Meet the new, new Gore, same as the old, new Gore. With the exception of the Incredible Hulk’s Dr. Bruce Banner, no one undergoes more startling metamorphoses than the vice president. And every one is the same as every other! His transformation from bloodless bore to barrel of monkeys — heralded once again last week after his appearance at the Gridiron Dinner — has been noted repeatedly over half a decade.
His old self has provoked comparisons to every variety of wood (from balsa to elm) and inspired confounding mixed metaphors (the New York Times once reported old Gore was as “leaden on the hustings as a wintry sky”). But after getting his one-liners punched up by DNC jokewriter Mark Katz, the brain behind master raconteurs like Diane Sawyer and Barbra Streisand, the 400-plus Nexis mentions of the “new Al Gore” seem to indicate near unanimity on his transformation.
Gannett was one of the early spotters of a “new Al Gore” in ’92, after seeing him shimmy like a seal at the Democratic convention with his more coordinated wife. Brookings’s Stephen Hess thought he spotted a “somewhat new Al Gore” after his ’93 NAFTA debate, while the Arizona Republic noticed ” a different Al Gore showing up in Phoenix” in ’94. His alma mater Nashville Banner even encouraged us to “Meet the new Al Gore” as late as ’96, as his ” comedic timing” seemed to be “impressing a lot of people.”
And indeed it has, as he has had ample opportunity to perfect it, considering he repeats himself more than Mel Tillis singing “Louie, Louie” in an echo chamber. Perhaps you’ve heard him pull this zinger from his narrow quiver of quips: “Al Gore is so boring, his Secret Service code name is ‘Al Gore.'” He mopped up the floor with that one at the Gridiron Dinner in March ’94, as he did again on Patriot’s Day in Fall River, Mass., in April ’95, and again at the American Society of Newspaper Editors dinner in April ’96, and at the Council of the Americas Conference in May ’96, and at the Hospitality Investment Conference in June ’96, and at least twice at the Democratic National Convention last August.
Now we know why he’s such a fan of recycling.
