Keep Your Eye On The Prize

Al Gore and the IPCC share the Nobel Peace Prize for their work in bringing to light the serious and rather imminent nature of the threat of global warming.

This is great news for the Al Gore brand, obviously, and re-raises the question of whether or not he should try to use this as a springboard to run once again for the presidency that he nearly won in 2000. Some say he did win, and I think most anyone reading this blog would agree that we wish he had won, but that's rather beside the point.

I don't think Gore will run, nor do I think he should. I suspect it would be best for the rest of us if he did run, because I think a President Gore will be better for the country than a President Hillary Clinton, the most likely outcome at this moment, will be. However, I think a President Gore is not nearly as effective as Al Gore, Professional Activist is for Gore himself.

As a slight aside, this bloggingheads.tv episode is one of the best I've heard in rather a while. David Corn and Jim Pinkerton are quite respectable center-left and center-right pundits, repectively, and have discussions that civil, enlightening, and entertaining. There are several really good bits of the diavlog that deserve pointing out, I'll try and get to a few of them in the next day or two. But really, you should just watch the whole thing. It will be an hour well-spent, I assure you.

Here's the bit that leads me to mention this diavlog here. Jim is perfectly right-there's absolutely no reason for Gore to believe that he would have more ability, as President, to improve the chances of changing world opinions and actions on the subject of climate change.

Look, there are two countervailing forces here. There are people who are concerned, for humanitarian, environmental, or other personal reasons about the impact that a warming planet might have. There are a few really silly, anti-environmental motives for doubting or denying warming, but most serious counterarguments are fundamentally economic in nature. And they're not entirely wrong. Even the most optimistic estimates say that dealing with climate change will have a negative effect on economic growth, as vast resources are spent on upgrading the energy sector to become more efficient and less carbon-emitting.

Now, in my opinion, this is not a big deal. But I am not a believer in economic growth uber alles. I think there are many things that are more important. And preventing Antarctica from falling into the ocean and billions of poor people in low-lying countries from drowning definitely qualify as more important, in my book. Plus, without making the energy economy significantly more efficient, there's no realistic way that we will be able to significantly raise the standard of living of the rest of the world, since there is an unseverable link between standard of living and energy consumption.

But, the point I am trying to get to here is that corporations, generally, are going to be against making drastic changes for the sake of halting global warming. And, generally, what corporations want, governments provide. The only way of changing this is going to be real, massive, public outcry.

And the fact is, Gore can generate that outcry more efficiently in his current role than he ever could as President. As President, every time Gore goes on Meet the Press to talk about carbon taxes, they're going to also have some hack from The Concerned Citizen's Brigade or some other ridiculously misnamed corporate stooge group to bring up misleading or outright false claims, statistics, etc. to protest. But as a private person, he gets to host his own events, control the story the media tells much more effectively.

Plus, as David points out, he has authority without responsibility, which is ideal. He won't get tied down with scandals or negotiations about other issues. If Al Gore thinks the single most important issue facing us right now is global warming, then the best thing he could do for the cause is keep on doing exactly what he has been.