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CNN Larry King Live

Interview of Al Gore

Aired July 05, 2007 - 21:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

LARRY KING, CNN HOST: It's always a great pleasure to welcome the former Vice President of the United States Al Gore to "LARRY KING LIVE."
This Saturday he hosts "Live Earth," an incredible 24-hour worldwide concert series with major performers, all in an effort to fight global warming and save the environment.

He's author of the runaway bestseller as well, "The Assault on Reason." First, we need to ask, how -- how's your son doing?

AL GORE, FORMER VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Oh, thank you, Larry. He's -- he's doing very well. We're treating it of course as a private family matter. We're very happy that he's sought and is getting the treatment that he needs. And beyond that, we appreciate the good wishes that have come our way. And we're treating it as a family -- a private family matter.

KING: One other thing and then I will leave it alone. Have you spoken with him?

GORE: Oh, of course.

KING: And how's he doing, you know, emotionally?

GORE: He's doing fine. Thank you.

KING: OK. How did this thing come about? This massive thing Saturday night? I think we discussed it on this show once.

GORE: Well, it wasn't my idea. Some of the best things I've been involved with have not been my ideas at all.

Davis Guggenheim made the movie, "An Inconvenient Truth." Kevin Wall, the executive producer of these "Live Earth" concerts, saw that movie and he and his wife were moved by it and he contacted me and mutual friends introduced us and we got to know each other really well.

He -- you know, there's 6.5 billion people in the world, Larry. Kevin Wall is the only one who can pull off these "Live Earth" concerts on all seven continents. It's absolutely amazing. And it's been great fun for me to work as his partner.

I've had the opportunity to contact a lot of the greatest performers in the world and ask them if they would do this and -- and they all are doing it -- 150 of the very best performers in the entire world.

There are also 10,000 other events simultaneously -- watch parties, if you will. Some of the many, many thousands of people in city squares with giant screens. And it's the launch of a three-year campaign to get the message about the climate crisis and the solutions to the climate crisis to every person on earth so that we can move across this political tipping point, beyond which everybody in every country puts pressure on their leaders and every party to make this a top priority and solve the climate crisis.

KING: How will we see it in the United States?

GORE: Well, a lot of different ways.

There will be one of the eight giant mega concerts will be at the Meadowlands in the New York City area and New Jersey. And there will be a prime time concert for three hours on NBC. It will be on all of the NBC networks. It will be on MSN streaming live.

And as I said, there are going to be watch parties. And if people want to host a watch party, there's still time to sign up for it. You can go to LiveEarth.org or AlGore.com. We will sign you up, send you the information so that you can become an official site.

And we are asking all of the 2 billion people estimated to be in the audience Saturday to sign a seven-point pledge that embodies the solution to the climate crisis, including putting pressure on your country no matter where you live in the world to sign and join an international treaty within two years that cuts global warming pollution by 90 percent in the developing countries and by more than half worldwide in time for the next generation to inherit a healthy earth.

KING: All right. You're in -- you're in London, Tokyo, Johannesburg, Shanghai, Sydney, Hamburg and Giants Stadium in New Jersey. What about...

GORE: And Rio de Janeiro.

KING: Yes.

GORE: Then we have, also, a special performance from Antarctica, the first time ever.

KING: Penguins or people?

GORE: You -- people. People. And let me just say there will be a couple of surprise locations and you'll have -- you'll have to stay tuned for those announcements. But one of those announcements will be coming tomorrow. But there will be some surprises throughout the day.

KING: There was a question, Al, about Rio de Janeiro. Clear it up.

GORE: Clear it up. Rio de Janeiro's going to be a giant concert on the beach at Copacabana. Tipper and I went down there to announce that concert. Fantastic performances in Rio. Probably a million people expected in the craft (ph) in Rio de Janeiro alone. Wonderful acts.

Of course, that -- the same is true everywhere at all of these concerts. It's very exciting.

KING: Wasn't it a question about Rio not coming off?

GORE: There was a question, but it's been resolved. One of the local government officials in Rio raised some questions that -- about safety that have been worked out. And that's completely resolved now. We've got the green light. All signals are go. And we're in the countdown right now.

It was started, incidentally, in Sydney, Australia because of the time zones, of course. This will go on for 24 hours with the prime time moving around the planet as each one of the locations moved into its prime time. And the feed will be available all over the world.

KING: Where will you be?

GORE: Well, I'm going to be at the New York -- New York concert in the Meadowlands in New Jersey, just right in the New York metropolitan area. And then one other location, as yet to be announced.

KING: How is this going to be funded?

GORE: Well, it is -- it's actually not designed to raise money. It's designed to raise awareness.

KING: But how...

GORE: And to spread word about the solutions. But the costs are covered by the ticket prices. Most of the large concerts have tickets that are sold to cover the cost. All of the performers, by the way, are performing for free. And God bless them.

These are the best acts in the entire world, and they've all said, yes, we're going to give our time and our talents in order to try to help save the climate. And of course, as you know, Larry, we've talked about this, that the earth's climate really is in great jeopardy. Some of the leading scientists in the world have now said that we may have as little as 10 years in which to make major changes, lest we lose the chance to save and retrieve the favorable climate balance on which human civilization depends.

KING: How'd you get Madonna?

GORE: Went to talk with her a couple of times, actually. Tip and I went, with Kevin Wall down and had a very nice meeting with her. She has actually performed -- written a brand new song. It's fantastic. And she will perform it for the first time on 7/7/07. She's performing near her home at the London concert.

Some other performers have done that. The Black Eyed Peas. I talked to their front man, Will.i.am, a terrific guy. I've met all of them -- and in the process of trying to convince them to be a part of this. And Will.i.am agreed to write a song. He said, "I'll get -- get it to you within seven days." And almost to the minute, seven days later, in my e-mail, here shows up this fantastic new song that will be performed for the first time at Live Earth.

So there are a lot of exciting things going on.

KING: Before we take a break, the announcement that will come tomorrow is about another location?

GORE: Yes.

KING: Not -- it's a hot -- did you just put that together?

GORE: No.

KING: There are no more than the other continents we've already mentioned, so it has to be two on one continent, right? It's not a new continent. Could be in outer space.

GORE: Stay tuned.

KING: Al Gore's our guest. Live Earth is a 24-hour worldwide concert series. It's incredible. We'll go back to talking about it and lots more with the former vice president right after this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

(MUSIC)

GORE: The concerts are linked to the beginning of a campaign. We have a climate crisis that is a planetary emergency. We can solve it. We will solve it. But we will solve it when enough people around the world get the message.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KING: We'll come back to discussing this incredible event. Never anything like it. It will take place Saturday night, put together by Al Gore and a whole bunch of other people involved. In fact, Kevin Wall, one of those people, the Live Earth producer, executive producer, will be with us later in the program.

Some items in the news, Mr. Vice President. Just today, Republican Senator Pete Domenici broke ranks with the administration, says he's unwilling to continue the current strategy in Iraq. He joins fellow Republican Senator Lugar, both good friends of yours. What do you make of this?

GORE: Pete's a thoughtful guy. So's Dick Lugar. And I think what you're seeing is evidence of a growing bipartisan determination to take a different course. And as I've mentioned to you before, Larry, what the invasion of Iraq had in common with our current policy toward the climate crisis is that, in both cases, unfortunately, the truth was ignored. The facts that were available, that should have justified a different policy, were pushed aside in favor of an ideological conclusion that had been reached before any facts were even examined.

And you know, now we have got to find a way to base America's policies on the truth. And as best we can determine it, not according to some, you know, lobbying campaign or special interest group. But in the course of democratic free debate, where we look at the facts.

And the climate crisis is the most serious challenge we've ever faced, by far. And the solutions are things that we should be doing for other reasons anyway.

For example, all of the oil that we depend on now from the Persian Gulf in the region, where the Iraq war is continuing -- and it's mainly a civil war now, of course -- our continued dependence of imported oil from these vulnerable areas is connected to the same pattern that leads us to put 70 million tons of global warming pollution into the earth's atmosphere every 24 hours around the world, as if it was an open sewer. And pretending that that doesn't have consequence, when there's signs to tell us it definitely does and we've got stop doing, that's really the essence of this problem.

But because it's so pervasive, in order to change it, we really have to have a sea change in public opinion in this country and around the world before the politicians and the government leaders in every nation will have the courage to do what really is necessary. But when we make these changes, we will also be less dependent on imported oil from areas like Iraq.

KING: Can you call the surge now a failure?

GORE: You know, I hate to put a label on efforts to try to salvage the best outcome from a terrible situation here. The basic problem was that we went in on false premises. It wasn't Iraq who attacked us on 9/11. That's where the -- that's where the problem started.

The country was unfortunately convinced to accept the terrible false impression that Iraq was responsible for attacking us on 9/11. Iraq had nothing to do with attacking us. But the original invasion was because of that false impression.

And now, we have an obligation. Even those of us who tried to prevent this invasion, who felt that it was a mistake and that we would get trapped in a civil war, no matter our views at the beginning, we now all have an obligation to get our troops out of there as quickly as possible in a way that does not make an already terrible situation even worse.

And what you're hearing from Pete Domenici today and Dick Lugar earlier and a strong majority in both the House and the Senate, and huge votes, although not by quite enough to overcome the filibusters that the minority are involved in, what you're hearing is a strong bipartisan determination to take a different policy. And I hope we do.

KING: By the way, even Colin Powell, last week, called it a civil war on this program.

GORE: Right.

KING: Scooter Libby, what do you make of the -- I know your former running mate and former president served with you, of course, you as vice president, with Bill Clinton as president -- really attacked it yesterday. What do you make of the commutation of the Libby sentence?

GORE: Well, I thought it was disappointing.

KING: Surprised?

GORE: Well, I heard the clamor from some within the president's base. I didn't think he would do it the way he did it, the day that he was supposed to start serving his sentence. I just thought that it was the wrong thing.

KING: Your book "The Assault on Reason," are you surprised at how successful it's been? I mean, it's a very strong political statement.

GORE: Well, thank you very much. I feel passionately about the need to fix the cracks in the foundation of American democracy. We made this mistake in Iraq and we're making this even worse mistake on the climate crisis because facts and logic and reason are not playing the role they should.

And this book, "The Assault on Reason," has been very well received. And I can't say I'm -- I don't -- maybe I am surprised that it's been as successful. I mean, it's done extremely well for an extended period of time. It's still -- it's still doing -- I'm very happy about that.

But, you know, I'm more focused on trying to get that message out there. And it's intimately connected to the climate crisis. Because that's the way we got into this mess. And the way we get out of it, the way we adopt a new set of policies that stops polluting the earth's atmosphere and causing this climate crisis, it to base our policy on the facts.

You know, the scientific studies about the climate crisis have been censored? Congressman Henry Waxman had hearings showing that in almost -- maybe more than 200 examples where scientific studies were funneled through the White House and were censored by an appointee who used to run the disinformation campaign for the carbon polluters? You know, that's just wrong.

And saying it's wrong isn't -- I hope that people don't hear that as a partisan statement. I think the climate crisis is way beyond politics. It used -- environment used to be a bipartisan issue. It should be again. This shouldn't -- it's not a political issue. You've heard me say this. It's a moral issue.

KING: But it used to be a Republican issue.

GORE: Well, with Teddy Roosevelt, absolutely.

KING: Yes.

GORE: And, you know, Teddy Roosevelt IV, a prominent Republican, an investment banker in New York City, is now a member of the board of the Alliance for Climate Protection, which is the organization that is partnering with Live Earth and is the beneficiary of the Live Earth concerts.

KING: We're going to get back to Live Earth in just a moment. We'll be right back with Al Gore. Don't go away.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KING: We're back with Al Gore. We're going to get to some more issues in a while.

But back to Live Earth, which takes place Saturday night around the world, what do you want to accomplish with this?

GORE: I'd like to all two billion people in the audience sign the Seven Point Pledge and become a part of the solution to the climate crisis. I know that's hoping for too much.

But the reason Live Earth is the launch event for a three-year global campaign is that we know it's going to take some time. But I hope that it gets the attention of the world in a way that we've never been able to do in the past and delivers the facts about the climate crisis and about the solutions to the crisis.

And all over the world, we're going to be delivering messages about the solutions to it. And we're going to be launching a global advertising campaign.

And incidentally, we're going to have a competition for young people -- people of all ages, but especially young people -- all around the world, to make commercials that we will then run over the next three years.

And current Current.tv, on a pro bono basis, is going to be managing that competition for free, and we're inviting people to send over the Internet the best 60-second commercial that they can make to get the message out there about how to solve the climate crisis. We're going to scientifically vet all the information to make sure that it's exactly right.

None of this is going to be partisan. None of it is going to have a political dimension to it. It's all going to be focused on getting a new set of policies worldwide.

KING: Well, as you know, we're being seen around the world now. So, everyplace that has tuned into you is tuned into us.

And one of the venues you've chosen -- Shanghai, China -- has a huge population, is considered a major polluter.

Why go there?

GORE: Well, you just gave the reason. Because they need to be a part of the solution.

China and the United States are the two biggest sources of global warming pollution. And we both have dynamic economies that are growing, and we both have the opportunity to invest in the new, cleaner, more efficient technologies that will allow continued improvements in the quality of living.

And, of course, the Chinese standard of living is so much lower than ours for the average person. They have a right to aspire to a higher quality of life. But they shouldn't have to repeat the mistakes that we made 100 years ago and continue burning so much dirty fuel, without capturing the carbon pollution and keeping it from going into the atmosphere.

So, it's very significant, by the way, that the Chinese authorities are allowing this concert in Shanghai. It's going to be broadcast all over China. It's very exciting, and we're engaging the Chinese.

I'm going to be launching a training program in China to train lots of Chinese people to give my slide show, in Chinese, all across China.

KING: Wow. Did any city turn you down?

GORE: No. We've had a lot of cities competing to host Live Earth. We had one city where there was a disagreement among some of the sponsors.

But actually, this is now by far the largest entertainment event in the history of the world, and it's all focused on this one message.

KING: We'll be right back with Al Gore, the former vice president. Lots more to talk about. We're only halfway through. Don't go away.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KING: We're back with Al Gore. Live Earth is Saturday night around the world.

An e-mail question now from Clint in Charlotte, North Carolina.

"Why is our country pushing so hard for corn fuel"?

GORE: Well, you know, alongside the need to reduce global warming pollution, there is also the need to reduce dependence on foreign oil. And alcohol fuels grown from plants, including corn, can, if it's done the right way, give us a source of renewable fuels.

Once it's burned, yes, the CO2 goes up. But it's then recaptured in the next crop and recycled through the crops.

Now, people have raised questions about all of the energy that's used in processing that corn. And if it's not done right, you actually have a negative energy balance. If it's done the right way, we can save energy.

But what's most exciting, Larry, is there's a new generation of alcohol fuels. Within the next two to three years, there will be new ways to process it without using a lot of energy and heat from natural gas and oil, and instead using enzymes and some of the biotechnology breakthroughs.

Some of the venture capital firms in Silicon Valley are hot on the trail of these breakthroughs, and they are going to be coming. So, it's pretty exciting.

KING: By the way, do we have security concerns here, what with recent occurrences in England and Scotland? Do you have some concerns?

GORE: Of course. Always, you have to be prudent. And there has been tremendous care taken in every single one of the venues.

Of course, all of that's been done quietly, behind the scenes, with the security folks and with the national authorities in each of these places, and the city authorities.

That's been handled very well, and we feel good about it.

KING: Do you -- how do you feel about Senator Inhofe, who has been, I guess, the most strong critic of yours in the Senate, who calls climate change "a hoax"?

GORE: Well, you know, there's some people who still think that the earth is flat. And I just don't know what to say to 'em.

When he took over the Environment Committee, he named the chief lobbyist for the coal industry as the head of that staff. And now, he's no longer head of the Environment Committee; Barbara Boxer is.

But, you know, I try as best I can, Larry, to try to find a way to respond that opens a dialogue and doesn't just cause them to build walls.

It's hard when some of the largest polluters close their ears and spend millions of dollars a year trying to intentionally confuse people into thinking this isn't real, the same way that tobacco companies spent millions of dollars to try to convince people that the doctors weren't really saying that smoking causes lung disease.

And that was really unethical what they did. And what these polluters are doing now is also unethical.

You know, the future for every generation following ours is at risk.

And incidentally, you know, temperatures reached 122 degrees today in parts of the Colorado River Valley -- all-time records. Almost half of the United States is either in drought or near-drought conditions.

In my part of the country, in the Southeast, there are big open cracks and dry soil in areas where that's never happened in the memory of the oldest farmers there.

So some of the problems that scientists have said we should watch out for because they are associated with global warming, are beginning to happen. The stronger storms, the sea level rise, the diseases from the tropics moving into the areas where more people live. The melting of the ice.

A new study says that the North Polar Icecap is now melting three times faster than the most pessimistic projections were just a few years ago and could be completely gone in as little as 35 years but we can still save it if we act quickly. And that's what the Live Earth concerts are all about, that to get past the nay-sayers and the cynics and the carbon polluters and instead lay the truth before the people of this country and the world and define it properly as a moral issue.

A lot depends on us doing the right thing now while we have the chance.

KING: There's no stronger proponent of your position than you. Live Earth is Saturday night. We'll be right back with Al Gore. Don't go away.

(MUSIC)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

TOMMY LEE JONES, ACTOR: Each one of these balloons represents two ounces of greenhouse gas. You can't see it. You produce greenhouse gases every time you use energy. The average home produces over 200,000 balloons every year. Save energy and you'll also save money and reduce your impact on climate change. You have the power to make the difference.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

KING: If that voice sounds familiar to you, that's Tommy Lee Jones, who was Al Gore's roommate at Harvard and that's one of a series of PSAs that Jones is featured in. Visually compelling as well to draw people's attention to the danger of global warming. Back to a couple of political things.

What do you think of the imminent entrance into the presidential race of your fellow Tennessean, Fred Thompson?

GORE: Is he about to announce? There's speculation ...

KING: I assume so. We keep saying -- I mean, what do you think generally if he comes in? Will he be formidable?

GORE: Sure. But I am not a very good judge of candidates on the Republican side. Maybe not on the Democratic side either but you know, there are 500 days between now and the presidential election so for me I just think it's premature to get into all of this horse race stuff.

KING: When people say to you, Al, you have such strong feelings. You had the most votes last time. Why not consider it? I mean, it's kind of an obligation. You're so involved. Why not?

GORE: Well, I appreciate it when people say that. I ran for president twice. I've kind of fallen out of love with politics, as I've told you, Larry, but I deeply respect those who are involved in the political game but what politics has become is something that requires a tolerance for these sort of spin messages that I don't think I'm very good at.

In any case, I'm involved in a different kind of campaign not for myself, not as a candidate, but to change people's minds about the most dangerous crisis we've ever faced and the greatest set of opportunities we've ever confronted to solve this climate crisis.

And it feels to me like that's the right thing for me to be doing.

KING: All right. We have an e-mail from Jerry in Houston, Texas. "Mr. Gore, how can you fly in your private jet, live in a massive mansion and set an example for others?"

GORE: Well, first of all, I fly commercial most of the time. There are a few occasions when that's not possible. I came here on a commercial airliner and we just finished putting 33 solar photovoltaic cells on the roof of our house. We're right now in the midst of installing a geothermal system for the heating and cooling and changing the remaining lights and windows and insulation that haven't already been done and we are walking the walk and we're going to have a green standard, the lead certification, for our house. Drive a hybrid and all the rest and look, I've never claimed to be perfect but I'm doing the best I can and one of the pledges at the Live Earth concerts, the second pledge is to reduce my own global warming pollution as much as I can and offset the rest in order to become carbon neutral.

And we're asking everybody in the world who attends these concerts or watches them to sign that and the other six points in that pledge and my family and I have long since become what's called carbon neutral. We are part of the solution and not part of the problem.

KING: You were considered a very strong vice president with a lot of clout. What do you make of the tenure of Vice President Cheney?

GORE: Well, I think I've warned you in the past, Larry, that you have to take whatever I say about Vice President Cheney and President Bush with a big grain of salt. I am afraid I've been losing my objectivity of them. I'm not a big fan, didn't vote for him, and didn't think, this will sound harsh, but I think that Vice President Cheney has done a lot of harm to our country. I really do. He was the strongest advocate of scrapping the U.S. participation in the efforts to solve the climate crisis.

Both he and President Bush come out of the oil industry and the part of the oil industry that's been least responsible on these issues. Some oil companies, by the way, are actually advocating visionary solutions here and some coal companies are too.

We should be trapping the CO2. We should put a price on carbon ...

KING: We've ...

GORE: I think that we ought to cut taxes on employment and replace them dollar for dollar with pollution taxes, including CO2 taxes, and that would help us deal with this.

KING: We're going to get another break, come back, spend a couple more minutes with Al Gore and then be joined our remaining moments with Kevin Wall.

We'll be right back with the vice -- former vice president right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KING: We're back with Al Gore.

We have one more e-mail question from Jeff in Naperville, Illinois: Mr. Gore, I am a seventh grade science teacher and I've been surprised at the way my students have not been introduced to the topic surrounding global warming. How can we help American students return to the forefront of world science?

GORE: Yes, I agree. And when I was that age, there was a thing called continental drift that still wasn't accepted enough to make it into the textbook. Of course, now, it's universally accepted.

The climate crisis should be taught in the schools. There is a scientific consensus, as "Scientific American" said in a special issue last fall, the debate is over. And the -- the science is very well understood and the basics have been understood for a century and a half. So, I think it should be taught.

KING: Are you optimistic that it will?

GORE: I am optimistic. Yes. I think that we're close to reaching a tipping point beyond which this becomes so widely accepted that people focus on the urgency of it. When they do, there's going to be a wave of great concern that we move much faster than we are now. We're kind of in a bubble of illusion right now, with so many not yet having taken the time to really look at the facts. This is a planetary emergency, Larry. It is one that can be solved but it's going to be solved when we get everybody sufficiently focused on it to support the new policies and the changes that are going to lead to the solutions.

KING: Did you see the Michael Moore film "Sicko"?

GORE: No. I've been wanting to see it. I hear great things. It's probably gotten better reviews than any of the movies that he's made and I think he is a very talented filmmaker and a lot of great reviews for that movie. I hope that "Sicko" leads to, along with other things, a move to pass national health insurance, at long last in our country.

KING: Harry Truman proposed it in 1948. What do you think of the potential candidacy, one more political thing and then we'll get a break and Kevin will join us, of Mike Bloomberg.

GORE: Well, I like Mike Bloomberg. And I like his -- what he's said and what he's done on the climate crisis. But he ran as an independent I wouldn't be inclined to support him if -- well, I don't know. You know -- it's -- I'm not sure he's going to run. I just have no idea. It's just speculative at this point.

KING: Can an independent win?

GORE: Never have.

KING: Be hard.

GORE: Yeah. And it's never happened in U.S. history.

KING: We'll take a break and when we come back, Al Gore will be joined by Kevin Wall, the man who put it all together, the Live Earth founder and executive producer. Don't go away.

(MUSIC)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KING: This tremendous concert will take place, Live Earth, Saturday night around the world and Al Gore said earlier, the man who really kicked it off, made it possible is Kevin Wall, he joins Al in New York. The Live Earth founder and executive producer. How did you two come together, Kevin?

KEVIN WALL, LIVE EARTH FOUNDER: We came -- I saw Al's slide show and the movie. I contacted him after my wife and I discussed it and thought what we could help out, what we could contribute to is knowledge and the ability to put together and event that would raise this sort of attention and immediately Al and I met and Al said, let's do this together.

So here we are today. KING: Are you surprised at how far it's come?

WALL: Well, yes. I mean we're right now in the 24 hour window. We're counting down. Al and I locked off today, New York. I'm on my way to London where we're building all the world seeds (ph) in this hugely complicated thing that we're about to pull of but fasten our seatbelts. We're on our way.

KING: All right. A critic of both of you is Bob Geldof. Mr. Geldof is the noted producer. He has produced concerts like Live Aid and Live Acres (ph) and he calls this an enormous pop concert. Says we're already aware of global warming and says he would only organize an event such as this if he could go onstage and announce concrete environmental measures from the American presidential candidates, Congress or major corporations. Al, you want to go first?

GORE: Well, he made one comment quite a long time ago in what he thought was an off-the-record session in the Netherlands and he hasn't said that in quite a while. We have a lot of respect for him and we've taken his advice in -- in making sure that this is the beginning, not the end but the beginning of a multiyear campaign and listen, this seven point pledge that 2 billion people will be asked to sign is a very concrete outcome.

If we can get a small fraction of the people watching this concert to sign up to those measures then you are going to see the beginnings of major change but ...

KING: What was the toughest thing, Kevin, in putting this together?

WALL: You know, Larry, the toughest thing is the complexity of it. We really -- this wasn't about just a couple countries. The air we breathe here is the same air that they breathe in the U.K. or in China and what was important was how could we put something together in seven continents. This has never been done before and an immediate distribution plan that we can put together, talk to, effect maybe 2 billion people in one day.

Logistically never been done. This is like -- think about 10 Super Bowls in the same day around the globe, all of them being produced. It's very complicated but we've risen to the challenge with unbelievable people and a fantastic partner here with Al Gore.

KING: Now, where were you going to be Kevin? Al is going to be at the Meadowlands. Where are you going to be?

WALL: I'm going to be in London. We've built, with the BBC, a massive control room and I'll be onsite in London and Madonna is closing there and when she closes I'll back at the BBC to the world control room.

KING: Do you kick it off, Al?

GORE: Well, we're going to save some surprises as I told you, the initial concert will unfold in Sydney, Australia. Kevin and I were together just for the last several days of this week in London where the different feeds from all around the world are being coordinated, London and New York are the two pillars of it but all of these other concerts are unfolding in their own time zones and I will have a role in some of the others by electronic means but we're going to save some of that until the day of.

KING: When I say begin it all, you could begin it by satellite to Sydney, couldn't you?

GORE: We're going to -- there are going to be a lot of surprises as this thing unfolds, Larry and as I mentioned earlier, over the next 24 hours stay tuned for several new announcements, some exciting twists and turns in this that I think people will enjoy.

KING: Kevin, how are you rehearsing all of this?

WALL: Well, you know, fortunately I have ADD so I can't micromanage it and what I try to do is hire the best professionals in their jobs and let them get on with the jobs. Otherwise you could never pull off an event of this size.

So I'm spending a lot of hours. I'm up at 5:00 in the morning, working at least till midnight every night and we're in the countdown phase. I won't sleep now until it's over.

GORE: Larry, let me just say ...

KING: Stars -- go ahead, Al. Go ahead.

GORE: This is really going to start accomplishments. Hasn't been done yet but we're now in, as Kevin said, a 24 hour window but I've watched this guy handle all of these amazing tasks that come together with this. It's really incredible. It really -- and the team helping him is really fantastic. This is going to be a major event that people look back upon as something that was never done in the past.

And I hope it has -- we both hope, obviously, that it has the impact it's designed for.

KING: Kevin, I congratulate you -- well, I'll congratulate you Monday.

WALL: Thank you. I look forward to it. We're blasting off, ready for a show and we're going to hopefully be the launch of changing the world.

KING: And we look for that announcement tomorrow, Al. It better come true.

Al Gore and Kevin Wall. We thank them both very much. What an extraordinary undertaking. It's all happening Saturday night and starts in Sydney, Australia.

That's tonight's edition of LARRY KING LIVE. Anderson Cooper is the host of 360. He is doing it out of New York. He is there right now. Anderson?

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