If you are inclined to think that the unjustly awarded election of 2000 led to one of the worst Presidencies of this or any other era, it is not easy to look at Al Gore. He is the living reminder of all that might not have happened in the past six years (and of what might still happen in the coming two). Contrary to Ralph Nader’s credo that there was no real difference between the major parties, it is close to inconceivable that the country and the world would not be in far better shape had Gore been allowed to assume the office that a plurality of voters wished him to have. One can imagine him as an intelligent and decent President, capable of making serious decisions and explaining them in the language of a confident adult. Imagining that alternative history is hard to bear, which is why Gore always has the courtesy, in his many speeches, and at the start of "An Inconvenient Truth," to deflect that discomfort with a joke: "Hello, I’m Al Gore and I used to be the next President of the United States."

It is to cry.

I'm one of those who hold Al Gore in some part responsible for the debacle of the 2000 election, for the misteps which allowed the election to be close enough for Bush to steal it (but I also hold Nader in complete contempt for the important role he played), but certainly Remnick is entirely correct here, that one of the things that makes the fiasco of the Bush years such a tragedy for America is that the path we might have gone down is so clearly and distinctly better than the one which was forced on us. It's practically impossible to think of ways in which a Gore Presidency could have been worse for the country, or the world, than the Bush Presidency we've been suffering under.

That Bush has failed, and so completely, and is apparently unable to undo his failure even as it becomes apparent even to some of his staunchest supporters, is his personal tragedy, which in the future some very talented writer might be able to bring to life on the stage or the screen in a way that moves audiences who have no clear recollection of the damage done in the Bush Years. But for those of us who have suffered through that time, and continue to do so, it's going to be difficult to find it in ourselves to feel any sympathy, or indeed, empathy, for this man who has hurt us in so many ways.

And Gore? He's plugging his new film about global warming, An Inconvenient Truth:

a brilliantly lucid, often riveting attempt to warn Americans off our hellbent path to global suicide.

Gore seems to have taken it upon himself to be our conscience, in much the same way that Jimmy Carter did after he left office:

There is no substitute for Presidential power, but Gore is now playing a unique role in public life. He is a symbol of what might have been, who insists that we focus on what likely will be an uninhabitable planet if we fail to pay attention to the folly we are committing, and take the steps necessary to end it.

The irony is that when all things are considered, Gore, the man who seemed to have lost the most in 2000, may come out ahead of Bush in the end on all counts.

Update: Krugman:

The United States will regain effective government if and when it gets a president who cares more about serving the nation than about rewarding his friends and scoring political points. That's at least a thousand days away.

That's what's got me in a near-constant state of depression: a least a thousand more days.

Update (5/1): In American Politics Journal, Bernie Weiner discusses Bush's tragic flaws. [Thanks to JoAnne]