How Al Came Back To Life

It must have been hell for Bill Bradley. Al Gore was agreeing with him again. Every time Bradley opened his mouth at the Democratic debate in Los Angeles last week, Gore seemed in full accord. "I agree with that statement," he said at one point. "I think it was a very fine statement." Ouch. For months Gore had been treating Bradley's ideas the way a cleaver treats meat. But now that Bradley's campaign resembled ground chuck, the Vice President was showering him with roses--a spectacle that's likely to continue this week, if Gore finishes off Bradley on Super Tuesday. In the press room during the debate, Bradley's campaign chairman, Doug Berman, watched with a resigned eye as Gore heaped praise on the loser. "He should just come out and endorse us," Berman said, a trace of bitterness in his voice.

After the debate, self-satisfied Gore operatives moved about the press room, and Berman caught sight of Carter Eskew, the Vice President's message strategist and principal knife sharpener. Berman leaped to his feet, strode across the room and gave Eskew a big, happy hug. Then Gore's campaign manager, Donna Brazile, came over and slapped Berman on the back. It was the same thing that had just happened onstage, the victor playing kissy-face with the vanquished, but there was more to it than that, because Al Gore owes Bill Bradley a huge debt. Meeting the stiff challenge that Bradley posed last fall forced Gore to become a far better candidate--to debate important issues, hone his ideas as well as his cleavers, overhaul his campaign and his personal style, and finally say why he thinks he should be the next President. Bradley did many things wrong in the course of this campaign, but what he did right helped trigger the transformation of Al Gore--from the laughingstock of last summer to the focused, effective candidate who will be ready for the Republicans next fall.

The Vice President acknowledges the debt. While stressing that he is "not looking past the battle for the nomination," Gore told TIME on Friday that "the strong, bracing competition [from Bradley] has helped me to dig deep and find a better way to communicate and connect and campaign. I would not have preferred that. I've run both ways, and I prefer unopposed. But my preference would have been to my detriment, because the competition has been good for me."

With Gore riding high, it's worth remembering the slough of despondency he trudged through last summer, when Hillary Clinton's Senate bid was sucking up the headlines and campaign cash. Gore talked about his very real technology accomplishments and managed to call himself the father of the Internet. He smothered his announcement that he was running to become the next President with a clumsy attempt to distance himself from the current one. Even a nice photo op in a canoe became painful, when 170 million gallons of water were released--during a drought--to lift Gore's boat. Worst of all, Gore was making forgettable speeches (something called the "livability agenda" was much on his mind) in front of small, dutiful crowds. All the while he was studiously ignoring Bradley, who was working hard and well below the radar: raising money, recruiting a grass-roots army in New Hampshire, offering himself as a pure and plausible alternative.

CONFRONTING THE CRISIS