I agree with you. (I omitted if Dean loses from my post.) At first blush though I see this as move by Gore to pay back the Clinton-McAuliffe power structure that he believed made it impossible for him to run again. (Remember how all of the big donors supposedly zipped up their purses when he came calling about 2004?)
Al Gore is clever enough to know Dean won't win in 2004.
This I don't know. Al Gore needed a half dozen consultants to figure out what color suit to wear. I don't think he has much in the way of political intuition. He does have lots of anger over 2000 though. Dean lets him vent that with his hate-Bush rhetoric and there is the added bonus of the anti-Clinton/McAuliffe candidate. Al just couldn't resist.
Chris Matthews actually said, when commenting on this news today, that Gore "nobly accepted" the Supreme Court decision back in 2000.
Poor Chris, always swayed by pretty words. He was very taken with Gore's concession speech (which I will grant was well written and delivered), but he ignores Gore's subsequent words and behavior, which have NOT been noble. More like a big sulk.