Word: bradleys
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...disillusionment with politics, but the New Gore wasn't always a pretty sight. He often seemed as hyper and needy as a ninth-grader on a first date. But at least voters realized that he was truly, madly, deeply committed to winning, and they liked that about him. Bradley's cool, take-it-or-leave-it approach to politicking began to pale by comparison...
...Hardest Working Man in Politics made his debut on Sept. 25 in Washington, when Gore and Bradley delivered back-to-back speeches at the fall meeting of the Democratic National Committee. Bradley, who was enjoying his big media moment, went on first. With his reading glasses perched on the tip of his nose, he gave a wry, understated speech that stressed party unity and common ideals like gun control and help for hungry children; he was warmly received. Then the O'Jays' tune Love Train started blaring, and Gore took over the stage--and the audience. He abandoned his prepared...
...weeks later, when the rivals met again at the Jefferson-Jackson Day Dinner in Iowa, a gathering of 3,000 Democrats, Gore was even more aggressive. Again Bradley spoke first, lamenting the state of politics and wondering why he and Gore couldn't be more like home-run rivals Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa, "pushing [each other] to be the best we could be." When it was Gore's turn, he called Bradley a quitter--Bradley left the Senate while Gore "stayed and fought"--and then neatly turned the tables on his reform-minded rival. "I listened carefully to what...
...Bradley didn't stand up--he regarded Gore's move as a transparent ploy, the kind of low gambit that was beneath him. Bradley's contempt for Gore--"He sees Al as a smaller guy," an adviser said at the time--blinded him to the seriousness of Gore's counterattack. He could see through Gore, so he assumed that voters would see through him as well. But there was more to Gore than Bradley believed; voters liked what they saw in the Vice President. He wasn't charming, but he worked hard and came to play. A Bradley strategist calls...
...Bradley didn't have any cold-eyed operatives around him who could tell him he was wrong about Gore. No one in his small circle of longtime advisers--communications director Anita Dunn, campaign chairman Doug Berman, press secretary Eric Hauser--had ever run a presidential campaign, and they all saw Gore just the way Bradley did. In meetings they referred to him as a "joke." When Gore poached some of Bradley's best lines, talking about wanting "a different kind of campaign" that would "elevate our democracy," they thought everyone would realize that Gore was robbing them blind. Nor were...