SFGate

California Democrats feeling jilted by Gore's silence

Carla Marinucci

Monday, May 7, 2001

Usually mellow Californians are sending an angry message to Al Gore these days: Hey, buddy, you don't call, you don't write.

"The vice president hasn't called to thank me. Not one phone call, not one letter. And I'm sorry to say that," fumed state Democratic Party Chairman Art Torres last week. "I'm insulted for the members of the California Democratic Party . . . considering what we did for him."

What California Democrats did was deliver a whopping 12 percentage-point, 1. 3 million-vote margin of victory in November in the nation's most populous state. It took hundreds of thousands of phone calls, lawn signs and mailers to provide Gore with 54 electoral votes against George W. Bush.

Not to flog a dead horse, but if Gore had done so well in his own state, Tennessee, he'd be president today.

The comments by the usually cheery Torres, an enthusiastic Gore backer, spell trouble for the former vice president -- and, Democrats say, suggest that the usually politically sensitive Gore has written off the idea of a presidential run in 2004.

That may be one reason why California Democrats -- already speculating about the next presidential race -- are mentioning names like Sen. Chris Dodd of Connecticut, House Democratic leader Dick Gephardt of Missouri and Sen. Evan Bayh of Indiana as possible candidates the next time around.

"I haven't heard anybody talking about Al Gore for president" in 2004, said Torres. "I don't think he's taking it seriously. We're really hurt we haven't even been acknowledged by him. Not to even call or thank the Democratic Party is really sad."

Gore isn't the only one who could use a dig in the ribs, Torres said. "We haven't heard from (Joe) Lieberman, either," he said of the Connecticut senator, who was Gore's vice presidential candidate. "Joe's never called me for all the work we did for them."

Torres is saying that he's going to take action -- soon. "I'm going to call Miss Manners," he said.

-- Anonymous, May 07, 2001