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Richly deserved

Of all those who won Nobel Peace Prize over more than a century, few have been more worthy of the honour than Al Gore and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Together they brought the force of solid scientific enquiry and ardent advocacy to drag to the forefront of global consciousness an issue that the politics of denial did its best to obscure. In some ways, the Panel had the harder task. This network of nearly 3000 scientists drawn from many countries had to meticulously study the evidence — even as affirmers and deniers of global warming waged a furious debate in which selective science was too often used to bolster arguments. After close to two decades of work, the Panel concluded, with qualifications that speak to extreme scientific caution, that the rate of consumption of the earth’s resources by the human race is posing a threat to the sustainability of life on the planet. In that sense, it weighed in on the side of environmentalists, the politically weaker party in the debate. Even so, the global energy industry, along with its patrons and affiliates, has finally come around to accepting this verdict. However, the efforts of the scientists might not have made the world wake up to the perils of global warming if a protagonist with a powerful voice had not stepped forward to convey the message. With his name-recognition and political skills, Mr. Gore fitted the bill admirably.

The former Vice President of the United States had to reinvent himself to become nature’s oracle. While it was the U.S. Supreme Court that finally extinguished the prospects of a Gore presidency in 2000, the Democratic candidate had only himself to blame for a verdict so close that it lent itself to what happened. He had put off potential supporters by coming across as a candidate overly programmed by pollsters. In the years since, the ‘Goracle’ has discovered his inner voice and turned into a passionate advocate of the causes he believes in. In 2003, he courageously struck out on his own to oppose the invasion of Iraq. It was this go-it-alone spirit that gave the world An Inconvenient Truth, the splendid Academy Award winning documentary on climate change. It is difficult to imagine another American politician putting himself at such risk of being regarded as an eccentric by highlighting an issue that the general public did not seem to be very concerned about. Now that the man and the cause are on centre stage, the drumbeats for a Gore candidacy in 2008 have begun to sound. Would it be better to make another try for the power to make a direct difference — or stay above the fray and provide moral leadership? That is the question before the man who had the presidency stolen from him seven years ago.

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