The Tennessean runs a story today on Gore’s message, which follows on what I thought was a perceptive opinion piece by David Brooks in The New York Times a couple days prior (well, not everyone thought it perceptive).

Al Gore’s newest (s)creed comes in the form of a lament. Moving on from the gospel of environmental disaster, which causes the otherwise anti-religious among us to throw their hands to the heavens and shake with the spirit of Gaea, we are implored to now look to the American political tragedy

“There is a crack in the foundation of our democracy,” the former Tennessee senator said.

That crack, he said, is caused by the replacement of reasoned dialogue with manipulative appeals to emotion.

We have nothing to fear but Al Gore himself - and the Democrats say that Republicans peddle the emotion. Having read a number of excerpts from the book, I cannot help but flashback to college, where reading the tedious writing of overeducated academics was a daily requirement. Having moved beyond that phase of life, I see no reason to be so masochistic - especially since we’re talking only about a self proclaimed academic, who so gloriously flunked out of divinity school, couldn’t finish law school, and who (funny enough) received a “D” in natural sciences at Harvard with an overall “C” average.

But hey, he writes nearly as awkwardly as Bush speaks, and a Gore presidency would have required us all to wear solar panels on our backs by now, so I’m happy with the trade off.

Gore’s complaint seems to stem from the emotional “manipulation” of the public by the Bush administration over the Iraq war and the public’s reliance on broadcast media (as Brooks notes, doesn’t the Internet solve a lot of the problems Gore bemoans?). The former vice president’s inescapable conclusion is that no one rational could believe what conservatives believe. Because, as we now all know, the 9/11 attacks never actually happened, Saddam Hussein wasn’t responsible for a million deaths, and France and Russian didn’t maintain the same threat assessment the United States did. If only we would just skip away from the Middle East with a smile on our face. Without our interference the region would devolve back into the great and peaceful landscape it has always been. Perhaps even women will get the chance to vote by the next millennium. Or, if we’re lucky, men will, too.

Contrary to Gore’s assertion, the American public isn’t stupid. There’s a difference between dumb and busy. Yes, people get their information faster now - because they can, and because life has become more and more complex with each generation. Read Gore’s book in its entirety if you must - I’m going to stage a protest and watch some TV.