Quotes of the Day

If most people had been listening to Al Gore for the past year and a half, they wouldn't have been so surprised by his endorsement of Howard Dean early Tuesday. But not many people were listening. Gore told a crowd in September of 2002 that President Bush's quickening march to war with Iraq was a disaster; the party leaders who did notice called it a stupid move that would put Gore on the wrong side of history. Gore told TIME two months later, "I don't care." He was going to speak his mind from now on.

And since then he has, attacking the Bush Administration's policies on the war, the economy and the environment relentlessly. With all nine of the Democratic presidential candidates currently howling over Bush's struggles in Iraq and conservative policies at home, it's easy to forget that before the 2002 election debacle, Gore and Dean were two of the only Dems going after him. Is there some complicated strategy behind Gore's endorsement in Harlem Tuesday morning? Who knows what goes on in the mind of Al Gore? But he was definitely at the forefront of Dems who decided the only way to beat Bush was to tack left and appeal to the base. And that gives him a lot in common with Howard Dean.

You could probably forgive Dean's opponents for starting to suspect he sold his soul to the devil at some point. Last month his comments about the stars and bars threatened to blow him off the road, but then two of the biggest unions in the country gave him their endorsements. As he began to transform his campaign into a nationwide effort last week, he got distracted by days of debate over his refusal to release his records from his five terms as Vermont governor. Now he gets the nod from the guy who won more votes than any Democrat in history.

The endorsement caught everyone by surprise. (Between this and the President's visit to Baghdad, reporters are starting to wonder if there any leakers left in Washington) Some former Gore aides said that the Veep is just unpredictable since 2000, doing whatever he wants in far less scripted fashion than he ran his campaigns. Political pundits started seeing conspiracy theories, calling the endorsement the first shot of the battle between Gore and Hillary Clinton for the 2008 nomination. Dick Morris wrote in his New York Post column, "The fight we are witnessing is a battle for control of the Democratic Party." By announcing his endorsement just one block from Bill Clinton's Harlem office, the theory goes, Gore was stepping out as the political godfather of the party's liberal wing.

Who knows if Gore thinks he's going to be facing down Hillary in four years? But his words over the past two years show he is part of the Dean wing of the party, the Democrats who believe the key to winning next Fall will be energizing and turning out their base. To centrist Democrats like the Clintons and Joe Lieberman, this is disastrous, a return to the failed candidacies of McGovern, Mondale and Dukakis. The angry liberals argue that times have changed — with the country polarized between love and hatred for this president, there are no swing voters in the middle to appeal to. Gore obviously believes it, and he's not afraid to say so.

Some reader responses to this article:

If Al Gore's opinion has attracted as much attention as it has and carries as much weight as it apparently does, it makes you wonder, should he really be sitting this one out? Was this supposed to be his election?
Tony Bellandi
Puyallup, Wash.

What the DLC and the DNC don't realize is that Democrats want to go all out against Bush's radical conservatism with a return to the Democratic liberal tradition. We don't want to be quasi-Republicans, we want to be what we are: liberals. Clinton didn't win because of his programs; he won because he was Clinton. Clinton-lite didn't work for Gore and it won't work for Dean. Gore recognizes that Dean is going to wipe the floor with Bush because Bush's radical conservatism is too far out of the mainstream values of middle America.
Eric Blackstead
Essex Fells, N.J.

I think that Gore should have waited until the first primaries were over to see which candidate the public was leaning towards and which candidates would be dropping out of the race. Then he could have made his choice of Dean. The appearance of the Gore endorsement slights the important middle of the road Gephardt wing of the party.
Michael Murphy
Lubbock, Texas

He should have kept his mouth shut if he could not have endorsed Lieberman, who was good enough for him in the last election. How embarrassing for Lieberman! Gore is a jerk!
D. Ugarte
Eagle Lake, Texas

I think it strengthens Dean, which in turn strengthens Bush's chances dramatically to retain the White House, which personally is what I hope happens.
J. Durham
Dallas, Texas

I think Al Gore's endorsement of Howard Dean is wonderful. Not only because it helps Dean, but because it shows that Gore has learned a lot since the 2000 election. Gore is FINALLY showing the guts he lacked back in 2000, which made him lose the election.
V. Ocasio
Auburn, Ala.

• Mitch Frank
• The former Veep has been simpatico with Howard Dean for months