Gore’s Moral Imperative

by tristero

I finally saw An Inconvenient Truth and I simply can’t stress enough how important it is for as many people as possible to see it. Not only because it is a superb, sobering description of an imminent environmental catastrophe. Something even more important is on display.

An Inconvenient Truth depicts a genuine American politics of engagement and character. Or more precisely, the untapped potential for it. In the film, Gore says several times that tackling head-on the serious problems that global warming causes is an urgent moral duty. He’s right, of course. But the film makes abundantly clear Gore himself has a moral imperative. And that is to return to electoral politics as soon as possible. Man oh man, does this country need more like him.

Should Gore run for president again? Hell, I’d vote for him in a heartbeat. Gladly, juat as I did in 2000. [Update: As per suggestion in comments, here’s a link to a draft Gore site.] But Somerby has a good point. The mainstream press loathes Gore and that makes it exceedingly difficult to determine how much of a chance he has. That said, a Gore campaign conducted at the political and intellectual level of the film would be so inspiring it could just motivate considerable interest and commitment by young people which could help counter that kind of assault.

In contrast, the latest bundle of snoozers packaged into an “agenda” by the Democratic party’s utterly inept national political consultants is a major league embarassment. It’s almost as if the party consultants concluded that since the world is facing an energy crisis, the Democratic party should set an example and not have any.

The modern Al Gore, however, points the way towards a seriously exciting Democratic politics, one that can see a deeply important problem clearly, find ways to tackle it, and inspire the political will to do so. We need that kind, and how.

If the presidency is closed to him, there is the Senate again or a governorship. Why not? But relegating a person like Gore to permanent outsider status in national electoral politics is a waste of a precious natural resource that this country simply can’t afford, even in the best of times. And these are not the best of times.