MSNBC Countdown-Transcript

Interview

MSNBC Countdown-Transcript

OLBERMANN: As promised, a pleasure to once again be joined by Vice President Al Gore. The new book is "The Assault on Reason."

Thanks for your time again, sir.

GORE: My pleasure.

OLBERMANN: Cindy Sheehan‘s point, that this country cares more about a game show than the war in Iraq, so she‘s getting out of the whole process, do you agree with her? And is what she‘s saying kind of representative of what you‘ve written about in the new book?

GORE: I don‘t agree with that sentiment as it was expressed. I think that our public airwaves and, more importantly, the national conversation of democracy, if you will, now is dominated by elements that were not features of the conversation that our founders expected that we would have.

And a lot of the—a lot of the public forum is taken up not just with trivialities, but also with very cleverly constructed propagandistic messaging that really doesn‘t take logic and reason into account.

And we—there was never a golden age when everything was all logical in the past, of course not. But the relative role of facts and logic and reason used to be much larger than it has become in the age of 30-second TV ads and the multiscreen experience.

OLBERMANN: The sense of defeat in her statement, that the country doesn‘t want change, that she‘s beating her head against a wall, taking out the specifics of her and her situation, it does seem to be symbolic of what we‘re talking about, though. How on earth do you change the broader sense that protest, that dialogue, that involvement is meaningless or pointless?

GORE: Well, first of all, my heart goes out to all those Americans who have lost loved ones, be it children or spouses or partners or brothers and sisters, in the war. And, of course, Mrs. Sheehan is one of those who has tried to also play a role in our national dialogue.

And I‘d like to separate those two things. I think that it is difficult for any individual to gain access to the public forum in the same way that was the case when the printed word was dominant. I think that the Internet is bringing back not only the printed word, but a public marketplace of ideas, that is more accessible to individuals.

And for all of its excesses and bad features, the Internet does invite a robust multi-way conversation that I think is already beginning to serve as a corrective for some of the abuses of the mass media persuasion campaigns that brought us the invasion of Iraq and the ignoring of the climate crisis and the other serious mistakes that we‘ve been making over the last few years.

OLBERMANN: Put in context with me on this, and I want to get back to the Internet, because it‘s obviously, it‘s vitally important to any kind of feedback, any kind of interaction. But in terms of this public perception that it can or cannot effect change in this nation, the Democrats‘ agreement last week to continue to fund the war in Iraq, basically on President Bush‘s terms, do you see one as representative of the other? Fit them together for me.

GORE: Well, I think that it might have happened even without it, even without these trends, because the tools available to the legislative branch of government are less precise, and often more difficult to wield, than those available to the executive branch.

The power available to the executive branch has increased in the television age. And the use of symbols is something the—any president has the upper hand with over Congress, by and large. And when the congressional leaders didn‘t have the votes to override the president‘s veto, then their options were diminished.

I have a lot of faith in Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid and the new leaders of the committees, but they didn‘t have the votes. And so I understand that their options were reduced sharply.

But there‘s no doubt that a lot of people who felt that they would just instantly change the course of the war may not give them as much credit as they should for trying as hard and effectively as they have. And they‘re not done yet.

OLBERMANN: To one of those points in there, I was intrigued by the suggestion you made in the book about Congress should hold its key votes in prime time. That would get, theoretically, some of the public momentum back. At least people might initially mistake it for some sort of live-action series or reality show.

But why is it that you or I can check on the minute-by-minute progress of a football game or a basketball game or a baseball game or an "American Idol" show on the Internet, on a BlackBerry, on your cell phone, but last week, during those votes in the House and the Senate, I couldn‘t get a representative-by-representative vote or Senate-by-Senate vote, senator-by-senator vote, anywhere on the Internet. What happened there?

GORE: I think that‘s an excellent point, Keith, and it should be remedied. And I have a list of specific recommendations for a lot of the institutions of our society, including the Congress, and that‘s one of them. I think that we should have the most important debates in prime time, so that the American people could watch if they choose to.

And I think that the Congress and all parts of the government should be transparent to those citizens who wish to contact them over the Internet and get a minute-by-minute, second-by-second account of what‘s going on, and give their own opinions during the process.

OLBERMANN: And on the subject of transparency, you also argue in the book, let me read the quote precisely, "The current White House has engaged in an unprecedented and sustained campaign of mass deception, especially where its policies in Iraq are concerned." Should that not be put in the present tense? Isn‘t the administration still using propaganda and disinformation, especially on Iraq? And what are the immediate steps to try to remedy that?

GORE: Well, the—they have—the president himself has changed his rhetoric slightly on the implied linkage between Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden, but the vice president has not. And overall, more than half of Americans still have the opinion that Saddam was involved in that attack. At the time the Congress voted, 70 percent believed that Saddam Hussein was primarily responsible for the attack of 9/11.

And I think that impression did not come about accidentally, I think that there was an organized effort, with all of these administration spokesmen in the same week going out and using the same phrases, a mushroom cloud over an American city, the uranium from Africa that Saddam was supposedly using to make a bomb that he would then give to Osama, it was all false, it was all nonsense.

But the fact that it was conveyed so skillfully and so effectively that more than two-thirds of the American people had it firmly in mind as the principal reason to support the invasion of Iraq, that‘s an indictment of the integrity of this national conversation of democracy that our founders assumed would take place, with a well-informed citizenry that would hold our elected officials accountable.

And the fact that that‘s not working is not so much an indictment of President Bush and Vice President Cheney, although it is, but much more serious, in my view, is that our nation was so vulnerable to such crass efforts to manipulate opinion and drive the country in directions we would never have chosen if we had a full and open debate.

OLBERMANN: The premise of the book appears to be, in sum, and if I‘m wrong, please correct me, or someone will send in an e-mail immediately, for democracy to work, people need to connect with each other, connect with the political system, and actively take part in the democratic process. But at the heart of it, aren‘t you demanding first that people think? How do you—you can‘t force them to think.

GORE: Well, I think that all of the activities of democracy that come natural to us as human beings, regardless of where we were born—immigrants who come here from other countries take to our democratic processes like ducks to water, because it‘s a universal desire for dignity and respect.

But when the conversation is diverted to these trivialities and to these propagandistic efforts to sway public opinion this way and that in a one-way dialogue, then people don‘t have a way to join the conversation.

One of the reasons why so many Americans feel as if their votes don‘t count, that their opinions aren‘t heard, and that they have no way of meaningfully participating in our democracy, is because they know that, for example, in the last election in November, 80 percent of the campaign budgets and contested races were spent on these 30-second TV ads. Those are one-way. They aren‘t based on facts and logic. And campaigns never have been entirely thus based.

But, when the bulk of it is made up of these mass persuasion techniques that don‘t respect the facts and don‘t respect the people who are the objects of this persuasion, then we get the kinds of serious mistakes that we have seen with the climate crisis, with the invasion of Iraq, with the mass warrantless eavesdropping on American citizens, eliminating the prohibition against torture that General George Washington laid down that‘s been respected by every president and both parties for more than 200 years.

These things happen not just because one White House makes terrible decisions, but because we are more vulnerable to these kinds of sophisticated efforts to bypass reason and logic to reach a preconceived policy that was decided before the facts were ever brought into play.

It‘s like the old line from "Alice in Wonderland," first the verdict, then the trial. If they decide to invade Iraq regardless of the facts, then there‘s no discussion of the facts that‘s going to matter. But we the people, without using the phrase in a way that inevitably sounds corny, we the people must reclaim the integrity of our democracy by using the new tools that are now beginning to be available to us, to insist on respect for reason and logic to a degree that our founders hoped would be the case.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

OLBERMANN: So you‘re wondering about the other thing with Al Gore, the running stuff? Think you‘ll find he is now officially undecided. Our interview continues.

And among the candidates who are decided, Senator Obama gets extraordinarily good news from the polls.

You are watching COUNTDOWN on MSNBC.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

OLBERMANN: The only reason Al Gore‘s movie, "An Inconvenient Truth," was even in a position to win an Oscar this past February was because he had lost the 2000 Florida recount.

Our fourth story on the COUNTDOWN, as plan B‘s go, Mr. Gore‘s comeback career has been hugely successful.

But he as his finding out on the media tour for this, his latest book, "The Assault on Reason," questions about whether he‘s planning to take another shot at the White House are impossible to escape. Many, myself included, cannot help but wonder if, on global warming, on Iraq, on any of a number of imperative issues, Mr. Gore could surely be more effective from inside the Oval Office than from the top of the bestseller lists.

More now of our conversation with Al Gore from earlier today.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

OLBERMANN: Listen, by the way, one other topic while you‘re here, I know nobody ever asks you about this, it‘s the prospect of you seeking the presidential nomination next year. There‘s an item in the "Newsweek" June 4 issue that reads, "He," and that would be you, "is 50-50, according to one of his closest friends and financial backers." What‘s your reaction to that item?

GORE: Well, whoever that was doesn‘t reflect my thinking. And I can‘t even answer the question, Keith, without sounding repetitious. You know my answer. I‘m not thinking about running. I don‘t expect to run. Yes, I haven‘t ruled out the possibility at some point in the future, but I‘m not keeping that exception alive to be coy. I really don‘t expect to be a candidate again.

But here we are, 500 days or so before the next election. I don‘t see why, you know, everybody has to close the doors and say, OK, let‘s narrow the field, and make your bets. I‘m an American citizen. I‘m going to continue speaking out on my views forcefully and as best I can.

And this book, "The Assault on Reason," is really about not politics or candidates, but about the way the whole system operates, and how it‘s gone off course, in my opinion, and how we can set it right again.

OLBERMANN: And it is a call to action to the American electorate, to get more involved in the things that really matter to our survival, not just as a democracy, but, as you pointed out in "An Inconvenient Truth," as the human race.

But to that point, sort of threading these two things together, could it not be argued that the best thing you could do personally to get the changes you say that we need is to actually become president of the United States?

GORE: Well, I respect that argument, and I‘m under no illusions that there‘s any position as influential as that of president of the United States. I don‘t think I‘m necessarily very good at politics or at a lot of the things that our modern political system rewards. And as a result, I‘m serving in other ways. I‘m involved in a different kind of campaign, to persuade people to solve the climate crisis.

And it‘s really as part that effort that I‘ve addressed the problems with our democracy. I‘m convinced that we have to fix the foundations in our democracy in order to make better choices and solve the climate crisis.

OLBERMANN: All right. The one last topical or nontopical question, depending, I guess we would view it as topical and you would view it as nontopical. You mentioned the door closing. When does the door close?

GORE: I have no idea.

OLBERMANN: You don‘t know that? That‘s still up in the air?

GORE: Oh, I thought you were talking about deadlines and dates and so forth. I really don‘t know those dates.

OLBERMANN: That‘s where we‘ll leave it. The 45th vice president of the United States, Al Gore, whose new book is "The Assault on Reason." I hope you are as successful with it as you were with "An Inconvenient Truth," and that the results are as positive for all of us.

GORE: Thank you very much, Keith. And thanks for your passionate involvement, in your own way, trying to address a lot of these same issues.

OLBERMANN: You‘re very kind, sir. As ever, great thanks for being so generous with your time.

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