The Second Coming

摘要

The introduction music was U2, stadium volume. The posters were slick, expensive and ubiquitous, featuring a map of Florida and the words STILL GORE COUNTRY! By the time the celebrity victim and former almost-presi-dent took the ballroom stage in Orlando, the 2,500 Democrats at the state party convention were geeked up like WWF fans on "Smack-down" night. And Al Gore gave them the fighting words they came to hear. Feisty and clean-shaven after a year of meditating in political isolation, Gore tore into George W. Bush and his fellow Republicans' record on domestic issues with a mixture of I-told-you-so scorn and populist fire. The GOP's "right wing" agenda, Gore said, had squandered the surplus, starved education and healthcare programs, put retirees at risk and polluted the environment. Worse, he said, Republicans imply that critics are unpatriotic. "They're wrong to vilify honorable men and women who oppose their right-wing agenda and blatantly dishonest budget," he shouted, coat off, sweat pouring from his brow. "I've had it!" The crowd loved it. "He came in here all charged up," said Raul Martinez, the mayor of Hialeah, Fla. "It's like he's a new man: Gore without chains."