Gore in the Ring
by Emil Guillermo

Al Gore’s found the perfect antidote to the Buddhist Temple campaign fundraising scandal. No matter what John Huang gives up in accordance with his recent plea bargain, Gore’s showing he’s ready.

He’s going to ignore it all! And don’t count on him showing up at any but a minimum of Asian American events.

The vice president has traded in his cocktail eggrolls for taquitos and has transformed himself into Matador Al! Ole!

Bullfighting, after all, can turn a Gore’s trademark wooden appearance into something else entirely. For a bullfighter, such stiffness helps provide a matador’s steely presence, which that suddenly, with the rush of a bull, turns into a fluid grace. Ole!

Only in this ring, it’s Matador Al trying hard not to be gored by a Bush. And yes, that’s him speaking Spanish! Better than the Taco Bell dog. (Go ahead, say it: “Yo quiero Al Gore?”)

Matador Al is going to be doing a lot of that this campaign.

The mainstream may have played up his talk about values at his announcement. But I noticed all that Spanish in his speech. One expected it later in the week when he spoke to the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials. But in his formal announcement?

The Vice President goes ethnic at a good time. It helps obliterate the Temple fiasco. Plus, it shows he’s just following the crowd. Latino numbers have gone through the roof. California’s gubernatorial election showed what happens when they vote. Republicans get creamed.

The only problem is that George W. Bush speaks Spanish, too.

To avoid seeming like a “Juan E.-come-lately,” Gore may need a Plan B. And I’ve got it for him.

Make that “B” as in boa. Feather boa. Get some. And some tights. Fast. Loud colors work best. And don’t wait for any Asian or Mexican donations. Buy it with a credit card. Just get enough to last the campaign. The stuff works.

Ask Gov. Jesse “The Body” Ventura, currently the reigning, officially-sanctioned beltholder of Minnesota politics. He’s causing a stir in California’s presidential primary.

Gore, meanwhile, is still a relative stick-in-the-mud.

Last week, Gore went on ABC’s 20/20 and said that Clinton’s extramarital affair with Monica Lewinsky was “inexcusable.” Ho-hum. That’s three inches somewhere in the paper.

Better if he gave Clinton a body slam, followed by a sleeper hold. Then he could taunt the cheering crowd with a pink feather boa.

With California’s primary moved up from next June to next March, people are talking about California’s big pot of delegates. And now pollsters have added Ventura into the mix of serious “potential” candidates.

George Washington to Jesse the Body? From wooden teeth to no underwear? It could happen.

Paul Maslin, the pollster for California Gov. Gray Davis, now working with the Gore campaign, told the San Francisco Chronicle that Ventura’s name recognition is 80 percent.

I don’t think God’s official recognition rate is that high. The governor of California himself is recognized by only 53 percent of California voters.

What’s more, the positive rating for Ventura is high -- even higher than Davis. And Davis, as you may recall, won the election last year by a 20-point margin.

Another pollster, Mark Baldassare of the Public Policy Institute of California, unabashedly says Ventura is for real. “If his name is on the ballot,” he told Chronicle reporter Carla Marinucci, “he will be a force to be reckoned with.”

Ventura’s strength turns out to be with the middle-of-the-road voter -- moderates turned off by both parties, but find a strong attraction to the ex-Navy Seal with the common touch. Ventura the guy’s guy. If you’re a person who thinks politics is a bunch of b.s. and little more than show biz for ugly people, then Ventura has loads of appeal.

Have a beer with him, and he’d belch. He’s different from the other guys we’ve all come to despise -- the phony political class, the suits, the public policy wonks who relate to budgets and documents, but not people. They just don’t connect with any of us.

Oddballs like Ventura have often had a white-male base. But what if he started attracting disenfranchised minorities? Latinos? Asian Americans?

The only thing that may slow that trend is that Ventura may be too amok for us all. He’s not ashamed of bragging about losing his virginity at 16 to win a bet. Or visiting prostitutes in Nevada. And then there’s the underwear matter. Boxers or briefs? Shoot. He doesn’t wear any.

For now, coy Ventura’s got a half-nelson on California politics. But who gets hurt? Bush? Gore? Both? Better double the order on feather boas. Make it triple, if Ventura starts speaking Spanish, Tagalog and Chinese.