Albert Gore III caught doing 160 kmh in a ... Prius???

Gore kid's arrest could help save planet

July 09, 2007
by Linwood Barclay, TheStar.com

Not for a minute do I believe Al Gore put his son up to driving 160 kilometres per hour in a Toyota Prius, thereby causing the lad to be arrested by police, who discovered marijuana and narcotics in the car. But if you're looking for a novel way of boosting the cause of environmentalism, you could do a lot worse.

When I heard Gore's 24-year-old son, Albert Gore III, had been pulled over driving at such a high rate of speed, and that police had allegedly found drugs in the vehicle, I'll bet I had the same reaction you did.

Gore's kid was doing 160 kilometres per hour in a hybrid?

This bit of news may do more good for the environmental movement than anything Al Gore has done to date. Sure, there was that global warming movie he made, and the companion book he wrote, and the Oscar, and he's been touring the planet warning us that the polar ice caps are going to melt and that if you live in Kansas you're soon going to have waterfront property.

And even if you think there's a lot of truth to the message, as I do, you can't help but think that doing the right thing as an individual isn't going to be very much fun. I'm all for making sacrifices, especially if I'm not the one who has to make them (which, by the way, is the Republican motto).

Switching over to a hybrid car is one of those right things, but, unfairly or not, it still has a reputation among car enthusiasts as something you have to pedal really fast when you're on the ramp merging into traffic on the 401.

That's all likely to change after news of this arrest.

I like cars. I like cars a lot. Not the big, stupid Hummer-like things that look like they're going to fall over when then they turn a corner, or which, when you end up parked between two of them, make it impossible to back out without putting your faith in a much higher power. But regular cars, cars that look like cars are supposed to look, I'm very big on, especially when they have a bit of zip to them.

So while I'm taken with the idea of a car that's great on gas and doesn't do nearly as much harm to the ozone layer, it's hard to get very excited about it. (Not that a clean planet isn't, at some level, something to be excited about.) You think, if I buy those light bulbs with the curly tails, turn back the thermostat and get a new, energy-efficient fridge, can I keep my six-speed manual and optimized close gear ratio?

But to hear that the Prius was doing 160 kilometres per hour, you have to wonder, was there a tailwind? Were the police clocking the young Gore while he was driving downhill? There's nothing to indicate this was the case. Based on what we know, that's just how fast the car was going.

Now, I don't want to drive 160 kilometres per hour. Those street racers? Crush their cars, I don't care. But for a car enthusiast, it's nice to know your ride has untapped potential. And if your car can do 160 kilometres per hour, it's not a stretch to think you can handle the ramp to the 401 with the best of them.

It's a bit early to know whether Toyota will be running the news reports of Gore's arrest in its advertising, but if I were a Prius salesman, I'd take customers aside and whisper to them, "This is the one Gore's kid got arrested in doing 160 clicks, you know." That ought to close a lot of sales.