Inventing Al Gore: on Government Reform

Gore as reporter uncovered City Hall zoning scandal

[In 1974 while Gore was a reporter at the Tenneseean], real estate developer Gilbert Cohen complained about his difficulty in securing a [zoning permit] in the district represented by Morris Haddox. Cohen thought he was merely prodding Gore into a story on city council inefficiency. Gore told him he was onto something bigger.

The Tennesseean set up a joint sting operation with the district attorney. Cohen agreed to be wired for sound and met Haddox, with Gore parked just out of view. Cohen asked what it would take to pass the permit. “It’ll take a grand to get it done,” said Haddox. The Tennesseean had a councilman cold, on audiotape & film, taking a bribe.

What looked to be a slam dunk ended in bitter defeat for Gore & his paper when the Haddox case went to trial. It ended in a mistrial, the jury deadlocked 8-3 in favor of conviction, with one member undecided. Like his father’s defeat, the case was more painful evidence that righteousness did not guarantee victory.

Source: Inventing Al Gore, p.107-10

Supported “PAC participation in the political process”

[During his Senate campaign in 1984], Gore had sponsored legislation that limited PAC money, but that didn’t stop him from soaking up every PAC dime he could under existing rules. He caucused with PAC representatives, highlighting the votes he had made in their favor. “I am a strong supporter of PAC participation in the political process,” he told PAC Manager, a PAC newsletter. “I need to raise large sums of money, and I have enjoyed getting involved with the PAC community.” Source: Inventing Al Gore, p.153

“Reinvention” caused some reform, but nothing fundamental

“Reinventing Government,” or REGO, was a classic New Democrat idea-fix government, don’t demolish it. In 1993, Clinton named Gore to head a six-month examination of the federal government called the National Performance Review (NPR). Gore’s report made 384 recommendations for streamlining and energizing the bureaucracy and promised $108 billion in savings and a 12% cut in the federal workforce-252,000 jobs-by 1998.

His reinvention quest ultimately led to some significant reforms, principally in the area of purchasing practices. But Gore failed to entertain the fundamental questions as he launched REGO: What does government do? Could someone else do it better? Gore’s efforts add up to a mixed picture. By 1998 the federal payroll had been reduced by 330,000 positions (15.4%), mostly at the Defense Department. In the end Gore’s REGO probably did save the government some money and certainly helped make it smaller. But it was not redesigned, reinvented, or reinvigorated, as he set out to do.

Source: Inventing Al Gore, p.278-83

Fundraising from White House? Maybe. Candor & caution? No.

In 1995, Gore phoned 52 potential Democrat donors, securing nearly $800,000 in commitments. Gore placed the calls from his White House office, putting him at odds with an 1882 law that barred federal employees from soliciting or receiving campaign contributions in a federal building. The Pendleton Act was a relic, but it was still observed by members of Congress, who routinely left their offices to make fund-raising calls from other locations.

It was not clear whether Pendleton applied to the vice president. But what was clear was that his usually circumspect instincts had been flattened by the money hunt.

No court case had ever determined the legality of a situation like Gore’s; thus Gore concluded there was “no controlling legal authority” that barred Gore from making the calls in his office. Gore also announced that while he had done nothing wrong, he would never do it again.

Source: Inventing Al Gore, p.298-9 & p.323-4

Buddhist temple fundraiser: overzealous but probably legal

Three weeks before election day in 1996, Gore attended a fund-raiser at the His Lai Buddhist Temple in Los Angeles. The event raised $140,000, despite federal laws that prohibit holding partisan political events at institutions with tax-exempt status. Some of the temple’s nuns and monks, who had taken vows of poverty, admitted to serving as illegal “straw” donors, writing checks for up to $5,000 and receiving immediate reimbursement from temple officials.

“I did not know it was a fund-raiser,” Gore said in 1997, contending that he believed he was attending a goodwill event. Some details support that contention: after lunch, he delivered a standard stump speech praising racial and ethnic diversity. There were none of the usual thank-yous he offered to groups of contributors for their financial support.

Exactly what Gore knew may never be completely clear. But the episode suggests that Gore’s zeal for election money in 1996 eroded his judgment, sense of propriety, and usual attention to detail.

Source: Inventing Al Gore, p.313-4 & p.319-22

*The above quotations are from Inventing Al Gore, by Bill Turque.* Click here for definitions & background information on Government Reform. Click here for more quotes by Al Gore on Government Reform.
*Other candidates on Government Reform:*
Pat Buchanan George W. Bush Al Gore Ralph Nader Harry Browne Dick Cheney Joe Lieberman *2002 Candidates:* Elizabeth Dole Janet Reno Jeb Bush Robert Reich	*Withdrawn Candidates:* Lamar Alexander Gary Bauer Bill Bradley Steve Forbes Orrin Hatch John Kasich Alan Keyes John McCain Dan Quayle Bob Smith Donald Trump Paul Wellstone
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