Gore to the fore, but will he run?

Even before Gore won an Emmy for his so-called “user generated” cable television network, Current, or an Oscar for his film on climate change, An Inconvenient Truth, he was growing in stature for another reason: his early opposition to the Iraq war.

He had initially voiced it in 2002 in an address that his newly galvanised supporters now describe as uncannily prescient and unfairly dismissed, though it was seen as a politically off-kilter at a time of great popularity for President George W Bush.

The awarding of the Nobel Prize to him was certain to further intensify calls for him to enter the Democratic nominating contest for president. The rumours that he would win it had already helped a grassroots movement to draft him into the race raise tens of thousands of dollars for advertisements.

Gore’s aides, and, on one or two occasions, Gore himself, have said he is not interested in running for president when his main goal has been raising public awareness of global climate change and man’s role in it. But they have been coy, refusing to absolutely say “no,” and, in the process, giving the various groups now dedicated to drafting him into the race reason to continue their efforts.

Associates of Gore, however, have said they truly believe he does not want to run but speculate that he does not have reason to tamp down the presidential talk when it serves to keep the focus on him and causes he is pursuing with a perceptibly pure heart — a perception that could change with a presidential run.

“You never say never in politics but I think he’s having such a big impact on the issues that he cares about that if he decided to run for president he would just be viewed in a fundamentally different way,” said Chris Lehane, a former aide and spokesman for Gore’s 2000 campaign. “Once you become a candidate for president then you have a completely different lens.”

At a time when the US is preoccupied with the most wide-open presidential race in more than 50 years, former aides like Julia Payne say he does not talk much about politics, recalling that she saw him at the wedding in Nashville of a former staffer.

“The last time I talked with the Vice President, we talked light bulbs, not politics,” she said.

Long-time adviser Carter Eskew said he talks to Gore about once a week. “I don’t think he’s going to run,” said Eskew. “He has said technically he hasn’t ruled it out. But I can tell you he’s making no moves and no sounds to indicate to me that he’s going to run.”

Gore’s spokeswoman, Kalee Kreider, was more definitive. “He has no intentions of running for president in 2008,” she said recently from Nashville, where Gore lives.

But that is not stopping the draft Gore movement. Peter Ryder is an activist in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, trying to persuade Gore to run. His group, Algore.org, is planning a November 11 concert to raise money for the effort.

“I think we need more than just a good president. We need someone with the potential for greatness. Al Gore, his rational approach to issues and problems, and obviously his work on global warming, made my decision to support him,” Ryder said.