Al Gore now richer than Mitt Romney
With the sale of Current TV, the former vice president's fortune is pegged at more than $300 million.
A lot has changed for former Vice President Al Gore, who left the White House with a reported $1.9 million net worth.
With an estimated $100 million gross profit from the sale of his Current TV to pan-Arab broadcaster Al-Jazeera, Gore is now worth more than $300 million, according to an estimate from Forbes.com.
That puts his net worth well ahead of that of former presidential candidate Mitt Romney, who has an estimated fortune of $230 million and was often mocked for being out of touch with ordinary Americans during the election.
Gore's wealth accumulation began soon after he left the White House in 2001. Apple (AAPL) tapped him in 2003 to serve on its board, and the former vice president held more than 100,000 shares and options in the tech company as of Dec. 17, according to a regulatory filing. That makes Gore's stake worth more than $56 million, based on Apple's recent trading price.
Google hired Gore to serve as a senior adviser on environmental issues in 2001, a role he held for three years. He doesn't have a formal financial relationship with the company currently, Forbes.com reports.
Gore also has his hand in a global investment company called Generation Investment Management, which he founded in 2004 with ex-Goldman Sachs (GS) executive David Blood. Together, Blood and Gore have reportedly built a company with assets under management of more than $6 billion.
The truth is, serving in the White House often proves beneficial to a person's financial health.
Take a look at former President Bill Clinton, who since leaving the White House has built a net worth of about $38 million, helped by income as an author and public speaker. He's able to command speaking fees of more than $700,000, although more typically he is paid in the $500,000 range for his public events, reports CNN.com.
Still, Gore's new wealth may strike some people as being at odds with his image as an environmental do-gooder.
Conservative television host Bill O'Reilly condemned Gore as a hypocrite, citing a report that he wanted to sell Current TV to Al-Jazeera before higher taxes kicked in on Jan. 1.
Other people have pointed out that Current's sale to Al-Jazeera, which is backed by Qatar, "reeks of irony," given Qatar's oil-based economy, which might not jibe with Gore's environmental message from "An Inconvenient Truth."
Gore's net worth might not be as high as Forbes estimates: Bloomberg, for one, pegged his profit at $70 million from the Current TV sale. If that's the case, his net worth might be only $270 million or so -- but that's still higher than Romney's.
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From reading the comments, the Republicans have a misinformed view of liberals. Liberals and the media don't despise wealth. Look at Warren Buffet. What they do despise is getting wealthy by unethical means--such as wall street bankers who knowingly made bad loans and marketed them as Grade AAA investments. Or, CEOs of companies that exploit loopholes in the law or take advantage of weak governmental oversight to pollute at will for profit regardless of the consequences to the public at large. Or, CEOs who cook the books to inflate earnings so they can earn outrageous performance-based bonuses. i haven't seen any factual evidence that Al Gore did anything unethical or violated law.
I'm neither republican nor democrat...both parties are as crooked as a dogs hind leg..they are both liars and schemers and cheats and backstabbing cut throats...the two party system has gotten too far out of control neither side cares about doing for the people in this country...both sides only care about doing whats right for the party..I watch the political shows on sunday mornig and I get sick of listening to the same old crap and lies every week from the same people...give it up already and start doing some good for us starting with the so called president and working the way down through the channels to the janitor...get rid of the damn lobbyists and the donations from the oil companies and insurance companies and if a bank fails...oh well too damn bad...they screwed up and thats their problem just like when I screwed up my credit it was my problem...my government didn't give a crap about bailing me out and the bank of america didn't care that I lost my job...they took my house anyway and kept the money I put into it and sold it again for more than I paid for it....
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Amazing... no comments from the Peanut Gallery!
What's the matter libbies, are you speechless for a change? For some reason this is not surprising, but just think that this POS actually could have made it to the presidency. There is a big problem with the media going after conservatives long before they even get close, but with the libs it is all hand holding and singing cumbaja. It is sickening. If i was still serving as a career soldier, i would get out as soon as possible because of the decay
in leadership in D.C.
Gore did win 500,000 more votes than Bush but the Supreme court awarded the win to Bush. If Gore had won the debt today wouldn't be an issue. Gore campaigned on using the surplus to pay off our debt while Bush ran on giving it to the wealthy with a tax cut. How'd that work out?
"Some economists argue that both the Bush and Gore plans could bump against hard economic reality because they both are grounded in hazy projections on the size of federal surpluses. One analyst said forecasting a decade of budget surpluses is about as "accurate as a 10-year weather forecast." A new round of federal spending or tax cuts could lead to budgets that present future lawmakers with a choice between deficit spending or trimming programs.
"You know darn well that Bush's big tax cuts and Gore's spending proposals could get locked in based upon this surplus mirage," said Robert Bixby, executive director of the Concord Coalition, a Washington organization that champions debt reduction. "If the projection is off by 50 percent, you really get into trouble down the road."
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