Gore’s continuing credibility problem

By Jon Dougherty

What, did I hear more “misstatements,” “embellishments” and
“oversights” spoken by the master fibber in this campaign, Vice
President Al Gore, during the first presidential debate?

Yeah, that’s because Gore is a habitual liar; he has stretched the
truth so many times now, it is pure fantasy to believe his gaffes are
just accidents.

For a guy who claims to be his “own man” and who wants voters to look
at him as his own person, he sure trashes the truth like the master he
has served for eight years, President Bill Clinton.

On Tuesday, Gore made a couple of claims that — well — just weren’t
true, in his bid to “out-debate” George W. Bush, a fellow who wasn’t
supposed to be so much competition for Gore in the first place.

In one instance, Gore — complimenting Texas Gov. Bush’s handling of
a series of natural disasters that have struck the state in the past
year — told viewers he personally traveled with Federal Emergency
Management Agency director James Lee Witt on a trip to assess wildfire
damage this past summer.

Texas, dry as a bone, was burning up — along with dozens of other
states — and FEMA had been called in to assess the damage and help out
with facilitating federal disaster funds.

Gore said he was with Witt on one of those trips. He wasn’t.


According to Thursday’s Washington Times,
“Vice President Al Gore yesterday conceded that a dramatic anecdote he told in Tuesday night’s debate was not exactly true — and the accuracy of one or two others was questioned as well.

“Mr. Gore — who said he traveled to Texas with the Federal Emergency Management Agency Director James Lee Witt to inspect wildfire damage — acknowledged yesterday he did not,” the paper said.

Instead, Gore — who did travel to Texas this year — “had been in a Houston hotel — possibly for a fund-raiser — at the time and had not traveled to Texas with Mr. Witt to survey the fire damage. He said yesterday he had been briefed by FEMA officials,” the Times said.

But wait, there’s more.

Gore also fibbed about an education anecdote he tried to use to demonstrate why billions more in federal tax dollars needed to be spent on the nation’s failed public school system.

The Gore campaign spent much of yesterday putting out other fires concerning other anecdotes, including one by Mr. Gore that a Florida school forced a female student to stand in an overcrowded classroom.

“Her science class was supposed to be for 24 students,” the vice president said during the debate. “She is the 36th student in that classroom. … They can’t squeeze another desk in for her, so she has to stand during class.”

Sarasota High School Principal Daniel Kennedy, however, said that isn’t true. The class was short a desk for just one day.

“That was probably one of the first days of school when we were in the process of leveling classes. And, she did have an opportunity to use a lab stool,” he said on radio station WFLA in Sarasota.

“We don’t really have any students standing in class, and we have more than enough desks for all of our students,” Kennedy told the paper.

In his first debate appearance with Bush, Gore told two whoppers in the span of 90 minutes. We can only guess how many more will be told in the next 180 minutes of the two remaining debates.

Polls tell us that over half of all soccer moms think Gore is an honest, straightforward guy. That’s truly remarkable, considering that most American moms expect a hell of lot more honesty from their own kids than Gore is demonstrating.

No wonder Gore wants Bush to avoid the “credibility” issue. It’s a winner for the Republicans.

Editor’s note: Dougherty will be on vacation from Oct. 9 through Oct. 13. His opinion column will return to WorldNetDaily on Oct. 16.

Jon Dougherty

Jon E. Dougherty is a Missouri-based political science major, author, writer and columnist. Follow him on Twitter. Read more of Jon Dougherty's articles here.