By Rick Manning
Joe Biden must have dressed up in his best Al Gore, Jr. suit for a Beverly Hills global warming pep rally, as the man who “invented the Internet” bemoaned that a modern day Thomas Paine would struggle to get his pamphlet “Common Sense” to the masses today due to the high cost of television airtime.
Is this the same Al Gore, who used his influence to get his environmentalist television station Current TV carried by most major cable networks, only to sell this access to Al Jazeera, which is owned by the Emir of Qatar?
Apparently, the Hollywood crowd is not as disillusioned with Gore who made a cool $100 million on the deal to sell television access to U.S. markets to the very Middle Eastern oil interests as his former staff at Current TV where the sense of betrayal was palpable when the sale was announced.
Beyond the obvious hypocrisy of the politician who would have been president if he had only won his home state of Tennessee, the very fact that Mr. High Tech apparently hasn’t noticed that the printing press has been replaced by this little www thing is stunning.
In 1776 when Thomas Paine wrote and published “Common Sense,” it went viral selling almost 100,000 copies at a time when the colonies only had 2.5 million people. This made the pamphlet the largest selling book in the history of the U.S. on a per capita basis.
And the 48-page booklet was a game changer. By writing in a style that was familiar to the average colonist and using familiar Biblical references to the God fearing populace, Paine’s work transformed American attitudes toward independence laying the groundwork for Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence that was finalized just six months later.
George Trevelyan’s History of the American Revolution highlighted the importance of Paine’s work writing: “It would be difficult to name any human composition which has had an effect at once so instant, so extended and so lasting […] It was pirated, parodied and imitated, and translated into the language of every country where the new republic had well-wishers. It worked nothing short of miracles and turned Tories into Whigs.”
Today, Paine would not have been limited to a printing press or a television broadcast, his work would be a viral YouTube video that would reach millions based upon its powerful message and presentation.
The proof of the power of YouTube, Facebook and Twitter is all around us. Just one year ago, with zero money spent on promotion, the video “If I wanted America to fail” took many in the nation by storm with more the 2.6 million people viewing it — all due to the power of the message and presentation.
For the self-proclaimed “Inventor of the Internet” to not have a clue that his “child” had become the ultimate democratization of communications and was changing the world reveals just how out of touch he has become.
The fact that the professionally vacuous of Hollywood could erupt in applause at the “great” man’s musings about the good old days when Johannes Gutenberg was king reflects just how far out of touch they both are.
Of course, Al Gore is too cool to be stuck in a printing press world when everyone else is tweeting. That’s why I wouldn’t be surprised if, after the diamond encrusted crowd departed, Joe Biden pulled off his Al Gore Halloween mask and laughed out loud at the rubes of Rodeo Drive who bought his drivel.
Rick Manning (@rmanning957) is the vice president of public policy and communications for Americans for Limited Government.
