So now the question becomes, How will he choose to spend all the capital he has accumulated? No wonder friends, party elders, moneymen and green leaders are still trying to talk him into running. 'We have dug ourselves into a 20-ft. hole, and we need somebody who knows how to build a ladder. Al's the guy,' says Steve Jobs of Apple. 'Like many others, I have tried my best to convince him. So far, no luck.'"


(Time)