Daily News Roundup, 10/12/07: The Gore Award Trifecta

Al Gore already has an Oscar and an Emmy. He added to his award shelf when he won the Norwegian Primary this morning. He shares the Nobel Peace Prize with a UN panel on climate change.

So, of course, what you will see all day on the news is speculation about whether Gore will get into the Presidential race. George and I talked about it yesterday, and no doubt you have talked about it with your friends and neighbors, if they are into this sort of thing. Politico wins the Friday Worst Analogy Award:

Sources say Gore, 59, will resist entreaties to enter the presidential race, which are rising like the ocean levels in "An Inconvenient Truth."

So that's terrible. As a member of the punditocracy, I am supposed to tell you if I think Gore is going to run. Since this is a year of unpredictable events, I will instead tell you that I think it would be a bad idea for him to do so. Maybe later, but not this time. I have to be consistent — if I thought it was too late for Fred Thompson to get into the race (which I did), even acknowledging how different and more effective a Gore candidacy would be than whatever Thompson is doing, I still have to say it is too late.

In economic news, some figures on nationwide foreclosure rates are out, and the amount of foreclosures in September 2007 was double the rate of foreclosures in 2006. Industry analysts also noted that September's numbers were down from those reported in August, but that was to be expected: August's foreclosure filings were are record-high levels.

Michael Chertoff is talking more about the environment within the context of the border fence than I would have predicted he would have to, and that's a good sign, even if his descriptions of his decision calculus are a little goofy:

"I have to say to myself, 'Yes, I don't want to disturb the habitat of a lizard, but am I prepared to pay human lives to do that?' " he said in a phone interview.

Talking about it like this lets you know he is totally serious.

We've talked about the CIA, and here's a weird bit of news to round out our coverage: the CIA's internal watchdog has recently issued reports on the agency's secret prisons and other areas of operation which criticized upper management. Now the relatively new Director of the CIA, Michael Hayden, is launching an investigation of those investigations, in what the LA Times sees as an effort to rein in the inspector general. You know, the guy in charge of making sure everyone's minding their p's and q's and doing what they're supposed to be doing. I suppose it is possible that Helgerson is a zealot with an agenda, but the idea of taking on inspectors general in this manner — and it isn't just happening at CIA — indicates a disquieting pattern.

Another disquieting pattern is Vladimir Putin's continued transformation into a full-blown Bond villain. He had Condoleezza Rice and Robert Gates to his house to kick off some talks and he got rowdy almost immediately:

"Of course we can sometime in the future decide that some anti-missile defense system should be established somewhere on the moon," Putin said, according to an English translation.

"But before we reach such arrangements we will lose the opportunity for fixing some particular arrangements between us."

This could lead to some disillusionment among the diplomatic corps, or people excited about the Eastern European missile shield. I'm not sure this is a partisan issue: Republicans are proving to be poor at getting along with Putin, but I don't know that Putin's in a mood to get along with anyone, and that could lead to some disillusionment all around, especially at the White House.

Maybe disillusioned Republicans can take solace in working for the candidacy of Stephen Colbert. Or one of his candidacies, anyways. Last night on Larry King, Colbert said that not only would he run for President, but also "that he would seek the nomination of both parties."

When King said this was a "cop out," Colbert, host of his own talk show, The Colbert Report on Comedy Central, said that it actually demonstrated true "courage" because "I could lose twice."

If you can find clips of the interview, they are worth getting, because it was hilarious. And since it seems like Colbert is totally unstoppable, you may not have a choice about whether to vote for him in November. You know, assuming there's no pesky laws that prevent him from running against himself on both tickets.