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'Draft Gore' Movement Makes '08 Pitch
October 10, 2007 1:11 PM
ABC News' Nitya Venkataraman Reports: Grassroots organization DraftGore.com pleaded with former Vice President Al Gore to enter the 2008 presidential fray via an "open letter" in the New York Times.
Written on behalf of volunteers and petitioners behind the DraftGore movement and addressed to Gore, the full-page ad in the Times' A-section says:
"You say you have fallen out of love with politics, and you have every reason to feel that way. But we know you have not fallen out of love with your country. And your country needs you now -- as do your party and the planet you are fighting so hard to save." (LINK)
(The ad's timing comes two days before the announcement of this year's Nobel Peace Prize winners; Gore's crusade for the environment landed him a nomination.)
DraftGore.com founder Monica Friedlander started the group in 2000 after her "outrage" towards the outcome of the Bush-Gore battle for the White House. Today, the group is run by a five-member executive committee, including Friedlander, each of whom operate from different locations. Alongside Friedlander, the committee includes: Treasurer Eva Ritchey in North Carolina, Nathalie Green in Kentucy, Andrea Aronhovde in Washington, D.C., and web guru Bill McCormick in California.
Ritchey says the five organizers met "by accident over the Internet four years ago just seeking fellowship with other people who believe Al Gore was a missed opportunity for America" and insists DraftGore.com has had no contact with Gore's office outside of delivering a petition of signatures to the former Vice President in July urging Gore to make an '08 run.
Ritchey describes their efforts as "a draft, not a fan club."
Though they serve mainly as an Internet hub providing "resources to the ground troops," Ritchey says DraftGore.com will launch a letter-writing campaign in the next week to Florida DNC Chair Karen Thurman to put Al Gore's name on the state ballot.
"If the president serves the people, we ought to get the choice. And since he is a viable choice he ought to be on the ballot," Ritchey says.
Ritchey describes their campaign's defining moment as the New Hampshire Democratic debate on September 26 "when the country came face to face with major candidates waffling on the issue of Iraq. I think it hit them like a brick."
Air America Radio host Randi Rhodes the next night began promoting Gore as a "political solution", Ritchey says, ever since she describes the swell of ground support "like a tsunami."
Ritchey told ABC News the ad cost them $64,575 and ran on stand-by, meaning the ad could run at any time within a seven-day window. Though the ad has been part of the group's larger strategy since late spring, DraftGore.com founder Monica Friedlander says the money for the ad was raised in six days following an appeal about ten days ago to their 136,000-member signature base.
Abbe Serphos, PR Director at the New York Times, said Times policy does not allow them to "disclose the rate that any one advertiser pays" but did confirm the rate and standby status of the ad given to ABC News by DraftGore.com.
Serphos confirmed that the rate for a full-page, seven-day standby ad in this category is $64,575.
DraftGore.com chair Friedlander says most contributions came in small donations in the $20-$50 range.
Because of that, Ritchey adds the "ad belongs to the petitioners."
Both Ritchey and Friedlander mentioned the importance of keeping their grassroots movement to draft the former Vice President separate from Gore's office.
Friedlander insists, "This is our effort, no way driven by him or encouraged by him," but she adds, "They also don't try to stop us."
Gore spokeswoman Kalee Kreider told ABC News that the former Vice President "understands and appreciates the sentiment behind the ad" and "hears what people are trying to say to him, however he does not have any plan to run for president."
As for Friday's Nobel announcement, Kreider indicated that October 12 would be an "
October 10, 2007 in Tancredo, Tom | Permalink | User Comments (32)
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Just what we need: Gore vs Romney. Hypocrite1 vs Hypocrite2
Posted by: Royce | Oct 10, 2007 11:01:51 PM
Daddy get's it all wrong as do all the liberals who claim the 2000 elections lie,a s rigged, stolen, etc. Even when later, again, counting the chads fraudently as Gore's camp wanted it, Bush still won! It was recounted several times and each one had Bush winning. Stop spreading lies because of your sour grapes. I love how the liberals continually decry voter fraud, stolen elections, etc., but when they win a landslide victory into congress in the last election, suddenly, magically, everything worked great, all those supposed machines were now working and the Dem wins stand. How so very convenient? The Dems just can't stand the fact that they had thier heads stuck in the media land sand that was so sure Gore would win, as they were that kerry would, so of course they were shocked when they learnt otherwise.
Yes, I really do hope Gore wins again so he can again be devastated and humilated as last time. He's such a joke. thorw Hillary onthe ticket though to make it that much more winnable for us Repubs! The libs will always be whiners, liars, and bullies if they don't get their way and if you dare to simply disagree with them. Hillary is thier perfect duplicious candidate, with Gore's sleazy Hollywood connections being the perfect pairing.
Posted by: embrair | Oct 10, 2007 11:07:55 PM
And once again, we have liberals/progressives talking about the issues, and conservatives talking about liberals. Interesting, isn't it.
Posted by: Bill | Oct 11, 2007 1:20:04 AM
Rebuttal to posting by: embrair: In the 2000 election Mr. Gore garnered 48.4% of the popular vote to Bush's 47.9%, even without hanging chad. I believe that means MORE PEOPLE wanted Mr. Gore than Bush. It's unfortunate we have an antiquated and flawed electoral system. Rebuttal to posting by: Chas: Where in h--l did you come up with those figures? You need to look at the 2007 financial disclosure posted on opensecrets as reported by the Federal Election Commission. I'm not going to post the correct names and figures for you. It's people like you that makes me wish one of our legislators would author a bill requiring voters to pass an intelligence test in order to vote. I believe it would probably pass and Bush's veto would be over-ridden. Then there would be no more fiasco's like 2000 where a losing candidate becomes president.
Posted by: GC | Oct 11, 2007 1:34:25 AM
GO "Gulfstream Gorebal Warming" Gore! Living life by example! You set the environmental standard to which we should all live by!
Posted by: TexBork | Oct 11, 2007 2:21:59 AM
Gore won FL in 2000. If ALL the votes in FL had been recounted properly, Gore would have won. There has so much other documented election fraud by Bush-K Harris-et.al., including voter suppression, that Gore DID win FL.
Gore not winning TN is irrelevant.
Gore never said that he invented the internet. The actual "inventor" of the internet said that the World Wide Web would never have been developed as rapidly for ordinary people if it had not been for Gore.
Gore's house in TN is not only a residence. It houses three separate organizations AND all the security, both public and private, that the Gore family requires.
The National Academy of Sciences, who rarely endorse anything, have agreed with Gore's conclusions in "An Inconvenient Truth".
The 2000 and 2004 elections were fraudulent and stolen. Energy companies, Halliburton(s) and Blackwater(s), and Pentagon procurement fraud vultures helped bankroll that fraud, intimidation, and theft of the public will.
Posted by: KurtSteele | Oct 11, 2007 4:52:14 AM
Al Gore would make a great predident, but the media won't give him fair coverage during a campaign; it will be a repeat of 2000 when all of the mainstream media, including ABC, went after him with every lie spoonfed to them by the GOP.
Posted by: John MacNeill | Oct 11, 2007 7:53:33 AM
go go go al the time is now
Posted by: carl banda | Oct 11, 2007 11:33:00 AM
If Al was going to run, he would already be in the race. Sad.
Posted by: AngryCitizen | Oct 11, 2007 2:50:48 PM
As ABC takes my post down and mulls over the consequences of it for them, let us again understand that all MAINSCREAM media got taken badly and participated in the lies and failed direction of the neo con bushbaby swill buckets. The Miami Herald tried to destroy the election evidence from Florida quickly so you would not ever understand that most all the hanging CHADS were hanging under GORE votes and the ebullient katie harris and the cuban republican Miami Herald rag know it. You all here today should know this eternal truth as well...
Posted by: daddy | Oct 11, 2007 3:23:02 PM
"The 2000 and 2004 elections were fraudulent and stolen."
Kurt, so, if the voting machines don't work, votes are discounted, and people turned away how on Earth did the Dems sweep into power in congress in the last election?! It doesn't add up. You just can't face the facts.
Posted by: embrair | Oct 11, 2007 4:04:46 PM
Let the right-wing flying monkeys howl... Gore/Obama is a slam-dunk against Mayor 9/11, Fast-Hands Freddie, Flippin; Mitt or any other pathetic candidate they can possibly offer up.
Run, Al, RUN!
Posted by: Jonathan Blaque | Oct 11, 2007 6:44:53 PM
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