Ezra Klein is a bright young man. He’s a frequent TV news talk show guest and once contributed essays to the Washington Post.
He now writes for Vox — and he’s put forward a patently absurd, but still interesting idea: Al Gore should run for president of the United States.
Yeah, that Al Gore. TheĀ former two-term vice presidentĀ who collected more popular votes than Texas Gov. George W. Bush in 2000, only to lose the presidency when the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 to stop counting the ballots in Florida, which went to Bush and gave him the presidency.
http://www.vox.com/2015/3/16/8220537/al-gore-president-2016
What commends Gore to make the race? According to Klein, he has more unique ideas on how to govern than any of the other so-called alternatives to Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Klein agrees with Gore that climate change is an international concern. He thinks Gore is credible on the issue and can make the case eloquently using the White House as his bully pulpit.
Does he have drawbacks? Oh sure.
Klein writes: “The problem with a Gore candidacy, to be blunt, is Gore. He can be a wooden candidate. His relationship with the press is challenging, to say the least. He is an aging politician in a country that loves new faces. His finances are complicated, and he made an insane sum of money by selling his cable network to Al Jazeera. His divorce from Tipper Gore means his personal life isn’t the storybook it once was. He is loathed by conservatives, who find his environmentalism to be rank hypocrisy from a jet-setting, Davos-attending mansion dweller ā as politically polarized as concern over climate change already is, Gore could polarize it yet further.”
Klein’s essay attached to this blog post is worth your time.
I’m hoping Al Gore reads it and gives the notion Klein putsĀ forth some thought.