That’s not quite how I remember it. Sure Gore’s supposed stiffness was an issue, but there could have been all sorts of ways to dispense with that some of which he had already done. For the debates Gore chose just about the worst thing he could do, looking like he was cozying up to Bush and agreeing with him more than disagreeing, which had the net effect of making Bush look “smart” or at least smarter than he was. Here’s a couple of excerpts from Michael Moore’s book Stupid White Men that expresses it better than I can:
Privately, I think most people in the Nader camp thought what I thought-that once Gore had a chance to wipe the floor with Bush in a debate, the election would be over. So we figured, let's get out millions of votes for Nader to show the next President--Al Gore-that there's a large number of Americans who don't want him pushing the Democratic Party further to the right. A strong vote for Nader might be a way to check Gore and his promise to do things like spend more on the military and less on jobs. Yeah, we were real geniuses. Then came the debates. Ralph was shut out of them, which left America with three ninety-minute shows in which Gore and Bush agreed with each other more than they disagreed. In the second debate, the two of them said they agreed with each other on thirty-seven different issues. It was stunning to watch. Gore had blown it. He had failed to unmask Bush's ignorance and stupidity. He had failed to set himself apart and show the nation there was a real difference on the ballot. He had three chances to nuke that smirking son of a Bush, and he couldn't do it! Message to the country: If this is how he caves with Junior, what will happen when he gets in a room with the Russians? Or the Canadians! I was shocked by the implications. It was starting to look as if Gore would lose. He was going to lose his home state. He was going to lose Clinton's home state. He couldn't convince the Democratic dean of the Senate, Robert Byrd of West Virginia, to endorse him until five days before the election (thus sacrificing West Virginia, a traditional Democratic stronghold, to Bush). Any one of these states would have given Gore all the electoral votes he would need to win the White House. And the money shot: Then Al Gore failed to win the third and final debate with George W. Bush. Now where I come from, the smart guy wins in a debate; the dumb guy loses. It really is that simple. But not this time. I couldn't believe my eyes. It was clear that Al Gore was doing everything he could to lose the election. That was exactly my feeling too: it looked like he wanted to lose, and I couldn’t quite believe what I was seeing either. It was almost like he was in some sort of trance. If Hillary attempts anything like that, I believe all is lost. But hopefully she won’t. Hopefully she’ll dispense with any and all doubts bout whatever by being the best Democratic candidate she can be, not by trying to do everything she can to lose. We’ll find out soon. Sal On Sep 21, 2016, at 10:07 AM, authfri...@yahoo.com [FairfieldLife] <FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com> wrote: ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com <mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com>, <salsunshineiniowa@...> wrote : (snip) There’s really only one way Hillary could lose this debate IMO, and that’s if she pulls a Gore and tried to play down her own massive intelligence and experience in an attempt to make Trump look smarter than he is. Why anyone would do that is of course the big question, which I’m sure still leaves psychologists scratching their heads about Gore and his first debate to this day. Gore wasn't so much trying to make Bush look smarter. Gore had been brutally mocked for being too wonkish and was portrayed as stiff and boring, and he was attempting to counter that image. Hillary actually has a similar problem. She needs to come across as human and charming as well as intelligent and experienced. Not fair, but that's the way it is.
