Gore has 'no interest in running for office'

WASHINGTON — "I wanted it, and it was not to be," said Al Gore, the former vice president and two-time presidential candidate. "I am not pursuing it. I have been there, and I have done that."

Gore was on a break from promoting his book and documentary about global warming to dismiss — with something approaching finality — speculation that his rising profile should be interpreted as the first stirrings of another bid for the White House.

"Why should I run for office?" Gore asked, impatience in his voice. "I have no interest in running for office. I have run for office. I have run four national campaigns. I have found other ways to serve my country, and I am enjoying them."

These have been days of some vindication for Gore, the Tennessee Democrat who likes to introduce himself as "the man who used to be the next president of the United States," a melancholy reference to his defeat — a characterization he might be inclined to dispute — by George W. Bush in 2000.

The warnings of global warming that led the first President Bush to mock Gore as "Ozone Man" in 1992 hardly seem far-fetched in these days of melting ice caps and toasty winters.

He and his documentary, "An Inconvenient Truth," have been celebrated from Cannes to Hollywood.

With some Democrats recoiling at the prospect of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton as their party's nominee, there is speculation of how Gore could beat her for the Demo presidential nomination.

Yet if Gore has any annoyance these days, it is at the suggestion that "An Inconvenient Truth" was nothing more than the start of a campaign for president. "I am not trying to feed that or stimulate that," he said.