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Gore Puts Internet For Auction On eBay (Updated) 150

Posted by Hemos from the no-reserve! dept.
The folks over at SatireWire have got a pretty amusing article regarding Al Gore's newest fund raising effort. The fund raising in politics these days - sheesh. Updated 6:00 GMT by timothy: AntiNorm writes: "As of 9/17 0538 GMT, the auction is no longer valid." Seems like all the good auctions get pulled.
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Gore Puts Internet for Auction on eBay More

Gore Puts Internet for Auction on eBay

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  • You mean the French army doesn't get "rooted"? I thought that's why they lost all the time...
  • Big Tobacco bids: $0.02
    Budist Munk bids: $0.03
    Big Oil bids: $0.04
    Chineese National bids: $0.05
    Hmmm even with all of Algores biggest supporters, he's worthless.

    Say what you will, but I bet Al Gore can spell Buddhist, monks, andChinese.

  • I had to highest bid I always wanted to own the internet I can be like some kind of god or computer guy but it is all ruin for me going to back to work now :(

  • Gore (Score:2)

    by edhall ( 10025 )

    Well, the most technically astute president in the last several decades (and perhaps ever) was Jimmy Carter, who was a nuclear engineer. He was also the last man who had a credible claim to being a "Washington outsider," and one of the most honest men who has ever occupied the White House. And he was a mediocre president, at best.

    Thus, I'm not necessarily faulting Gore -- he at least knew who to listen to, whether he himself was technically savvy or not. So if I were voting just on the basis of who would most likely be net-friendly (and not just follow corporate interests and the wishes of the national security apparatus), I'd give him the nod. But it's real hard to get much enthusiasm over either of the major candidates.

    -Ed
  • Flamebait???

    The moderators must be stoned today. This one was even better than Trent Lott and the paperclip.

    Do not teach Confucius to write Characters
  • The sad thing about that is that it's so true. I remember watching Clinton's 2000 State of the Union Address and the Republican rebuttal on TV. Clinton outlined several goals he had. The Republican senators (obviously reading from a teleprompter, and not doing a very good job of it) came on afterwards and basically said that the Democrats were trying to ruin the country and all of Clinton's proposals were crap, then proceeded to describe their goals - which for the most part were EXACTLY THE SAME as what Clinton had just finished speaking about.

    I wish the politicians would just grow up!

    --

  • ...Al Gore--owner of the internet--has just been charged $800,000,000.00 for the following: Child porn, prirating software, illegal trading of MP3z........

    Guess owning the net does have its downsides.

  • If you call prosperity decay, I'll grant you one point.
  • Or the Greens or the Reform party. Funny how most Americans forget this. Must be a conspiracy or something.
  • And there are no hotheads on /. :)
  • Hear, hear! There are few things in life that do not deserve to have a bit of poking at, and politics and the people surrounding them are, by far, the least of these. Glad to know you're sane, Zordak. :) That makes one...
  • At what point do you think the creation of the Internet was completed?

    It ain't done yet, it seems to me.

    Some people are still taking the initiative in its continued creation.

    Thanks to Al for his contributions in Congress in the eighties and nineties. And thanks to some of you out there who are taking the initiative in other spheres now! - Steve

  • If we just follow the logical pronounciation:

    It's called a router, because it provides the route for packets from A to B. I can't think of what the row-te from A to B is supposed to be!

    :-)
  • Thanks! For a moment there I thought that I'd slipped into a parallel universe where corny jokes weren't appreciated. But, of course, we all know that THAT isn't true. ;) *braces for thrown produce*
  • ...the Commission was given the legislative mandate to fund connections to every one of two million classrooms in all 100,000 schools in our country.

    As someone who sweated bricks bringing my employer, a community college, onto the Internet in 1993, I knew first hand that it takes a lot more to bring Internet access to students than just bringing it to the front door, including internal wiring, computer purchases, and the biggest part, local desktop computer management.

    So when the initiative to wire up every classroom came down, I wondered if they'd also hire the army of techs to take care of it all.

    Of course, they didn't.

    Instead, locally, we have some poor underpaid state sod who runs around to a dozen or so schools under his watch and re-ghosts the labs and goes away, which makes the computers usable for about half a day until various students, both intentional and accidental, re-trash the install so the computers sit unused again until the poor sod gets back there in a few weeks.

    Yeah, there are better ways to do it. We install NT on our classroom desktops with strict ACLs and policies to prevent local changes as much as possible. Of course, NT by design is pretty braindead in this area so you have to have system directories with change access to everyone else it won't work at all (imagine /bin as 1777) so problems do happen, but not as often.

    But that's the point, these schools everywhere don't have the resources to develop better solutions to net use in the classroom, so they rely on limited techs doing the impossible while the computers sit unusable for most of the time.

    And don't get me started about how the teachers themselves often never got the training to use it.

    In a lot of poorer areas, their school's Internet connection is a few PCs in the library and that's it.

    But hey, literally it may be true. Every school has Internet access. So we can call it a "success" I guess... :-(

  • Re:you're no better (Score:4)

    by Fizgig ( 16368 ) on Saturday September 16, 2000 @12:37PM (#774219)
    One of my professors said she has a colleague with a big picture of Gore on his office wall. The colleague said that Al Gore stopped by his office (he does distributed computer) in 1994 and spent an hour in there asking questions. I had never heard of the Internet and didn't know the slightest thing about distributed computing at that point, so Gore's at least got some genuine interest in computers and networks.

  • 1990 was an example, not a fact... (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    In 1990, Al Gore had already been in Congress for 14 years...

    I suspect what he was referring to was his introduction of the Supercomputer Network Act of 1986 which provided funding to Universities to sponsor computer development.

    I don't think Al Gore was trying to take credit for something he didn't do. I think you are not giving enough credit to the people who put forth the funding for what amounted to a good idea.

    Good ideas are a dime a dozen... The key is convincing others the idea is good, and getting someone to help bankroll the development.

    And that's all Al Gore said was that he recognized it as a good idea long before other politicians did. Basically saying he's more progressive than the other old codgers.

    And that's saying a lot for a Congress where only about 30% of them even know how to use a web browser today.
  • This article will probably become a major controversy in the campaigns. Can't you here it...

    "[F]irst he called me a rat and now he's paid someone to make fun of me for discovering the Internet...boo...fuckin'...hooo!!!" - Al Gore

    The saddest part of this whole situation is that one of these two idiots in just over three months will be the most powerful man in the world. Forget fathom, plague, or nuclear holocaust....THAT scares the livin' **SHIT** out of me!!!

    -J

  • Re:Just wait... (Score:4)

    by norton_I ( 64015 ) <hobbes@utrek.dhs.org> on Saturday September 16, 2000 @09:47AM (#774222)
    Right. Just go on beliving in your fanciful little world. In three months, the most powerful man in the world with be the same person it is today. Alan Greenspan.

  • The internet isn't, and never was intended to be the 'information superhighway' that Gore and others talked about. the IS was supposed to be a way that you could get movies and shit from AT&T. It was always about central, corporate, controlled BS. The same crap as on telivison, but more of it. "Ohh... you could rewind pay-per-view movies, you can't do that with regular cable..."

    The internet has been around since the 1960s, and it has always been peer-to-peer. and its been around a lot longer then Gore's tenure in congress. The 'net is decentralized access for everyone, not just the giant media corporations.

    That dosn't mean gore didn't try hard to mold the 'net into the IS after everyone got hooked up. Gore pushed hard for the CDA and encryption restriction. Aperantly he didn't really understand what the net was or how it worked. As for wireing up the fediral government? well, thats good I suppose, but accessing government documents isn't really something that lots of people do.

    His exact quote was "During my tenure in congress, I took the initiative in creating the internet"

    And on the other side, we have 'the dubya', gees, whats the point of getting out of bed this november....
  • The "Internet" didn't exist in 1980.

    Try again. Have a look at RFC675 [isi.edu]. Read the title carefully. Notice the date? December 1974. AFAIK that's the first known occurrence of the word "Internet".

    In September 1981, RFCs 791 [isi.edu], 792 [isi.edu] and 793 [isi.edu] appeared, defining IP, ICMP and TCP (note the "I" in "IP") in the final version which is still theirs today (minor options and exceptions nonwithstanding).

    There is nothing wrong with having been using the Internet for nearly ten years in 1990.

    In fact, even though the word hadn't appeared yet, the "official birthday" of the Internet is generally taken to be April 7, 1969, the day of publication of the very first RFC [isi.edu] by Steve Crocker. See "Thirty years of RFCs" [isi.edu] for more historical considerations, and also the the Internet timeline [isi.edu].

  • So now he not only "created" it, but now he owns (0wnZ) it too? All he did was vote for something in Congress. Big deal. Many other Congressmen did as well, but you don't see them plastering it all over the place.
  • We're already living under fascist electronic surveillance. We managed to do that all on our own too. No help needed from the Germans for that one thank you very much!

    Yay UK politics. We have three major parties, and they all tell the same lies, walk the same walk. It's boring. Why can't someone just stand up and tell the truth: "You want better services? Better Policing, a better NHS, better education and a better life? Then we need to raise taxes. Will you seriously miss a 1 pound Income Tax rise? One pound a week? Not much is it...". Now that would be refreshing.
  • these people (at 800-be-a-geek) get REALLY pissed if you call them up and ask them about their phone number. I spoke with tonya, who was somewhat mean. I am never going to be a geek again.

    Jaeger
    www.JohnQHacker.com
    GodHatesCalvinists.com
  • I would hesitate to say that Gore is a "geek candidate" -- better than Bush, maybe, but still not great. His running mate, Joe Lieberman, was among the first to push for content standards on violent video games, and is very much in favor of censorware in schools, libraries, etc. This may improve their chances with Middle America, where parents want to make sure that their kids aren't exposed to this material, but those views sure don't sit well with most geeks I see.

    It would take a LOT of balls for a candidate to get up on some major TV talk show and say "I'm opposed to filtering the Internet -- let the parents monitor their children themselves." Not even a major candidate like Gore could do that and still have a lead in a tight race like this.
  • I thought it was funny when Gore was on Letterman the other night and they were running through a top ten Slogans for the Gore/Leibermann campaign that were discarded. One of them was something like:

    "5. I invented the internet, and I can take it away. Think about it."

    Gore was a pretty good sport.

  • Judging by the number of politicians selling out, I'd say its fairly low. High supply, comparatively low demand, all that economics stuff. But they are in positions of power, and they do have to get re-elected, so that must raise it some... I'd say that stock options would do just fine. ^_^


    -RickHunter
  • Sorry, you're wrong. You're conflating two very different things. There were many physical networks, including ARPANET, CSNET, NFSNET, and many other smaller ones. But the logical network has been called the internet since the early 1970's. The point of the term internet is that it's a network of networks. The various physical networks were tied together with common protocols (IP, etc.) to form the internet.

  • Re:you're no better (Score:5)

    by edhall ( 10025 ) <slashdot@weirdnoise.com> on Saturday September 16, 2000 @12:51PM (#774233) Homepage
    In 1990, I had been using the internet for about 10 years.
    You're being just as misleading as you accuse Gore of being. The "Internet" didn't exist in 1980. Its ancestor at that time was called the "ARPANET," and it differed in many ways (aside from size and speed) from today's Internet. It was run for the Department of Defense, with an (often ignored) "official use only" policy and a (strictly enforced) non-commercialization policy. Nodes were either military bases, military research labs and contractors, or universities such as MIT and Berkeley which were performing military research. Yes, there was an "underground" that used it for socializing and hacking, made up of people at these institutions (and a few of their friends). But such "unofficial" use was quite low-key, and at least among ARPAnauts was defended as being a matter of academic freedom (while the DoD generally looked the other way). But as traffic increased and budgets were cut, the DoD's benign oversight changed.

    In the late '80s the military insisted on cracking down on "unofficial use." Many schools and contractors wound up having to justify their access, and came up short. Efforts to start member-supported networks, such as CSNET, got a lukewarm reception since they (1) cost too much (no more 100% government subsidy) and (2) did too little (email and limited file transfer only). It took an act of congress to get these folks hooked up again: the ARPANET was split into the MILNET and NSFNET (NSF == National Science Foundation), with the latter offering subsidized access to any academic institution that wanted it and paid its share. And it was after this split that users starting refering to it as just "The Internet" (though from time to time I heard ARPANET referred to as "The ARPA Internet" back in the '80s).

    Guess who wrote the bill that funded NSFNET? Or the National Supercomputing Initiative which built its backbone? Or the one somehwat later that lifted restrictions on commercial use? Yup, Smilin' Al (or, rather, one of his staffers wrote the bill and he sponsored it).

    When you look at it from a technical perspective, saying that he "created" the Internet is a clear absurdity. But from a legislative and public policy perspective, it's hardly an exaggeration. I'm not convinced that Al "gets" the Internet any more than W does. But he did manage to listen to someone on his staff who "got" it. (And I've been racking my brain to remember the guy's name--I met him briefly while I was working at The RAND Corporation.) It's too bad that so few technophiles go to work as congressional staffers; it leaves me with some doubts as to whether Gore wasn't just "lucky" to be involved with the Internet.

    -Ed
  • Penis Birds were funnier than that!
  • What he was talking about was how he, in 1990, before 99% of Slashdot readers even knew about the Internet [...]

    I guess I'm in the other 1% then... I was using the net (when it was still called the Arpanet) back in '82 using a 2400bps acoustic coupler. None of this graphical WWW shit back then!
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • This article [hereliesalgore.com] has more info on the incedent and Al Gore's contribution to things technnical. His general cluelessness and the extent of his exaduration can be judged a little better with the info in the article.

    The aution is funny, deal with it.

    Gore's inability to grasp technical issues or his misreprentation of them to further his own ends is not as funny. He's supported restrictions on crypto exports, wants to shut down oil drilling, and favors coal burning. A dude with a poly sci undergrad and a law degree sets himself up for such attacks when he attempts to publish works way outside his field. "Earth in the Balance" is a very scary read indeed. It was published a while back and parts of it might sound stupid now, so don't expect open source Al to put it on the web anytime soon.

  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • George W. wishes he could auction off the last two months on eBay...
  • actually I saw slashdot karma for sale somewhere Im sure.
  • how long this auction will last for ( if it is really up on e-bay as it appears to be. )

    Hmmm, what kind of idiot would it take to buy something from someone who isn't really Al Gore?

    Oh. Oops - I forgot the calibar of people on the net...

    Another story for e-crime pundits I guess...

  • Since one year, I have heared many comments about Al Gore claiming Internet paternity. Can someone point me to a document explaining why ?
  • +1 funny? Oh please... read the damn article first instead of karma whoring...

    It's a _satire_, a joke, fake news. There is no auction, not even a fake one, on eBay.

    As written in the 2nd paragraph of the linked article: the 'auction' lasts for 10 days, starts at $1 and hopes to get $400B.

  • I really loooooooove reading liberals defending Clinton.
  • Yeah, yeah, there's always an Internet for sale on eBay...

  • eBay URL (Score:3)

    by AntiNorm ( 155641 ) on Saturday September 16, 2000 @09:22AM (#774247)
    In case you want to bid, the eBay URL is here:
    http://cgi.ebay.co m/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=439118853 [ebay.com]

    =================================
  • Which of course is the correct pronounciation! :-) Did the original Cambridge network have routers? If it did, then that proves it!

    Seriously though, I almost start puking when I hear people talking about "row-ters" because it just seems so... so... American. Anyway....
  • Jean is too scared of children playing with nukes in their parents' basement to laugh at anybody!

  • The terms "internet" and "internetworking" have existed from the beginning as names for the technology. But until the MILNET split, no one called the network which used those technologies "The Internet." It was "The ARPANET."

    -Ed
  • I'm sick of this joke. It was funny for a while, but it's been beaten beyond death. It's taken on a second life as a piece of character assasination. Politics turns jokes into political slogans that are repeated just as mindlessly. It's all this 'bzz bzz' in your ear that hypnotically lulls you out of your senses until you become a malleable voting zombie.

    Take off your weisenheimer hat for a moment and try to be fair while considering this.

    Marc Andreeson created the Mosaic browser under a government grant to support high performance computing. The grant program was created by legislation authored by Al Gore. Maybe Andreeson would have got alternate funding, or maybe he'd have worked on something else. But Mosaic is clearly a watershed event; Gore didn't write it, but without Gore it might not have been written.

    Do a little research:
    1986 -- sponsored Supercomputer Network Act (remember back when all the Internet goodies used to come out of NCSA?), and Supercomputer Network Study Act.

    1988 -- sponsored the National High Performance Computing Act (which funded Andreeson's work).

    1992 -- sponsored the Information Infrastructure and Technology Act

    1996 -- worked to support deregulation allowing cable companies to sell Internt service.

    I'd call this a pretty good record for a young senator with no personal technical background. It's all the more remarkable in that I doubt very much the good folk back home in Tennesee were clamoring to have the nation's universities hooked up over high speed WANS.

    Now, what exactly did Al say about all this? That he "took initiative on creating the Internet." Is there hyperbole here -- sure. It makes it sound like that when he took part in supporting research initiatives and policy changes he knew exactly what it would all turn into. The emphasis on supercomputers shows he was probably off the mark -- aiming to connect researchers to large computing utilities the way people are connected to large power plants.

    The fact is nobody knew this computer networking thing would be the driving force in the new economy.

    That the thing about technology -- sometimes the seed has to be planted even when you don't know what it's going to grow into. This is where you need government involvement in technology -- to do things which ought to be done but whose commercial fruits are unpredictable.

    Now, there's a lot of Al Gore's current positions that make me uncomfortable. The V-chip thing seems quixotic to me. Did you ever see a piece of home technology the parents could work but the kids couldn't? Kids'll be blackmailing adults so they can watch "Survivor". Also, when people start getting up on a soap box about protecting children on the Internet I get a rash. Hint to parents: put the computer in a public place and make it clear there is NO privacy to be expected on the Internet.

    So, there are legitimate reasons to be a bit leery of Gore, just like any body who has the particular skills to get himself into the position where he very well might become president.

    But, if you are making your evaluation of one of the leading contenders for presidency of the United States on the basis of the "Father of the Internet" joke, you're a joke yourself -- as a citizen.

  • Re:Why not read... (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    It started in Madison, Wisconsin, where it is still available. Then it expanded out to Boulder, CO, and soon Milwaukee, WI, Chicago, and Champaign-Urbana, IL. Now it is lots of places, including of course the Internet. Great idea. I had no idea it was in Canada though.
  • I sure remember calling it the internet.
  • while we're being nasty, it is fully possible that ronnie was telling the truth about not recalling. He was getting a little fuzzy in the cognitive department towards the end.

    Now the fact that people knew this and were happy with him as a president... not _that_ speaks volumes.
  • And these achievements would be what? Reinventing the government? The internet? The economy?

    How about none of the above.

    The government has grown since he and Bill have been in office, the only part that has been "shrunk" is the military.

    He didn't have jack to do with the internet.

    The economy growth that we were enjoying is due to Ronny and the Republican congress. Read your economics texts and pay attention to how long it takes for top level inputs to actually affect the economy.

    We have suffered through the most corrupt administration in the last 100 years.

    P.
  • So, how much did Tipper go for?
  • Considering I'm not even done with my bachelor's degree yet, I doubt very much that I was your freshment English teacher.

    OTOH, there was that entire year I can't remember due to too many drugs... :)

  • But when was the last time you heard of a Democrat having to leave office over a scandal?

    Good point. It demonstrates just how morally corrupt they are. :)

    BTW--I'm not saying the Republicans don't have their fair share of morally corrput members either. If it were up to me, I'd trash the whole damn morally corrupt government and start over. :)

  • I sure remember calling it the internet.

    Cool; perhaps you did. Nobody I knew did, but I'm hardly omniscient. However, what it was called has little to do with my original point: the "Internet" of the day (whatever it was called) isn't what we call the "Internet" today.

    Perhaps a bit of residue left over from the changeover of the early '90's will convince you. Network 10 (addresses where the first octet is "10") are not routed over the Internet. Addresses in this range are used for internal networks, for testing, and what-not. Well, guess what the first octet of all ARPANET addresses was? Yup, it was 10.

    Back when I first started working for them, RAND's address on the ARPANET was 10.0.0.7 (and not coincidentally, they were about the seventh node to join the ARPANET). At the time of the MILNET split, RAND received the new address 192.5.14.* (along with a few other class C's) which it has today; needless to say, the old address, like the ARPANET itself, no longer exists.

    My original point remains: several acts of Congress opened up and funded the Internet as we know it today, legislation that came out of Gore's office. You can love him or hate him for other reasons, but he at least deserves credit for that.

    -Ed
  • "SatireWire is intended for use by those age 18 and older. All stories are fictional and satirical and should not in any way be construed as fact. Please read our disclaimer. All contents Copyright © 1999-2000, SatireWire and FNwire, LLC. All rights reserved"

    Don't you guys get it... It's a joke!!! Someone is trying to auction off the internet and they just made up the story about Al Gore. Send the story to Segfault [segfault.org].

    I though /. was just for serious news

    Although it was a good joke...
  • You know, that has to be the most poorly formatted website I've ever seen. And probably the most partisian, as well.

    Is there some sort of law that says that the only well-done partisian website can be www.gwbush.com? He's certainly the most original.

  • Re:Why making fun of gore? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Nope, we're just saying Bush has some nose candy problems.
  • the IP rights to the paper clip soon? :)

  • Politicians are always quick to grab the credit for things that weren't their doing; that's what makes them politicians. So of course Al Gore is the father of the internet (or whatever). But even if that isn't really true, we still owe him a debt of gratitude for his advances to computer science. After all, he did invent the Al-Gore-ithm too, right? :-P
  • You really should read Bill Bryson's The Mother Tongue: English and How it Got That Way [bestbookbuys.com] before you go off and publicly get your knickers in a twist about American versus British pronunciations of English. The "purity" of many of these Britishisms is somewhat suspect, to say the least.
  • They can't auction off the internet. It's on my hard drive. There's a little icon on my desktop that says so.

    Once (as the story goes), and I'm not sure how, but I accidentally clicked on something and I got a message saying "Are you sure you want to delete The Internet?" Boy, was I scared. I know a lot of work went into that thing. But I guess if I deleted it, we could all go home. :)

  • it seems that this is not GPL'd. I have a /lib/modules/2.2.16/net/algore.o but no /usr/src/linux-2.2.16/drivers/net/algore.c Is algore.o a DDOS trojan kernel module? 8-)
  • I'm just curious--did you get sick of the character assassination of Dan Quayle? I do not agree with much of what he says--he's too authoritarian in many ways for me--but he was enver the dim bulb that he was reported as. Gore has made a career out of having his gaffes under-reported. There was a great bit I recall seeing once--perh. in the National Review--which demonstrated that he may very well have had more moronicisms than Quayle.

    Somewhat recently there was a great piece which showed how he has changed from someone supporting tobacco and guns and opposing abortion to just the opposite. The man's an opportunist and an authoritarian one at that. Remember his wife...

    Me, I don't vote. It's a stupid way to select leaders. The majority don't know any more and are no more noble than a minority. Most people are twits. It's bread & circuses time folks.

  • Just how the hell is that flamebait? Its a fact that George W. has taken a dive in the polls the last two months. I'd hardly consider an observation of that as flamebait.
  • I'm afraid I couldn't make head nor tail of this paragraph.

    Are you really a government worker? Your studied incoherence makes me think this could be an attempt at a troll.

    If you are an actual government worker and this is the best prose you can produce, well, I'd better accelerate my plans to move all my assets offshore.
  • already cornered that market via his main redistribution center in Mena, AR.
  • Whatever it is, it is most certainly not a shortcut, at least on win95.
  • I'm just curious--did you get sick of the character assassination of Dan Quayle

    YES!

    I'm a liberal democrat. I think of this as the politics of decency. I think it is hypocritical for liberals to collect material on Mr. Quayle with the intention of destroying his stature. Look -- Quayle had a talent for misstating himself, and while this may have been enough to disqualify him from high office it does not necessarily make him stupid. However, the press picked up on this and amplified it out of proportion; it turned him into a one dimensional caricature.

    For some it as a political vendetta, but what it was really about was that the press likes a good story whether it gives a true picture of the man or not. Remember their depiction of Ted Kennedy in the 1980 election; you may hate Kennedy, but he is not a moron. In fact he is widely considered by his peers as one of the best parliamentarians on the Senate.

    Gore has made a career out of having his gaffes under-reported. There was a great bit I recall seeing once--perh. in the National Review--which demonstrated that he may very well have had more moronicisms than Quayle.

    Which goes to show how intellectually empty the excercise of reporting misstatements is. Gore is an exceptionally intelligent person, with a tremendous capacity for hard work, and superb memory for facts. However when you speak as a politician, you have to be on guard that nothing you say can be taken out of context and spliced together in a way that twists your meaning. No wonder all we get from politicians is emotionalistic gobbledygook.

    In any case, if story gets out that a politican makes mistakes when he speaks extemporaneously, he's going to get exactly the same treatment. Quayle was crucified because he jumped onto stage (literally) as a young unknown and everyone questioned whether he had the weight to do the job. That stuff doesn't stick to Gore because the lazy media already has decided what the story is on him: hard working, but a cold fish -- too much intellect and not enough heart.

    Me, I don't vote. It's a stupid way to select leaders. The majority don't know any more and are no more noble than a minority. Most people are twits. It's bread & circuses time folks.

    You are horribly misquided on this one. It is true that if you can identify a minority of the population who are reliably intelligent, informed, reasonable and wise you could give over government to them. It is also true that if you can identify a minority of the population who are reliably intelligent, informed, reasonable and wise then the moon is made of green cheese -- a falsehood implies anything. If the history of the 20th century shows anything, it shows that governments that cannot be replaced by the people are extremely dangerous to them.

    Not voting is volunteering to be a slave. Not voting because voters are stupid is volunteering to be a slave to stupid people.

    If the public is uniformed, inform them. If they are ignorant, teach them. If they are foolish guide them.

  • When Gore said he "took the initiative in creating the Internet", it was a miswording and political exaggeration, not an outright lie.

    Yes, that's true. The trouble is Gore exaggerates as he breathes:

    1) He claimed to be a co-sponsor of the McCain/Feingold campaign finance reform bill -- but Feingold and Gore have never been in Congress at the same time. (Kernel of truth: he supported the bill)

    2) He claimed to have discovered Love Canal. But his first involvement was a year after Carter declared it a federal disaster area. (Kernel of truth: he sponsored Congressional hearings on Love Canal)

    3) He claimed to be the inspiration for "Love Story". (Kernel of truth: he did have contact with the creator of Love Story)

    4) He claimed that as a journalist his investigations put people in prison. (Kernel of truth: someoine he investigated was convicted and fined)

    5) He claimed that in Vietnam he came under fire. (Kernel of truth: As a military journalist, he did walk some patrols in downtown Saigon, and may have arived on the scene shortly after shooting had stopped)

    6) He claimed to have been the initiator of the Earned Income Tax Credit, which was passed before he entered Congress. (Kernel of truth: he did support the EITC in Congress)

    The question thus becomes; does Gore exaggerate deliberately or unconsciously? The first answer is very disturbing; the second would betray either a tendency to self-aggrandizement (fairly harmless, esp. for a politician) or to a lack of self-confidence (a potential problem in a crisis situation).

    I think it's probably a tendency to self-aggrandizement, which really is a minor character flaw of little importance in a Presidential election. But given that I'm not voting for him anyway, I'd like everybody to think he's deliberately lying to get votes in an act of contempt for the intelligence of the American people ;-)

    Steven E. Ehrbar
  • No, that's his karma being rewarded.

    Pan
  • I get modded down for pro-Democrat posts every once in a while...just the political makeup of the slashdot readership, don't worry about it.
    --
  • Debate topics will include whether there should be a prescription drug benefit as part of medicare, or whether medicare should pay for prescription drugs.

    Yep. For a nice comparison of our two candidates, visit Billionaires for Bush (or Gore) [billionair...orgore.com].

    But I'm still voting anti-Bush.
  • God, that would be unbelievable if it weren't so true. It seems the election has, for the most part, come down to Tweedle-dum and Tweedle-dumber (just don't ask which is which).
  • Excerpts from: No Credit Where It's Due

    by Declan McCullagh

    "Gore played no positive role in the decisions that led to the creation of the Internet as it now exists -- that is, in the opening of the Internet to commercial traffic," said Steve Allen, vice president for communications at the conservative Progress and Freedom Foundation.

    Since 1993, Gore has become one of the most prominent people in the Clinton administration on issues related to high technology. He hosts visiting businessmen and takes pride in personally announcing new technology initiatives such as Internet II funding.

    He also took the lead in supporting the Clipper Chip and continued restrictions on the overseas shipments of encryption products.

    High-visibility events can be prone to embarrassing slip-ups. At one recent White House event, Gore introduced Cisco Systems CEO John Chambers, who he had met with privately earlier that day.

    Gore told the audience how much he valued Chambers and one of the products Cisco produced. But he mispronounced "routers" as root-ers.

    geez, he is our hero!

  • In legislative context (e.g. Congress), an "initiative" is a formal step that's part of making something law, before it gets voted on by the entire body. When Gore said he "took the initiative in creating the Internet", it was a miswording and political exaggeration, not an outright lie.

    I guess whether or not it's a lie depends on what your definition of "is" is. (Oh wait, that's a different guy... :)

    I have lots to criticize Gore about. Let's not even get started about illegal campaign contributions, selling American nuclear secrets to the Chinese, etc.

    That wouldn't be news for nerds, that would be politics for hotheads. :)
  • If one actually searches the interview for the word "invent" one finds it didn't appear there anywhere, not even once. Gore instead claimed that, in regard to the Internet's creation, he "took the initiative" in a particular place at a particular time... his term in Congress. And it's true that he did.

    Some apparently would have us believe that the Internet's creation was completed prior to 1980. Silly stuff. As Vint Cerf said in '93 (http://cpsr.org/cpsr/nii/vinton-cerf -testimony [cpsr.org]): "In 1982, there were about 100 computers on the ARPANET and a few score others were part of the NSF-sponsored CSNET which also used the Telenet public data network. In 1993 there are over 1.5 million of them."

    So what happened between '82 and '93? Well a whole bunch of people took the initiative in a great many spheres... and in Congress no one more so than Big Al. Among his various initiatives, apparently, was a 1986 legislative effort calling for interconnection of the 5 super-computing Centers, with fiber optic technology, including the one in Illinois where Andreesen et al later developed Mosaic.

    Gore's sufficiently cognizant of the Internet's history to know that no one person or group of people "invented" it. And it wasn't created at any particular time; it was the creation of many people over many years. And in Congress, the main chap was Al G., right? Or who am I forgetting?

    - Steve R.

  • you're no better (Score:5)

    by macpeep ( 36699 ) on Saturday September 16, 2000 @10:32AM (#774286)
    If you want to make fun of someone, at least stick with the facts. Gore never said "I invented the Internet". What he said as: "During my service in the United States Congress, I took the initiative in creating the Internet.". Of course he didn't invent the Internet and nobody (I hope) is so stupid that they believe that Gore actually thinks he did. What he was talking about was how he, in 1990, before 99% of Slashdot readers even knew about the Internet, introduced bills that would bring "the information superhighway" to ordinary people, schools and businesses.

    It's sad that instead of giving the guy some credit, you have to mock him over and over again because of a little exaggeration that happened years ago.
  • > Why can't people have a sense of humor about politics and politicians?

    Agreed. Nothing entertains me more than seeing Jay Leno rip the side I'm voting against and then turn around and rip the side I'm voting for. Though I do require that his jokes actually be funny, on both sides of the fence.

    --
  • > It would take a LOT of balls for a candidate to get up on some major TV talk show and say "I'm opposed to filtering the Internet -- let the parents monitor their children themselves."

    Yeah, that would be too close to supporting genuine family values. What the public wants is censorship under the code name of "family values". (Or "protect the children". Pick your code name on the basis of your political leanings - they both mean the same thing.)

    --
  • He is the chairman of the fedral reserve board. Among other things, the board sets interest rates from the fedral reserve. This means that he basically has control over the supply of US dollars to the world.

    Consider that while international politics are a factor, most of what George W. or Al will do will be of minor interest to people outside the US. However, the US economy has a huge influence on the world economy, and to a large extent, Alan Greenspan regulates its growth.

  • What is the going price (Score:5)

    by www.sorehands.com ( 142825 ) on Saturday September 16, 2000 @09:23AM (#774310) Homepage
    for a politician?

    Does E-bay auction entire politicians? Or do they just auction votes on individual bills?

  • There's an article about it here [hereliesalgore.com]. I assume it originally ran in Wired, because the author of the article is a Wire columnist.
  • Not that any of this makes lying any more excusable. But lying about a private blow job isn't in the same league as Watergate or Iran-Contra.

    Illegal campaign contributions, FBI files, White Water, Juanita Broderick, hmmm...I'd say clinton lied about FAR MORE than a simple blow job.

    Or is this all part of that same "vast right wing conspiracy." Hmph.

  • Re:Why is Al Gore claiming Internet paternity ? (Score:5)

    by KingJawa ( 65904 ) on Saturday September 16, 2000 @09:25AM (#774315) Homepage
    An article about the claim "I took the initiative in creating the Internet" can be read here [hereliesalgore.com]. The author is a columnist for Wired.
  • You're right if transporting kids to the top of an existing structure is an appropriate analogy... but there was previously no existing Internet infrastructure that reached the public in many of these libraries or kids in the classrooms. That had to be created.

    As former FCC Chair Reed Hundt indicated, Gore deserves a portion of the credit: [fcc.gov]
    "On a personal note, many years ago I had a conversation with then-Senator Al Gore about his wish to see a schoolgirl in Carthage, Tennessee be able to learn from the limitless resources of the Library of Congress, without being barred by time, distance, and lack of money from such opportunities. He explained to me -- and this was long before the Internet was invented -- that fiber optic cable would make the connection between the schoolgirl and a bright future.

    From this conversation came this Commission's desire to include classroom connections as an essential goal of universal service. President Clinton in several State of the Union speeches and many other appearances mobilized a national commitment to this goal. And as Vice President, Al Gore has never let a week, or perhaps a day, go by without working to bring to every schoolchild the opportunity to learn on the information highway -- a term he coined.

    Thanks to the untiring efforts of Senators Snowe, Rockefeller, Exxon, Kerrey, Hollings, Congressman Markey, Secretary of Education Riley, and many others the Commission was given the legislative mandate to fund connections to every one of two million classrooms in all 100,000 schools in our country. School groups from all over the country supported these congressional initiatives and then pursued their implementation in our rules.

    -- Steve

  • Re:you're no better (Score:3)

    by dboyles ( 65512 ) on Saturday September 16, 2000 @11:03AM (#774325) Homepage
    ...at least stick with the facts.
    ...in 1990, before 99% of Slashdot readers even knew about the Internet...

    I think perhaps you should heed your own advice.

    I don't think any reasonable person believes that Al Gore believes he created the Internet. Calling Gore the inventor of the Internet is mocking the fact that he (as many politicians do) tried to give himself more credit than he is due. He screwed up. In all likelihood he simply mixed up his words and it didn't come out the way it should have. But he said what he said, and it has turned into a joke. Nobody is taking away Gore's achievements.

  • Plus confusion over the word "initiative" (Score:3)

    by jsm ( 5728 ) <james@jmarshall.com> on Saturday September 16, 2000 @11:38AM (#774329) Homepage
    Thank you. I don't mind the joking about it (hey, Gore himself does), but it gets old when people still hold it against him and forget his record. It shows they don't have the facts and the actual quote.

    In legislative context (e.g. Congress), an "initiative" is a formal step that's part of making something law, before it gets voted on by the entire body. When Gore said he "took the initiative in creating the Internet", it was a miswording and political exaggeration, not an outright lie. I'd say he "sponsored the initiative to extend the Internet to the general public." Whether or not those initiatives deserve any credit is another point of debate (but I certainly give no credit to the business world, as another poster does).

    And he popularized the term "information superhighway", which of course we all find annoying. But he did communicate the concept to a lot of unwired people.

    No, I'm not a Democrat, I'm just tired of misinformation. Criticize Gore (and Bush and others) for real problems, not made-up ones. Jokes I have no problem with; I liked the SatireWire article and the Letterman appearance (the first funny Letterman in a while, eh?).

  • Separated at birth? Dan Quayle & G.W. Bush?

    Now don't go "Nucular" flaming me! ;-)

    Vote [dragonswest.com] Naked 2000

  • yawn (Score:2)

    by Anonymous Coward
    As someone who worked in the federal government when Al Gore started all his government wide internet initiatives, I think there's some kind of misunderstanding about how much he did to force negligent federal agencies to get email access in 1994 and put up websites in 1995. "Reinventing Government" and all that. Gore took the lead role in those pushes under the government's plan of the "information superhighway." And the weird way that the rest of the technical public doesn't know about that... well no wonder this is funny to you. If you worked for the federal gov't when Gore was pushing the internet to executive branch agencies his comment "I invented the internet" means ONE THING- the us gov't internet policies came through my efforts. It makes perfect sense to me. why do people think this is funny? It's not that funny. My friends talk like that all the time, that "I invented this" comment was a running gag on Seinfeld. Why do people want to take it literally? stubborness?
  • We're auctioning votes, the politicians, and now even the 'net. Hmm... I suppose it had to happen eventually... well.. I guess it's time to auction off my karma...

    --

  • Hmm... Just a side thought but wouldn't that make him partially responsible (or at least indirectly claiming partial resposibility) in bringing about the world's larget repository (sp?) of porn, violent and offensive information and media including music, videos, books, magazines, images, etc., access to mentioned material and information relating to mentioned material? Wow... Tipper must be proud of him :P
  • http://dailyne ws.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000915/pl/gore_letterman_dc_3. html [yahoo.com] describes Gore on Letterman last Thursday, reading the Top 10 Rejected Campaign Slogans. You just stole number 9... number 9... number 9...

  • For Sale (Score:3)

    by rothwell ( 204975 ) on Saturday September 16, 2000 @12:01PM (#774343) Homepage
    One republic, pop. 270 million. Populace subdued. Please place bids at:

    The Republicrats,
    c/o Corporatism, Inc.

    Stay tuned for sponsored debates between a rich white guy in his 50s with strong family political connections, and a rich white guy in his 50s with strong family political connections. Debate topics will include whether there should be a prescription drug benefit as part of medicare, or whether medicare should pay for prescription drugs. Also on the table are whether taxes hould be cut, or whether we should cut taxes.

    Act now to get your piece of this exciting product! Auction closes in November!
  • You can get it @ boarders here in the Portland Metro area.

    We also got it in Vermillion SD @ USD in the early 90s.
  • Actually he didn't mispronounce "routers" as "root-ers" as this article suggests. He just used the UK English pronounciation.

  • ebay links (Score:3)

    by xjesus ( 231140 ) on Saturday September 16, 2000 @09:36AM (#774352)
    It appears that the link [ebay.com] does not contain the same description as the Satire wire article... is somebody trying to sell the internet out from under Al Gore? I can't read the ebay item number from the graphic on their website to tell for sure.

    If you're quick you can also get an Al Gore voodoo doll [ebay.com]. Aparently you can also get Al Gore's driver's license [ebay.com].

  • Campaign slogan (Score:3)

    by Kiro ( 220724 ) on Saturday September 16, 2000 @09:37AM (#774353)
    I guess Gore's campaign slogan now is,

    "I gave you the Internet, and I can take it back"

    --
    Kiro

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