HONG KONG — He still has the same patrician manner — friends would say aloof, others might say pompous. He still carries a mountainous chip on his shoulder, believing that he was robbed of the U.S. presidency seven years ago.

But Al Gore's speech last week accepting his share of the Nobel Peace Prize was of such noble quality that the world must lament that he will not be elected by acclaim as the next president of the United States. He was eloquent, authoritative, powerful and scary.

He warned that climate change is a "real, rising, imminent and universal" threat, that "our world is spinning out of kilter," the very web of life on which we depend is being ripped and frayed. We, the human species, are confronting a planetary emergency — a threat to the survival of our civilization that is gathering ominous and destructive potential even as we gather here."