Today the boyfriend and went to hear Al Gore speak at Constitution Hall in Washington DC. The boyfriend heard about the speech from MoveOn.org and asked if I wanted to go. He got the tickets online and we went. It was the first time (besides seeing Howard Dean speak) that I had seen a major political figure speak. I was going to bring my camera and my iRiver to record some audio but then we read about the event and it said you couldn’t bring anything with you. When we got there plenty of people had cameras and cell phones. We hadn’t taken anything with us but when we got there I wished I had taken something to record the moment.

The speech focused on the unchecked growth of executive power in the federal government, with a spotlight on the NSA domestic spying scandal. It was a powerful speech and made me wish he spoke like this during the 2000 election. Gore sited many examples of Bush’s abuse of power and how the legislative branch is losing power because of Bush’s law breaking programs like the wire tapping of American citizens in the name of terrorism. I can’t begin to describe the contents of his speech but you can see the full text here. What I can say is that I was totally blown away by his ability to rally a crowd. I really wished he had demonstrated this kind of enthusiasm during the 2000 election. I think if he had, he would be our President now and we wouldn’t be where we are. I doubt that Gore will run in 08 but if he did, he’d be a candidate that I could get behind like I did in 2000.