Yours.

She says I look like New York
says I remind her of home
she wears the shortiest shorts
she talks the phoniest phone

she's fragile like a butter(fly) like a diamond ring
you can pop her rubber-band, but I'm her bumble bee sting

I got a woman, and her name is yours
I don't know what to tell you, brother
but when it rains, pours

She says she fell like a stone
gave me her trembling heart
says she's too young to be alone
too old to go back to the start

she's fragile like a butter(fly) like a diamond ring
you can pop her rubber-band, but I'm her bumble bee sting

I got a woman, and her name is yours
I don't know what to tell you, brother
but when it rains, pours
Pours.

On Al Gore, and why he won't (can't) run for president in '08

REASONS:

1. Hillary Clinton
   
   
1. For all of the non-partisan political mumbo-jumbo, Al Gore is still a Democrat. He's loyal, I gotta give him that. His party may want him to run, but they want him to not run against Hillary more.
   
   The simple reality is, with Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton already battling for this bid, Citizen Al entering the bid would only split votes, weaken Hillary's campaign, and pull very few votes from Obama. Meaning it would do more work towards splitting the Democratic nomination campaign into even more of a tight-rope campaign (with unwanted mud-slinging inevitably the result), it would certainly not be the best choice for someone who's at this place in his career.
   
   
2. Bill Clinton
   
   
1. The major contributing factor to Gore's success in the 2000 campaign was the fact that Bill Clinton gave such a strong endorsement of Al's capabilities. At the time, Gore was broke (in political candidate terms), and desperately needed the extra nod.
   
   Now, though he may not need it quite as much, he certainly does not want the opposite. The last thing Al Gore wants is to campaign against Bill Clinton. And, with Hillary in the race, that's precisely what he'd be doing.
   
   
3. He doesn't need...
   
   
1. The Money
1. Search thestreet.com or forbes magazine archives, and you'll find that before the 2000 campaign, Gore's reported net worth was less than $1 million (somewhere around $800k).
   
   In October of 2000, thestreet.com had this to say...
   

   "To give you an idea of his savings, his total taxable interest in 1999 was $1,267," says Benjamin Tobias, a certified financial planner and certified public accountant at Tobias Financial Advisors in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. "He has got virtually nothing in the form of stocks. And virtually nothing in the form of savings."

   Of course, this may mean that Gore has been doing a lot of planning to minimize his tax burden -- a top priority of most wealthy Americans. If so, he's doing a bang-up job.

   In May of last year, Forbes Magazine reported the following...
   
   
   • In 2001, Gore became a part-time senior adviser to Google, which went on to an IPO. His compensation is unknown, but Eric Schmidt, who joined the company a month later as the chairman, got equity now worth $5.2 billion.
   • Gore took a seat on the board of Apple Computer in 2003, and he now has 60,000 stock options worth $2 million.
   • A year later he became one of the investors in Current TV, a cable network aimed at young people. It's available on cable systems with 28 million subscribers, but Gore's share has not been disclosed.
   • Also in 2004, Gore founded Generation Investment Management with former Goldman Sachs executive David Blood. The London-based firm invests largely in companies that make environmentally friendly products.
   • Gore receives from $75,000 to $150,000 for paid appearances on the lecture circuit.
     
     
2. The Press
1. If you haven't heard, he won the Nobel Peace Prize.
2. If you haven't seen it, the prize was for his work on "An Inconvenient Truth".
3. If the above two were news to you, here are a few other events you have missed.
1. John Lennon, Saddam Hussein, Princess Diana, and the notion of American Personal Privacy... all dead.
2. Soilent Green is people
3. 'blog', 'text', 'I.M.', and 'friend' are all verbs now.
   
   
3. To Rush
1. The fact that Al Gore is 59 means he could theoretically still run in 2012 so long as Hillary doesn't win. Let me say that again. IF HILLARY DOESN'T WIN IN 2008, AL GORE COULD RUN IN 2012. He's not gonna run against re-election of "Billary" (NOT at typo... you heard it here first...), and he could probably sweep the primaries against every one of these crackers with 4 years of Nobel prize campaigning under his belt.
   

Now, in a perfect world, Schwarzenegger gets the constitution ratified in the next couple years, allowing foreign-born citizens to be elected, and it completely backfires with the following 2012 ballet. I'll let you vote.

___ Guliani / Schwarzenegger

___ Gore / Bono

Word.
- Meshach


This post brought to you by the following campaigns.

Winter Listening...

Here's what I'm listening to this winter.
(In no particular order)

• Milosh - Down-tempo masterpieces.
  
• Heist At Hand - A chick-lead Mars Volta with better songs?
  
• Stateless - Just toured with DJ Shadow... fitting.
  
• Edie - Nashville singer from Holland with a hypnotic falsetto.
  
• None shall pass by Aesop Rock - Just a solid freakin' record from beginning to end.
  
• In Rainbows by Radiohead - It's on me, and it's growing.
  
• Alice by Tom Waits (... again) - A damn-near perfect record.
  

... and more to come.