No, not really. But former Vice-President Al Gore has endorsed former Vermont Governor and Democratic front-runner Howard Dean. Gore said it was time for Dems to get behind the front-runner and present a united front next November in order to defeat Bush. Now, I don't like Al Gore. I've never made a secret of this. But, this endorsement is good news for Dean and bad news for almost everybody else. Gore, an establishment-type who has always been a creature of the party, has endorsed an insurgent candidate whose support is primarily grass-roots. This gives Dean's canidacy the only thing it lacked. Establishment credentials. One would have expected Gore to go with Kerry or Lieberman, but I guess he was waiting to see who the front-runner was and throw his weight behind him. There's nothing like winning, after all.Is there a sinister ulterior motive at work here? Is Gore backing someone he knows will be destroyed in the general in order to position himself as a candidate in 2008? Maybe. Gore's not that old, and one can only assume still covets the presidency. Gore may be waiting to go all Nixon circa 1964 on us. If that's the case, then it is probably by far the most Machiavellian thing Gore has ever done. I guess we'll have to wait and see.
Bill Kristol and E.J. Dionne Jr. squared off in today's post about the chances of Dean actually winning the presidency and who might be able to stop him from winning the nomination. Dionne actually makes a really good point about there being an "anybody-but-Dean" candidate:
And even if Rep. Richard Gephardt slows down the Dean machine by beating Dean in Iowa, Gephardt's continued viability could further slow the emergence of a single anti-Dean alternative.
Tony
