More Like Gore

The reaction to Al Gore’s speech has sparked a debate... Some conservatives (to their consternation) find themselves agreeing. His electrifying delivery had many people admitting that even if alone while watching or listening they found themselves clapping and cheering. A few admitted to tears. Why such emotion and excitement?

Most Americans are disillusioned with the the mainstream media. Unquestionably liberals and progressives feel that their corporate-owned slant leans towards the administration’s perspective.

With political web blogs in the lead, the speech was ‘live-blogged’—watchers typing in highlights for those who couldn’t hear or see it live. Within hours diaries and posts, comments and questions flew across the internet. Links to the text, then the video were posted and sent to thousands of friends by e-mail.

That evening it was barely mentioned in news reports and shows. Too often, the angle was disdainfully trivializing, implying that anything Mr. Gore had to say was insignificant.

Among those who had watched or listened, there was a consensus that it was one of the best they had ever heard. Most agreed that there has been an overall desperation for leadership. It was refreshing to have a respected man such as Al Gore some speak the truth about the government’s behavior. The story grew until the firestorm could no longer be ignored.

The blog “The Rude Pundit” had a post that sums it up in an entertaining colloquial manner. WARNING The Rude Pundit uses swear words and sexual terms. If that offends you, skip his post. For the rest-- I’ve excerpted part of it here—without changing the overall meaning.

The added illustrations are mine.
Read it all at: http://rudepundit.blogspot.com/

While Gore Walks Upright,

Gonzales Hunches in the Ditch
Man, someone spiked Al Gore's coffee with spinach yesterday, 'cause he went all Popeye' on the Bush administration's Bluto
ass. Here's the Rude Pundit's favorite section from Al Gore's erection-inspiring speech yesterday:

________________________
The founders of our country faced dire threats. If they failed in their endeavors, they would have been hung as traitors. The very existence of our country was at risk.

Is our Congress today in more danger than were their predecessors when the British army was marching on the
Capitol? Is the world more dangerous than when we faced an
ideological enemy with tens of thousands of missiles poised to be launched against us and annihilate our country at a moment's notice? Is America in more danger now than when we faced worldwide fascism on the march -- when our fathers fought and won two World Wars simultaneously?

It is simply an insult to those who came before us and sacrificed so much on our behalf to imply that we have more to be fearful of than they. Yet they faithfully protected our freedoms and now it is up to us to do the same.
________________________

Goddamn, it's such in-yer-fookin'-gob rhetoric, innit Here's Bush, who in speech after speech makes some variation on the same stupid statement, as he did on January 11: "[I] said that after September the 11th, that oceans no longer protected us. You know, when I was growing up, or other baby boomers here were growing up, we felt safe because we had these vast oceans that could protect us from harm's way. September the 11th changed all that."

And then here's Gore, calling complete and utter bullshit on that idiotic line, that the oceans couldn't even protect us from the wind driven ships of the British, let alone Soviet ICBMs. But the other thing Gore is doing is good ol' locker room politics: he's calling Bush a dickhead.

"You want threats?" Gore is saying. "Dude, you only gotta keep track of a couple hundred goatfuckers who shit in holes on the side of a mountain. Try dealin' with a few million Soviets. God, stop being a dickhead about it and just do your job without fucking up the joint too much, a'ight?"

Gore's historical logic could also be extendedto this: as repressive as the United States government could be to its citizens during the Cold War, fuck, the Rude Pundit doesn't wanna imagine what Nixon or Reagan would have been like if they'd followed Bush's logic of the power of the president during "war."

It'd be like the difference between being gang raped in prison and being gang-raped in hell by forked-dicked demons with four balls, shooting torrents of fiery spooge into your lacerated asshole.

The rest of the speech is Al Gore representing the injured citizenry of this country, speaking
as someone who is not only disgusted by the treatment of a loved one- like the Constitution is in some horrid, rat-infested state-run nursing home -but as someone who is being hurt himself, as, indeed, we all are, every day, by the rampant, anti-American power grab the White House is engaged in, with the complacent Congress just along for the ride.

The government is spying on Americans without a warrant or any oversight other than by the spies themselves, Gore says. What the fuck, you know? What the fuck?

Unlike so many of Gore's barnburner speeches of the past, this one had more of an effect than the usual flea fart at a System of a Down concert resonance of his previous efforts.

For one thing, Attorney General Alberto "Where's Your Fucking Neck?" Gonzales appeared on Larry King's Zombie Live last night, where Larry King's zombie asked Gonzales about the speech. Gonzales took out the Bill of Rights and said, "Amendments? We don't need no stinkin' amendments" before setting the document on fire with his cigarillo.

King's zombie then asked Gonzales if it was that big a fuckin' deal to get a judge to "sign off on a warrant." Gonzales replied, "Larry, whenever you involve another branch of government in an activity regarding electronic surveillance, inherently it's going to result in some cases in delay." Then he distracted King by offering the zombie host the fresh brains of Sunni children, which King's zombie gratefully engorged. His work there done, Gonzales slunk off, hunched over like a beaten bellringer, to give Sean Hannity's manly jaw a stiff workout.

Gonzales used the much discredited "Clinton did it" excuse to defend the warrant less spying. These were called "black-bag jobs," and they involved physical searches of property without a warrant. The major difference is that, according to the Christian Science Monitor of August 31, 1994: "Unlike their predecessors, Mr. Clinton and [Janet] Reno have encouraged Congress to clear up legal uncertainties over black-bag jobs." This, of course, led to the expansion of FISA to cover physical property searches, passed by Congress.

It was not simply done and Congress was informed and told to go fuck itself.

But that's the difference, isn't it? One President respecting the checks and balances of government, another flushing them down the toilet like so much used tissue.

One speaker yesterday offered a path back to respect, another continued to advocate stuffing the toilet to overflowing. Haven't things come to a strange pass when to be "radical" is to merely ask that the government of the nation respect
its own laws?…”

We are suffering from a leadership vacuum. Whatever you thought of Gore in the past—this is a new day. If you look back in history many of our greatest leaders were not perfect people. They made mistakes. What made them stand out was their ability to learn and grow. To seize the moment in history that they were needed the most. They had the courage to stand up and speak out. They took action and demonstrated leadership. Al Gore’s words resonated with truth. Our republican democracy is in crisis. We need a national dialogue without partisan bickering. We must refuse to allow ourselves to be distracted by ‘who did what where when’ on issues and problems of ten, twenty and thirty years ago. If we don’t, the Constitution and Bill of Rights will no longer be functional documents.