In article <c183oa$31af$1@pencil.math.missouri.edu>, Michael Givel says...

February 9, 2004

New York Times

Gore Says Bush Betrayed the U.S. by Using 9/11 as a Reason for War in
Iraq

by Katharine Q. Seeleye

NASHVILLE, Feb. 8 - In a withering critique of the Bush
administration, former Vice President Al Gore on Sunday accused
the president of betraying the country by using the Sept. 11
attacks as a justification for the invasion of Iraq.

"He betrayed this country!" Mr. Gore shouted into the microphone
at a rally of Tennessee Democrats here in a stuffy hotel
ballroom. "He played on our fears. He took America on an
ill-conceived foreign adventure dangerous to our troops, an
adventure preordained and planned before 9/11 ever took place."

The speech had several hundred Democrats roaring their approval
for Mr. Gore, the party's 2000 standard-bearer.

Mr. Gore was one of three Tennessee Democrats, along with former
Gov. Ned McWherter and former Senator James Sasser, being honored
by the state party two days before the state's Democratic primary
on Tuesday.

The event served as a neutral platform for this season's
candidates. Gen. Wesley K. Clark and Senator John Edwards
addressed the crowd, but it was Mr. Gore who fired it up.

While the other honorees and party officials gave a nod to all of
the candidates, Mr. Gore, who has endorsed Howard Dean, referred
to his candidate in a nonpartisan manner.

He said he appreciated that Dr. Dean "spoke forthrightly" against
the war in Iraq, brought new people into the party and inspired
the grass roots over the Internet. But Mr. Gore told the crowd
that at an earlier reception for Dr. Dean, who was in Maine, he
had said that no matter who won Tennessee on Tuesday, "any one of
these candidates is far better than George W. Bush."

But his appreciation of Dr. Dean was tucked in passing into a
fiery meditation on his own political history, including a
recollection of the tactics used by the Republicans against his
father, a longtime populist senator from Tennessee, in his last,
losing election in 1970.

He recalled that President Richard M. Nixon had used "the
politics of fear" to make his father, Albert Gore Sr., out to be
unpatriotic and an atheist. And when his father lost, Mr. Gore
said, his father said: "The truth shall rise again."

He said he recalled that defeat because "the last three years
we've seen the politics of fear rear its ugly head again." Like
the Nixon administration, Mr. Gore said, the Bush administration
is not committed to principle but is obsessed with its
re-election.

"The American people recognize that there's a lot of politics
going on," said Claire Buchan, a White House spokeswoman, in
reference to Mr. Gore's comments.

Mr. Gore said he was ready to break his silence about his
disagreements with the Bush administration before the Sept. 11
attacks, but afterward he threw his speech in the trash.

But then the war in Iraq came, and he felt betrayed. "It is not a
minor matter to take the loyalty and deep patriotic feelings of
the American people and trifle with them," he declared, adding
with a shout: "The truth shall rise again."

General Clark followed Mr. Gore with a notably tamer speech. But
he honored Mr. Gore, saying, "The 2000 election was stolen from
the Democratic Party," and that Mr. Gore "would have been and
should have been a great president."

Mr. Edwards arrived long after Mr. Gore spoke and apparently had
little idea of what had occurred inside the room. He invoked his
Southern roots and was greeted with cheers.

Earlier, on the ABC program "This Week," he seemed to leave the
door open just a crack to the possibility of being the
vice-presidential nominee if he does not win the nomination.

While reiterating that he was not interested in being vice
president and did not see a circumstance where he would change
his mind, he was less unequivocal when asked why he would not
accept the nomination "if your party needs you."

"You don't know what's going to happen a month, three months, six
months from now," Mr. Edwards said. "As I sit here today, I
intend to fight with everything I've got to be the nominee. I
think I am the alternative in the Democratic Party to Senator
Kerry."

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company


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