Gore is acting like a candidate. He's making appearances here and there, getting free publicity, has a new movie out. He's cutting a higher profile, the kind of profile that leads folks to have that Eureka! moment when thinking of Gore versus the rest of the Democratic field. He's got the stature of Biden, but he's also attached to a key issue (environment) in the sense Sanders is, and he's won the popular vote once, like Hillary did. Of the top tier of candidates, Gore seems to have the plusses without too many of the minuses. He's well vetted; his liabilities won't be a surprise, but won't render him "under investigation". I strongly believe that Gore intends to run, and I believe, only a little less strongly, that he would be the most formidable candidate at this point, all things considered.
You seem to forgotten that he hasn't run for office in almost twenty years. He's going to be very rusty in his return to the political arena.
He'll be running against Donald Trump. The only reason Trump won was because his opponent was Hillary Clinton. Gore doesn't have the twenty years worth of baggage, the scandals, the email thing hanging over his head. Trump only won because Hillary was the weakest candidate fielded since Dukakis. Gore might be rusty, but he's a good salesman, and that's all campaigning is.
Quite the irony of history there. Gore running four years after a Clinton, who herself is called the weakest candidate since Dukakis, who actually beat Gore in the '88 primary. Maybe the "young blood / fresh face" issue with democrats is pretty deep, if we are at this point.
That being said, this may be the best time, as stated, for Gore to run since at least 2000. In fact, if he had won in '00, lost in '04 (which is practically guaranteed) and we had a rather similar-to-OTL McCain, McCain, Clinton, Trump series going up until 2020, it would even be time for him to perhaps run again.
I'm not sure if Gore could do anything to flip anything but Florida the south, (god help us if he lost Florida again), he did lose quite a bit of it back in the day, and rigid environmentalism may not be what the rust belt wants to hear.... but at least he seems more charismatic than he was in 2000 and if he had a younger VP from the right state it could work better than some other potential candidates.
