The deputies smelled marijuana and searched the car
They found less than an ounce (28 grams) of marijuana
along with the prescription tranquilisers
and painkillers Xanax, Valium and Vicodin,
and the attention deficit disorder drug Adderall
Orange County Sheriff's Department mug shot
of Al Gore III, taken July 4, 2007.
After his return from Vietnam,
friends such as John Warnecke
say that got high with Gore [Senior]
as often as 3 or 4 times a week,
listening to Grateful Dead albums and talking about
what they would do if they were president
"Al Gore stoned was a mix of expansiveness,
melancholy and paranoia," Warnecke said
And He Was Driving a Hybrid CarLike Father, Like SonPass the Weed, Al!
Daddy Got Stoned and Listened to the Grateful Dead
Al Gore Sr has long admitted that he smoked pot, both during his stint in Vietnam and for a "brief while" after his return. He claims that it was only a few times.
He's being economical with the truth. Former drug buddies of Gore's have come forward to say that he was a heavy smoker, right up until his first run for Congress in 1976.
In college, Gore was said to be hanging out in the basement of his dorm, getting high and watching TV most of the time.
After his return from Vietnam, friends such as John Warnecke say that got high with Gore as often as 3 or 4 times a week, listening to Grateful Dead albums and talking about what they would do if they were president.
"Al Gore stoned was a mix of expansiveness, melancholy and paranoia," Warnecke said.
However, once in the political limlight, Gore preached:If young people have emptiness in their lives, if they have a lack of respect for the larger community of which they're a part, if they don't find ways to feel connected to the adults who are in the community, if they feel there's phoniness and hypocrisy and corruption and immorality, then they are much more vulnerable to the drug dealers, to the peers who tempt them with messages that are part of a larger entity of evil.So spoke Al Gore in February 1999, denouncing illegal drug use by young people.
Phoniness? Hypocrisy? Corruption? Immorality? Those four words nicely summed up the Clinton-Gore "anti-drug" policy.
Young people try alcohol and other drugs for a host of reasons. Most of these kids aren't troubled; they are curious about what it's like to get high, and eager to engage in "adult" behavior.
Gore smoked pot as a young man. Were his college-chum "connections" agents of evil?
Does he think his old Harvard toking pals applauded when half-a-million Americans were arrested for pot possession in 1996, and again in 1997 -- far more than in any year under Nixon or Reagan?
in 1999, the then vice president told a group of black columnists he favors reducing the draconian penalties for crack cocaine -- which have contributed substantially to the explosive growth of the black and Hispanic inmate population -- to the level for powder cocaine, the preferred coke of white high-rollers.
But did Gore do more than whisper this to black columnists? Did he make it a "fundamental fairness" issue in his campaign?
Of course not. It was too contentious for 'middle America'.
He should have advocated treatment rather than prison for nonviolent drug abusers. Dropped the silly "entity of evil" rhetoric and spoke sensibly about teen-age drug use.
If Gore had done that he would have demonstrated he was cutting himself off from the phony, hypocritical, corrupt, and immoral drug policies of the administration he served.
The son of the US former vice-president Al Gore was arrested today on suspicion of possessing marijuana and prescription drugs after being pulled over for speeding in California, authorities said.
Al Gore III, 24, was driving a blue Toyota Prius at close to 100mph on a motorway near San Diego when he was pulled over by sheriff's deputies, said police department spokesman Jim Amormino.
The deputies smelled marijuana and searched the car, Mr Amormino said. They found less than an ounce (28 grams) of marijuana along with the tranquilisers and painkillers Xanax, Valium and Vicodin, and the attention deficit disorder drug Adderall. "He does not have a prescription for any of those drugs," Mr Amormino said.
Mr Gore was being held in the men's central jail in Santa Ana on $20,000 (£10,000) bail.
In 2003 he was charged with possession of marijuana; in September 2002 military police arrested him for drunk driving near a defence force base in Virginia; and he was given a ticket for reckless driving by North Carolina police in August 2000.
Kalee Kreider, a spokeswoman for his parents, did not immediately return phone messages.
The former vice-president turned environmental crusader has been in the UK this week talking about the dangers of climate change [and the pleasures of marijuana].
The 24-year-old son of former Vice President Al Gore was arrested for drug possession on Wednesday after he was stopped for allegedly speeding in his hybrid Toyota Prius, a sheriff's official said.
Al Gore III -- whose father is a leading advocate of policies to fight global warming -- was driving his environmentally friendly car at about 100 miles per hour on a freeway south of Los Angeles when he was pulled over by an Orange County sheriff's deputy at about 2:15 a.m..
A subsequent search yielded a small amount of marijuana, along with prescription drugs including Valium, Xanax, Vicodin and Adderall, said sheriff's spokesman Jim Amormino. There were no prescriptions found, he said.
Gore was arrested on suspicion of drug possession and booked into the Inmate Reception Center in Santa Ana, about 34 miles south of Los Angeles, on $20,000 bail, he said.
It was not Gore's first brush with the law. He was arrested in 2003 for marijuana possession and in 2002 for suspected drunken-driving.
Gore was still in custody as of mid-morning and was sharing a holding cell with an unknown number of people, said Orange County Sheriff's spokesman Jim Amormino.
"There are no special privileges," he told Reuters.
Gore cooperated with law enforcement as soon he was pulled over and quickly identified himself as the son of the former vice president, Amormino said.
A spokesman for the elder Gore said he was traveling and could not immediately be reached for comment.