GORE WARNS: 'AMERICAN DEMOCRACY IN GRAVE DANGER'

Breitbart.com (AP) ^ | 10/6/05

[evolved_rage]

Are we still routinely torturing helpless prisoners, and if so, does it feel right that we as American citizens are not outraged by the practice?

You betcha, you damn Loser!!!!

[hobbes1]

How many of you, I wonder, have heard a friend or a family member in the last few years remark that it's almost as if America has entered "an alternate universe"?

Me. Everytime you give a speech.

[Arpege92]

"So why are we all paying attention to fat-boy Gore instead of the president?"

Comedy!

[MarineBrat]

[GladesGuru]

"you know the 'truth of the point here'. . ."

The point is on the top of the Goron's head - but truth and the Goron's pointed head are mutually repelled.

With apologies to the author, "Well, Gore is Gore, and truth is truth, and never the twain shall meet."

[Free Baptist]

Following are the distinctions made between a democracy and a republic by the United States War Department (now called the Department of Defense) in 1928, in Training Manual No. 2000-25. This manual was "Prepared under the direction of the Chief of Staff" for military officers on the subject of citizenship. We reproduce the pertinent portion of Training Manual 2000-25 here.

A DEMOCRACY:
: A government of the masses.
: Authority derived through mass meeting or any other form of direct expression results in mobocracy.
: Attitude toward property is communistic, negating property rights.
: Attitude toward law is that the will of the majority shall regulate whether it be based upon deliberation or governed by passion, prejudice, and impulse, without restraint or regard to consequences.
: Results in demagogism, license, agitation, discontent, anarchy.

A REPUBLIC:
: Authority is derived through the election by the people of public officials best fitted to represent them.
: Attitude toward [governance] is respect for laws and individual rights, and a sensible economic procedure.
: Attitude toward law is the administration of justice in accord with fixed principles and established evidence, with a strict regard to consequences.
: A greater number of citizens and extent of territory may be brought within its compass.
: Avoids the dangerous extreme of either tyranny or mobocracy.
: Results in statesmanship, liberty, reason, justice, contentment, and progress.

[steve-b]

Soon after television established its dominance over print, young people who realized they were being shut out of the dialogue of democracy came up with a new form of expression in an effort to join the national conversation: the "demonstration." This new form of expression, which began in the 1960s, was essentially a poor quality theatrical production designed to capture the attention of the television cameras long enough to hold up a sign with a few printed words to convey, however plaintively, a message to the American people.

New form of expression?? Public demonstrations are recorded in classical Greek and Roman history, and it wasn't new then, either.

[Polyxene]

"Gore and his ilk are the danger."

You are SO right! Talk about America being in danger -- if Gore would have been elected, we would be the Socialist States of Amerika right now! God protected us from Albert Arnold Algore, Jr. in 2000 and Ketchupboy Kerry in 2004 -- may He also protect us from the Heinous Harridan in 2008!

[Unicorn]

Just think of all the people that voted for this bozo in 2000
maybe the dems. have more dead voting than we thought.

[daviscupper]

A while back Al Gore use to say that the greatest threat to civilization was the "internal combustion engine." Now apparently he is saying the greatest threat to American democracy is the TV set. Well, he may be right but why is the solution to the problem to eat your TV set? Have you seen the size of this guy lately? I think he ate every TV set in Tennessee!

[MPJackal]

"Grave Danger"

Is there any other kind?

[mict42]

This guy is a true fruit loop.

[StandUpBucky]

"In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, there was - at least for a short time - a quality of vividness and clarity of focus in our public discourse that reminded some Americans - including some journalists - that vividness and clarity used to be more common in the way we talk with one another about the problems and choices that we face. But then, like a passing summer storm, the moment faded."

Gore must not have noticed all the follow up stories--in the print media--that said the reports from journalists during Katrina were all wrong. Over-hyped, misleading, and just plain wrong. I wouldn't call that clarity.
Plus I can't believe that he completely discounts the access that is found on talk radio. There are tons of different kinds of talk shows, not just from the right, and most of those shows take calls and there is a conversation in the "marketplace" of ideas.
Someone else had it right, he is lamenting these changes not because it endangers democracy but because they have ended the stranglehold the left had on the public discourse and the media.

[oldleft]

[RightWingAtheist]

ROFL! I'd love for Penn to do a whole episode of BullS*it! on Gore.

[Arpege92]

Ouch....you're gonna pay for that remark!

[TChris]

"I came here today because I believe that [the] American [D]emocra[t] is in grave danger [of extinction due to irrelevance]."

There, that's better.

[Pessimist]

"GORE WARNS: 'AMERICAN DEMOCRACY IN GRAVE DANGER'"

What a strange way for him to announce his "comeback". :)

[evets]

[lstanle]

"As recently stated by Dan Rather - who was, of course, forced out of his anchor job after angering the White House - television news has been "dumbed down and tarted up."

And how dumb did Dan think television viewers were when he tried to effect the outcome of a presidential election by broadcasting a FORGED document. Thank God for Buckhead and Free Republic.