Topic category:  Other/General

by Jim Kouri, CPP

Political analysts and pundits have long suspected that former Vice President Al Gore is considering another run for the presidency. He lost to President Bush in 2000 after a highly contested race and he stubbornly continues to encourage the Democrat Party base to believe Bush "stole" the election.

With front-runner Senator Hillary Clinton's recent poll numbers revealing she'd be a weak, polarizing candidate, conventional wisdom is that Gore believes he has a good shot at capturing the Democrat Party nomination which is usually clinched by a candidate moving to the left and once nominated then appear to be moving to the center of the political spectrum. Clinton's prospects for nomination appear to be spiraling downward. A visit to the Hillary 2008 website indicates that thus far 77 people visited her site. That's obviously not much in the way of a groundswell of support for the junior Senator from New York. So enter John Kerry. Enter John Edwards. And enter Al Gore.

Gore's many speeches across the country have made a splash both in the mainstream media and the so-called new media -- blogs, Internet news sites, talk radio and Fox News Channel. And many political observers believe that's the point of his emotional, vitriolic language and his shouting like a Pentecostal minister caught up in the Holy Spirit.

For starters, a Political Action Committee, Patriots for Al Gore, has called for a special counsel to investigate the current NSA surveillance program being employed by the Bush administration, in response to its admission that this program has existed and "has wiretapped millions of Americans without obtaining proper warrants as outlined in current FISA laws." Of course, no one except certain members of the Bush Administration, congress and the intelligence community knows how many Americans were wiretapped. And one truly wonders if there were warrants issued to spy on millions of Americans, would that be honky-dory with the left-wingers?

The Patriots for Al Gore PAC claims it is in solidarity with remarks made by former Vice President Al Gore on January 16, 2006, that "rightfully challenged the administration and Congress to fulfill their oaths and to abide by the Constitution."

(One lawyer friend told me that the Constitutional clause that prohibits the NSA surveillance program is right next to the clause that guarantees a woman's right to abortion.)

PAG says full disclosure of all information pertinent to any illegal and/or unconstitutional activity must be provided to this special counsel and Congress in order to ensure a proper balance between liberty and security. In other words, they want all top secret information to be delivered to the special counsel process -- a process known more for leaks than for effectiveness.

One would think that with Gore's involvement in electronic surveillance during the Clinton Administration, he'd wish to avoid the topic. During the eight years he served as Vice President, the NSA performed far-reaching surveillance in a program code named "Echelon." The program even had it's own vocabulary known as the Echelon Dictionary. Echelon reportedly was domestic spying in every sense of the term.

Not surprising is the fact that not one Democrat complained about Echelon when the program was revealed by the New York Times and CBS News in 2000. And because of the Clinton impeachment fiasco, Republicans, true to their nature of being weak-kneed, were gun-shy when it came to calling for any more special prosecutors.

The Patriots for Al Gore's first order of business appears to be a petition to the Congress to do its duty as representatives of the people to restore the rule of law. It's been initiated by Patriots for Al Gore in the hopes of collecting enough signatures by fall 2006 to be delivered to the Capitol in Washington, DC by its Chairperson, Jan Moore.

There's no coincidence that PAG is looking at a fall target date -- just around the time of the 2006 election cycle.

According to statement released by Ms. Moore: " [T]he threats that remain to our national security now cannot be properly dealt with if taxpayers' money is being spent to wiretap millions of innocent Americans in violation of the very rights we need to fight to preserve, which gives terrorists freedom to plan attacks. They also cannot be preserved with partisan bickering. Such methods that skew the balance between liberty and security for partisan reasons only further the goals of terrorism and are counterproductive to the survival of Democracy. They must know that the American people object to such practices."

While Ms. Moore is only now starting to make serious noises, her work for Gore goes back to the 2004 "Draft Gore for President" campaign that ended when he endorsed Howard Dean. While many found this early endorsement a surprise, it's understandable that Gore felt a kinship with Dean. Both men display rather odd public-speaking behavior and both men are shrill demagogues of the left.

Moore also chaired an organization called "Progressives for Gore" which worked on Gore's presidential campaign. As the chairwoman, her accusations that Bush stole the 2000 election resonated with some moderate democrats, but her allegations that Bush stole it again in 2004 left her with ... well, the far-left.

Right after Gore lost to Bush in 2000, Ms. Moore said, "[We] remain committed to restoring the Peoples' President Albert Gore, Jr." Of course, "restoring" would mean Gore was inaugurated President at some time, which never occurred, a fact that eludes Ms. Moore.

Anyone claiming that Bush's secret NSA program is illegal is either ignorant about warfare or deliberately trying to mislead Americans. Congress gave the President the power to wage war in their September 14, 2001 resolution. Besides killing or capturing the enemy -- in this case terrorists -- part of warfare is the gathering of tactical -- as opposed to strategic -- intelligence. Critics claim the resolution doesn't say anything about NSA surveillance. True. But it is also silent on the use of tanks, but it's assumed tanks are part of warfare. So too is intelligence gathering part of warfare.

Chinese warrior-philosopher Sun Tzu once wrote, "Whenever you want to attack an [enemy], first you must know the identities of their [leaders], their associates, their visitors, their gatekeepers and their chamberlains, so have your spies find out."

Military operations are not police investigations that require warrants, rules of evidence and other protections and rights. Military operations should be designed to kill the enemy, disorient their followers, capture "intelligence assets," and win each and every battle. Someone should drum that fact into the heads of the appeasers and the Goretics.

Jim Kouri
Chief of Police Magazine (Contributing Editor)

Biography - Jim Kouri

Jim Kouri, CPP is currently fifth vice-president of the National Association of Chiefs of Police. He's former chief at a New York City housing project in Washington Heights nicknamed "Crack City" by reporters covering the drug war in the 1980s. In addition, he served as director of public safety at a New Jersey university and director of security for a number of organizations. He's also served on the National Drug Task Force and trained police and security officers throughout the country. He writes for many police and crime magazines including Chief of Police, Police Times, The Narc Officer, Campus Law Enforcement Journal, and others. He's appeared as on-air commentator for over 100 TV and radio news and talk shows including Oprah, McLaughlin Report, CNN Headline News, MTV, Fox News, etc. His book Assume The Position is available at Amazon.Com, Booksamillion.com, and can be ordered at local bookstores. Kouri holds a bachelor of science in criminal justice and master of arts in public administration and he's a board certified protection professional.