There are various theories to why Gore was pulled: either he realized they didn’t have the votes (they don’t yet — the total is estimated at 202) and so he bailed on a failure.

Or maybe someone else realized — whaddyaknow? He’s a liability.

The White House skedded a 1:45 Rose Garden Conference to tout it instead.

Funny thing is, the Democrats have a Speaker from San Francisco, and bill authors from Beverly Hills and Masachusetts — possibly the three locations where Gore’s name is not a punch line.