May 19, 1997

Washington Squares

For the next eight weeks, MoJo Wire gives you the chance to test your prowess with political trivia, and win a <b>FREE</b> subscription to <i>Mother Jones</i> magazine. Every Tuesday we’ll have a new set of questions about a different politician, plus the answers and winners from the week before. Just make sure you play before 5 p.m. Pacific Time each Monday.

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


This Week: Al Gore

Al GoreGrowing up inside the Beltway, the son of Senator Albert Gore, Sr. was destined for politics. A Harvard graduate and an Army journalist in Vietnam, Gore has a reputation for seriousness: At one time he reportedly devoted two hours a day to learning the technical details of nuclear arms control. And his studiousness has paid off — the advance for his best-selling environmentalist tract, Earth In The Balance, totalled $100,000.

But how well do you really know the Veep?

  1. How does Gore describe himself, politically?

    “a raging moderate”
    “a feminazi”
    “a tree hugger”
    “the L-word”
    “a techno-nerd”

  2. In 1987, how did former New Republic columnist Michael Kinsley describe Gore?

    “very lifelike”
    “Michael Dukakis without the sense of humor”
    “an old person’s idea of a young person”
    “an environmental wacko”
    “someone with the soul of a vice president”

  3. According to a joke in Washington, what is the Secret Service’s code name for Gore?

    “Second Banana”
    “Straight Arrow”
    “Cigar Store Indian”
    “Mr. Tipper”
    “Al Gore”

  4. In 1993, Gore appeared on the “Late Show with David Letterman.” What was the first question Letterman asked him?

    “Doesn’t it drive you crazy being an underling to a draft-dodging sleaze?”
    “Hey, have you taught Bill how to inhale?”
    “Don’t you have anything better to do than show up here?”
    “So, have you fixed the government?”
    “Clinton and Gore: Gone in Four?”

  5. Which of the following could Gore not put on his résumé?

    reporter for the Nashville Tennessean
    tobacco farmer
    Sierra Club member
    divinity student
    Angus beef farmer

Your name:

Your e-mail address
(for prize notification only):

Plus, you can add your name to our mailing list:

We’re compiling the results from this quiz, please come back later

Ted Rueter is the author of several books on politics, including The Newt Gingrich Quiz Book and The Rush Limbaugh Quiz Book.

So, smarty pants, how’d you do last week?

Check out our
Answers and Winners Page
and see if you get a free subscription to
Mother Jones magazine.

WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

The short of it: Last year, we had to cut $1 million from our budget so we could have any chance of breaking even by the time our fiscal year ended in June. And despite a huge rally from so many of you leading up to the deadline, we still came up a bit short on the whole. We can’t let that happen again. We have no wiggle room to begin with, and now we have a hole to dig out of.

Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

Because the in-depth journalism on underreported beats and unique perspectives on the daily news you turn to Mother Jones for is only possible because readers fund us. Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism we exist to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we need readers to show up for us big time—again.

Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

If you can right now, please support the journalism you get from Mother Jones with a donation at whatever amount works for you. And please do it now, before you move on to whatever you're about to do next and think maybe you'll get to it later, because every gift matters and we really need to see a strong response if we're going to raise the $253,000 we need in less than three weeks.

payment methods

WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

The short of it: Last year, we had to cut $1 million from our budget so we could have any chance of breaking even by the time our fiscal year ended in June. And despite a huge rally from so many of you leading up to the deadline, we still came up a bit short on the whole. We can’t let that happen again. We have no wiggle room to begin with, and now we have a hole to dig out of.

Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

Because the in-depth journalism on underreported beats and unique perspectives on the daily news you turn to Mother Jones for is only possible because readers fund us. Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism we exist to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we need readers to show up for us big time—again.

Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

If you can right now, please support the journalism you get from Mother Jones with a donation at whatever amount works for you. And please do it now, before you move on to whatever you're about to do next and think maybe you'll get to it later, because every gift matters and we really need to see a strong response if we're going to raise the $253,000 we need in less than three weeks.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate