'Democracy is under attack': Gore

Sun Aug 27, 3:50 PM ET

Former US Vice-President Al Gore warned an audience at the Edinburgh International Television Festival that "democracy is under attack".

The former presidential candidate said television networks in the world's biggest and most powerful democracies must do more to foster debate, which he said was crucial for democracy to flourish.

"In my country and others around the world democracy is under attack," the 58-year-old said.

Gore, who was also in Edinburgh partly to promote his film and book about climate change, both titled "An Inconvenient Truth", continued: "There's a feeling in the US on the part of many that the way democracy operates today is very different from the system we learned about in school."

He said that democracy, which he described as a "conversation", was now "more controlled and centralised", and that the most important role of the media was to facilitate democracy.

Gore said American politicians were spending their time raising funds at small gatherings and cocktail parties because, "the only thing that matters in American politics now is having enough money to put 30-second commercials on air to persuade the voters to elect or re-elect you."

The Internet, however, "offered the promise of recreating a meritocracy of ideas" and while not yet creating the wave of change that has been anticipated, had been "creeping into the TV domain".

Commenting on the US-led war in Iraq, increasingly opposed both by American politicians and grass-roots activists, Gore said: "It's been a long time since the US Senate or members of the House of Representatives had a feeling that what was said made any difference at all."

Questioned as to whether he thought US President George W. Bush, who defeated him in the 2000 presidential elections, was stupid, Gore replied: "I don't think he's unintelligent at all. He's incurious ... there's a puzzling lack of curiosity

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