Michael Moynihan assaults Algore.

What this means, of course, is that television stations like Current TV (which he co-owns) and films like An Inconvenient Truth (in which he stars) are cracking good fun, full of unmolested “reason,” while the hyenas of AM radio should be actively combated. Money is pernicious in the hands of Rupert Murdoch, owner of the New York Post, The Weekly Standard, and Fox News, but less so in the hands of Joan Kroc, who bequeathed $225 million of her fortune to National Public Radio. Knees knock and boots shake when Clear Channel lards its schedule with right-wing radio hosts—whom Gore, shockingly, calls “fifth columnists”—but less so whenClear Channel launches a handful of left-leaning stations, determining that progressive talk is simply “good business.”

I’ll add a related point: I find it odd to be lectured on fear-mongering from a man who is constantly exaggerating the impact of global warming and latching onto every natural disaster to support The Cause.

Remember, fear-mongering and hype are evil when conservatives do it. But it’s OK when liberals do it. Because it’s true. Calling Republicans evil is OK because they are evil, dontchya know.

Over the last twenty years, I have heard Democratic politicians, including Al Gore, tell me that, if Republicans were elected, social security would be ended, medicare would be gutted, seniors would be eating dog food, blacks would be dragged to death behind trucks, we’d all be homeless, we’d all lose our health care, school children would be starved, the air and water would be polluted, etc., etc., etc. For Al Gore, who has fear-mongered his entire career, to now lecture the nation on their use of irrational fear for political means, is the height of arrogance.

But then again, Gore is so comfortable on that height.