Al Gore Gets It Right

Now I am not a huge Al Gore fan: he screwed up enough in the 2000 election to allow Bush to win, and the rest is ugly history. Since then he’s made a few speeches that make sense. This one [courtesy of USAToday] is his latest Text of Gore speech.

You may or may not agree with everything Al Gore says, but he has a point: why is it that our national security, post 2001, is so severely threatened that we need to erode civil liberties to the degree that Bush seems to think fit? We didn’t need to do those kinds of things in World War 2, arguably a far greater threat.

Now for the realist in me: there is no way that talk of impeachment will get anywhere. The Republicans, who fell over themselves trying to oust Bill Clinton, will not allow it. That’s hypocrisy for you. Bush has broken the law. The debate over the Patriot Act was a charade: Bush didn’t need legislation to do whatever he wanted, he just neede a compliant Justice Department.

Strange how a party that talks relentlessly about Constitutional correctness doesn’t mind shredding it when it’s inconvenient.

Anyway, at least Al Gore spoke out. Pity he found his voice a few years too late.