Gore addicts - need a fix? Here you go, a couple of articles.

I Interviewed Al Gore and Shit

By Garrett Kamps
Article Published May 10, 2006

Al Gore is impossibly tall. He's a linebacker, broad-shouldered. He looks like one of those Stonehenge rocks stuffed into an expensive blue suit. If a car were to crash into Al Gore, it would, like that one car in that one Superman sequ--

Wait a second, I'm taller than Al Gore.

It's true. Looking at the picture we took together ("Mr. Gore, my mom would kill me if I didn't get a picture ... "), it is clear: I'm taller than the vice president. And damn it if his face isn't kind of ruddy, a little saggy. This is what the photo reveals — an aged man — and the photo does not lie. And yet ... and yet ... in my mind's eye he still seems huge, regal, invincible. In my mind's eye Al Gore carries a sword. I'd follow him into battle, off a cliff. And you would, too. And you better — the fate of the known world depends on it.

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So yeah, compelling shit. Lots of obvious and good reasons to see this flick. But here's one that's a little less obvious: Al Gore himself.

Think back to the 2000 election. Raise your hand if you voted for Nader. Whoops. Even if you did vote for Gore, did any of us do enough? Could we have swung Ohio? Arizona? Oregon? Were we still basking post-coitally in the booming days of Clinton, our guard down, the back door unlocked, Karl Rove in a ski mask ready to filch the silver? Sure feels that way now. And so for those of you who haven't thought about Gore since then — even though he's a de facto San Francisco resident, with an apartment downtown and irons in the fire at Google, Apple, and SOMA-based Current TV — now's your chance (your obligation, really) to reacquaint yourself with the man. Because even though we can all furl our brows and yell "Bush stole it!" Michael Moore-style (and he very well might have), at the end of the day we just didn't get it done. We allowed the GOP to send a very capable president packing, and seeing the man today really, really re-emphasizes the tragedy of this fact.

Because this man is a Leader, and his very presence reminds you of what it means to be that thing, how completely missing this brand of person is at this very important moment. I had the privilege of sitting down with him last week for 20 minutes for one of those PR junkets folks do to promote their movies, and, as indicated above, the man emits bigness. Still. If he were to rip open his shirt, a burst of light would come shining forth — I'm sure of it. And on the previous night, after the movie screening and the subsequent Q&A, when Mr. Gore was "wrapping it up" with his closing comments, explaining to us that Global Warming presents not only an opportunity to Save the World, but also a chance for us as a society to band together — the way past generations from the '40s and '60s did — joining forces to tackle problems like genocide in Darfur, the AIDS epidemic in Africa, the never-ending battle between dogs and cats — well shit man, we believed him! We stood to our feet and clapped. And it felt so good to actually believe a Leader again. To think we shunned this guy six years ago — kicked him to the curb! Shame on us! And look what it cost us? Oh fuck! Shit! But look — now's your chance to do Al a little favor, because we all kind of owe him, right? Owe him and ourselves. And like a nice guy, Al isn't lording the whole thing over our heads, isn't wagging his finger and saying, "See? See what happens when you don't vote for Al?" No, no. All he's saying is: "Go see my movie." Also: "Go throw a rock at a Hummer." Actually, he didn't say that. I did. Al Gore doesn't support the throwing of rocks at Hummers. That's what he told me, when I interviewed him and shit.

http://www.sfweekly.com/issues/2006-05-10/news/suckafreecity2_full.html

Gore urges us to accept An Inconvenient Truth

By Matt Zakosek
May 9, 2006 in Voices

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To my delight, Gore came across as extremely well read, and not just as a frequent visitor to blogs about the environment. (Ever the dutiful U of C student, I mentioned that our own Raymond T. Pierrehumbert is a frequent contributor to RealClimate.org, to which Gore replied, “Tell your professor that he’s doing a good job.”) Neil Postman’s Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business is a favorite of Gore’s, and I knew from the question-and-answer session after the previous night’s screening at AMC River East 21 that he is well versed in the works of Mark Twain and Upton Sinclair. But nothing could have prepared me for the cerebral turn our conversation was about to take.

The conversation veered in a radically different direction when my fellow journalist asked Gore about the state of democracy. In a world where a second-term president coins such malapropisms as “nucular,” Gore’s articulate nature is welcome (though I should note here that Gore rarely mentions the current administration, disparagingly or otherwise). We learned that Gore’s senior thesis was on the impact of television on the Constitution (who knew?), and it looked as if we had touched upon another favorite talking point. “ conversation of democracy isn’t operating the way it should,” Gore insisted, before adding importantly that “Thomas Paine, in the television age, cannot break into the democracy.”

How our conversation got around to the author of Common Sense, I’ll never know—but having just finished a senior thesis of my own, I could appreciate Gore’s willingness to revisit the topic. Unfortunately, before I could ask him to elaborate, his assistant informed us that our designated 20-minute interview time was almost up. I shook the great man’s hand and wished him luck in Toronto, which is where the film was headed the following morning.

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I’ve interviewed heroes of mine before, like sex columnist Dan Savage, and I must say that Gore was one of my warmest subjects. Occasionally, I couldn’t believe what was coming out of his mouth: the television rant, quoting Melissa Etheridge during the question-and-answer session, comparing his interviews in the film to a particularly painful bout in therapy. But in the end, his sincerity seemed revolutionary—thrilling, somehow. It was the perfect correlative to An Inconvenient Truth, which, after all, Gore considers “the ultimate action movie.” He just might be right.

http://maroon.uchicago.edu/voices/articles/2006/05/09/gore_urges_us_to_acc.php

Al Gore, Lehman's Roosevelt to Form New Global Warming Alliance

May 10 (Bloomberg) -- Former Vice President Al Gore and Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. Managing Director Theodore Roosevelt IV have formed an alliance to boost public awareness about global warming, people familiar with the plans said.

The alliance, which will be unveiled today, is a diverse group that includes bankers like Roosevelt, Viacom Inc.'s Paramount Pictures, former Georgia-Pacific Corp. President Lee Thomas, and former Environmental Protection Agency chief Carol Browner, said the people, who asked not to be identified.

Paramount, which plans to release a documentary later this month about climate change featuring Gore, will contribute $500,000 to the new nonprofit group, called the Alliance for Climate Protection. Gore, 58, will donate the $250,000 advance from his yet-to-be published book ``An Inconvenient Truth,'' which is the same name as the movie, the people said.

The money will be used to begin an educational campaign about the threat of global warming across all media. The idea to corral Wall Street, business executives and former public officials into one alliance stems from the belief that environmental groups alone aren't doing enough to alert the public to the dangers of global warming, the people said.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x2274719

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x2274719