Resurrection of Al?

In an article that appeared on The Hill, it appears that Al Gore might be ready to make a Nixon like run at the White House. In 1960, John Kennedy narrowly defeated Richard Nixon in a controversial election. Nixon was exiled where he became even more of a joke after being defeated in his run for Governor of California in 1962. However, after the more conservative Barry Goldwater was destroyed by LBJ in 1964, Republicans started having second thoughts about Nixon. Nixon, in turn, started glad-handing the party faithful, positioning himself for a run at the nomination in 1968. He locked it up and then narrowly defeated Hubert Humphrey in the 1968 election.

This could be a potential mirror for Al Gore in 2008. Gore was narrowly defeated in the 2000 election that had its share of controversy. Bush was blamed, but Gore received a great deal of scorn as well for not putting things out of reach by either winning Tennessee or New Hampshire. Gore was exiled to the political wilderness and was even see as the kiss of death after he endorsed Howard Dean in 2004 and Dean suddenly collapsed. But the more liberal John Kerry’s worse-than-Gore defeat to Bush kept shifting more of the 2000 election anger on Bush and the Democratic establishment rather than on Gore himself.

Gore has also been endearing himself more and more to the moveon.org portion of the Democratic base with his consistent attacks on Bush policies and complete opposition to the war in Iraq. In addition, Gore’s consistent position on global warming and energy policy are a bit more in favor following the aftereffects of Hurricane Katrina and the gas price spikes of last year.

With these as tools, as well as a couple of political favors that Howard Dean still owes him, Gore might be able to score a win in Iowa and a first or second finish in New Hampshire. This might be able to give him traction and generate more money to his campaign. Senator Clinton is already on the outs with the more liberal base because of her mixed position on the war and there are growing fears that she might not be electable. If Gore out-greens her, he might steal enough of her support in the party machinery to overcome the neck-and-neck race he’ll have to deal with from Mark Warner (former governor of Virginia). This is where the mood of the party will come into play as to see if they’ll be ready to embrace a more moderate candidate in the mold of former President Clinton.

Now, could Gore win the election? I doubt it. He’s made himself too extreme with his cries in the wilderness and all those SNL caricatures are hard to overcome. I’m also not completely sure that Gore could beat Warner in a head-to-head match up. But, if he does defeat Warner, he might be able to capture enough momentum to seize the middle and take out the Republican candidate, especially if the nominee is a hard righter like Sen. Sam Brownback (Kan). Still, I’d keep an eye on Al in the near future.