June 29, 2006
FOLLOWING IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF PRESIDENT STEVENSON (via Glenn Dryfoos):
OK, I'M A GORE FLACK (Martin Peretz , 06.28.06, New Republic)
I confess: I did buy five copies of Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth. But that doesn't explain why the book is on nearly every one of the important best-seller lists in the country. This coming Sunday, it's number one on The New York Times paperback best-seller list. Last week, it was already number one on the best-seller lists of The Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, and Denver Post. Book Sense, the weekly report of the Independent Book Sellers Association, also has it in the top place.Do I think this should worry Hillary Clinton? Yes. Not because she hasn't written a book that was on the best-seller list. She may have even written two: It Takes a Village and Living History. But let's face facts. In contrast to Gore's writing his own three books, she didn't really write any of hers herself. And, frankly, they are not serious books anyway, although It Takes a Village is a warm and fuzzy volume purporting to be about children's policy.
The New Republic will apparently never figure out that the reason Al Gore isn't president today is because he's the kind of guy who might write his own books. Posted by Orrin Judd at June 29, 2006 6:32 PM
Instead of playing the innuh-lectual in 2000, Gore would've been better served if he'd played up the fact that he flunked out of post-grad div school and was iirc about to flunk out of law school too when his pops sent him to Vietnam.
Posted by: Jim in Chicago at June 29, 2006 6:50 PMAside from just writing his own books, Gore is obsessed about continuoiusly talking about his books to anyone who'll listen and even to folks who don't, which manages to stoke the fires of the true believers, but reminds everyone else that Al is a tad eccentric when it comes to certain beliefs.
Hillary, on the other hand, collects a big royalty, has a book ghost-written, does the obligatory tour and then barely says a peep about the tome once all the marketing potential has been squeezed out of it. Far more cynical, but much better if you don't want your writings or utterances related to the book to come back and haunt you in 2008.
Posted by: John at June 29, 2006 8:37 PMIs it possible that that by 2008 (particularly if Republicans gain in 2006) the dems will be so deranged that they will pick Gore over Hillary?
One hopes this is the case.
He can self-fund, the shock troops will be behind him, and the Public Employee Unions will back him while the rest of labor will be indecisive.
Is it too much to hope?
Posted by: Bruno at June 30, 2006 12:32 PMHe will try for the obese vote, which (if the HHS is to be believed) is a growing plurality.
Posted by: ratbert at June 30, 2006 3:09 PM