Gore: Special interests have gotten 'out of control'

David Edwards and Muriel KanePublished: Thursday May 31, 2007
In an interview on CBS's Early Show on Thursday, former Vice-President Al Gore was asked about pressure from coal interests to have the US government not only pay for the building of coal liquification plants but order 25 years worth of fuel in advance. "That would be a horrible mistake," Gore responded, insisting that we need to shift away from fossil fuels and towards renewables.
"In a democracy, we have always had power exerted by special interests -- but it's out of control now," Gore said. "The special interests almost every time now outweigh the public interests, and that's dangerous for our democracy."
Asked further, "Don't you have a greater obligation to make your views more public," Gore laughed at length and replied, "Well, I haven't been a shrinking violet. I haven't been shying away from making my views known. ... I don't hold back, and don't intend to."
The following video is from CBS's Early Show.