Gore and peace

[T_i_B]

http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/jonathan_freedland/2007/10/gore_and_peace.html

Well, that certainly puts Judge Michael Burton in his place. Earlier this week, the high court judge ruled that Al Gore's movie, An Inconvenient Truth, contained nine scientific errors which had arisen in the context of "alarmism and exaggeration", and that therefore the film should only be shown in British schools with some balancing guidance notes. Somehow I suspect the blow of that court ruling will be softened by today's news that Al Gore, along with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, has won the Nobel peace prize for his advocacy on the issue of global warming - at the heart of which is, of course, An Inconvenient Truth.

When I saw the film more than a year ago, I wrote that it was a "model of political communication", somehow taking facts that you might have already known in your head and using them to reach your gut - which is where lasting political convictions reside. Many who had known abstractly about climate change before seeing Gore's movie admit they only truly cared about it, and saw its urgency, afterwards. And that turnaround has been repeated in countless countries among millions of people. For that remarkable achievement alone, Gore richly deserves his shared Nobel.

It'll be fascinating to see how this news is received in the US. There will be pride in an American winner and, among more than a few Democrats, feverish hope that this might push Gore to do what he has so far refused to do - and enter the 2008 election race. That drumbeat speculation had already started, even before the Nobel decision had been announced. This week a full-page ad appeared in the New York Times in the form of an open letter to the former vice president. "You say you have fallen out of love with politics, and you have every reason to feel that way," they wrote. "But we know you have not fallen out of love with your country. And your country needs you now - as do your party and the planet you are fighting to save."

Behind the ad is the Draft Gore campaign, frantically organising in key states such as Iowa and Florida or gathering signatures in Michigan to ensure Gore at least has a place on the primary ballot. According to John Nichols of the Nation, Draft Gore is better organised in some places than several of the official presidential campaigns, motivated by Democrats who would prefer "to nominate an internationally acclaimed thinker and activist than a cautious-and-calculating former First Lady or a cautious-but-somewhat-more-inspiring junior senator from Illinois."