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Maybe, he says--but we have to work fast. "I think the internal logic of both democracy and capitalism is architecturally the same," he says. Both are tools for pulling a lot of information together quickly, "the ideas and impulses and aspirations of millions and even billions of individuals." Both can move even faster now, thanks to technology, and both can gallop toward solutions to our problems, if only we can set them free of hobbling short-term interests. "The invisible hand in the marketplace and the wisdom of crowds in democratic decisionmaking" are two versions of the same powerful instrument, Gore says, and they are the best hope we have to find answers to the problems of the future. "I am by nature an optimist," he says.
A wispy cloud passed over the sun, and the heat-deflecting window shades adjusted themselves with a clatter. And why shouldn't he be optimistic? He is a man who not only survived one of the truly excruciating losses in U.S. political history but then picked himself up, staggered forward and soon found himself winning an entirely new race. As our conversation came to an end, Gore seemed content in a way he never did in politics, truly himself. He mastered disaster; he's his own happy ending.