Al Gore: Owned

The Al Gore is God Society may take umbrage with this, but let me share with you this clip from Meet the Press yesterday as Al Gore tries to defend his "do as I say, not as I do" lifestyle:



Glenn Reynolds notes the following:

My observation is that Al Gore is looking (and sounding) more and more like a Baptist televangelist all the time.

Amen...

The Continually Unraveling Consensus

If there is anybody left who actually believes that there is a scientific consensus that global warming is happening, chew on this:

The American Physical Society, an organization representing nearly 50,000 physicists, has reversed its stance on climate change and is now proclaiming that many of its members disbelieve in human-induced global warming. The APS is also sponsoring public debate on the validity of global warming science. The leadership of the society had previously called the evidence for global warming "incontrovertible."

In a posting to the APS forum, editor Jeffrey Marque explains,"There is a considerable presence within the scientific community of people who do not agree with the IPCC conclusion that anthropogenic CO2 emissions are very probably likely to be primarily responsible for global warming that has occurred since the Industrial Revolution."

The APS is opening its debate with the publication of a paper by Lord Monckton of Brenchley, which concludes that climate sensitivity -- the rate of temperature change a given amount of greenhouse gas will cause -- has been grossly overstated by IPCC modeling. A low sensitivity implies additional atmospheric CO2 will have little effect on global climate.

Larry Gould, Professor of Physics at the University of Hartford and Chairman of the New England Section of the APS, called Monckton's paper an "expose of the IPCC that details numerous exaggerations and "extensive errors"

Now obviously, an influential component of a very large and important organization of scientists distancing themselves from this unproven theory should shatter the notion of a consensus in support of anthropogenic global warming.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Al Gore had his little shtick the other day, and Michelle Malkin helps expose he and his minions for what they are:

The Stark Reality for Democrats

This is something I have been telling people offline for a few weeks, but it's something that is getting more mainstream play and is becoming more of a potential factor. The 2008 Democratic nominee just might be......Al Gore:

Al Gore on the second ballot: A scenario that a few weeks ago seemed preposterous is beginning to look plausible to some nervous Democrats looking for a way out of the deadlock between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. It goes like this: We love them both, but neither is a sure bet when it comes to electability. It's not about gender and race, each has more mundane vulnerabilities. Hillary's negatives will drive white men to John McCain; Obama's inexperience will require a gut check on the part of voters. What if the super delegates decide not to decide, denying either candidate the requisite number of delegates to secure the party's nomination. Democrats want to win. The new rallying cry: Gore on the second ballot.

Read the whole thing.

I just would like to say that Al Gore may be the one Democrat who can unite all factions of the Democratic party after the convention, yet I cannot possibly fathom a scenario where he can beat John McCain in November...

Truth on An Inconvenient Truth

Every so often somebody will moan about there being no scientists who are saying that what Al Gore is doing is wrong. Well, piling on to the court decision outlining Gore's lies is this:

ONE of the world's foremost meteorologists has called the theory that helped Al Gore share the Nobel Peace Prize "ridiculous" and the product of "people who don't understand how the atmosphere works".

Dr William Gray, a pioneer in the science of seasonal hurricane forecasts, told a packed lecture hall at the University of North Carolina that humans were not responsible for the warming of the earth.

His comments came on the same day that the Nobel committee honoured Mr Gore for his work in support of the link between humans and global warming.

"We're brainwashing our children," said Dr Gray, 78, a long-time professor at Colorado State University. "They're going to the Gore movie [An Inconvenient Truth] and being fed all this. It's ridiculous."...

...But Dr Gray, whose annual forecasts of the number of tropical storms and hurricanes are widely publicised, said a natural cycle of ocean water temperatures - related to the amount of salt in ocean water - was responsible for the global warming that he acknowledges has taken place.

However, he said, that same cycle meant a period of cooling would begin soon and last for several years.

"We'll look back on all of this in 10 or 15 years and realise how foolish it was," Dr Gray said....

..."It bothers me that my fellow scientists are not speaking out against something they know is wrong," he said. "But they also know that they'd never get any grants if they spoke out. I don't care about grants."

I'll think I'll put my faith in a guy with a long, respected history of academic scholarship in the field of meteorology than I will a politician from Washington, DC Tennessee.

Unsurprisingly, no domestic news outlets have picked up on this despite the fact the Dr. Gray's speech occurred in North Carolina. They have to protect the agenda at all costs, you know...

Cheapening a Prize

Apparently being a hypocritical let-them-eat-cake biased Chicken Little on the environment has its benefits:

Former Vice President Al Gore and the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change won the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize Friday for their efforts to spread awareness of man-made climate change and lay the foundations for counteracting it.

"I am deeply honored to receive the Nobel Peace Prize," Gore said. "We face a true planetary emergency. The climate crisis is not a political issue, it is a moral and spiritual challenge to all of humanity."

I suppose he'll take his private jet to Oslo to pick up the hardware and, of course, the check.

As always, Czech Republic President Vaclav Klaus makes sense on the issue:

Czech President Vaclav Klaus, a rare vocal global- warming sceptic among heads of state, is "somewhat surprised" that former US vice president Al Gore received the Nobel Peace Prize, the president's spokesman Petr Hajek said in a statement.

"The relationship between his activities and world peace is unclear and indistinct," the statement said. "It rather seems that Gore's doubting of basic cornerstones of the current civilization does not contribute to peace."

Klaus said in a recent speech that environmentalists' efforts to halt global warming "fatally endanger our freedom and prosperity."

I would say this cheapens the value of the Nobel Peace Prize that was given to people who have actually worked to do good in the world, like Martin Luther King (1964), Norman Borlaug (1970) and Muhammed Yunus (last year). And David Keelan says he has lost all respect for the prize. But given the fact that Communists, terrorists, anti-semites, and crooks have already won the award, I'm not exactly sure how Al Gore being a hysterical hypocrite makes thing any worse than they already were.

No, TV doesn't try to push an agenda at all

No sir, no way:

Former Vice President Al Gore is expected to make an appearance on the NBC comedy show "30 Rock" in November. Gore was in New York last week to tape the episode, and a Gore spokeswoman says "he did have a great time".

Gore's office anticipates the episode will air as part of, what it called, NBC's upcoming "Green is Universal" week of environmentally-based programming, Nov. 4 - 10.

I am stunned that NBC will waste a week of program preaching environmentalist propaganda. That being said, if they are dumb enough to try this stunt during the November sweeps, then they've got it coming to them:

"We need to not just think green, but act green," said Zucker. "This commitment to a week of programming is an incredible opportunity for NBCU to use the collective power of its platforms – broadcast, cable, and film – and consumer expertise and reach to further the message of environmental awareness and change."

"For the first time ever, the massive resources of the entire NBC Universal family will stand together behind a single pro-social cause," said Zalaznick. "This far-reaching initiative represents the first step in our commitment to help raise environmental awareness and effect change both internally and externally."

Highlights from the "Green is Universal" week include:

NBC Entertainment programming, both scripted and unscripted, will adopt green-friendly and environmentally-oriented messages – across all dayparts – to promote the crucial issue of ecological awareness. Among NBC's many programs to feature this content will be the entire Thursday night line-up, including the Emmy Award-winning comedy "The Office," "My Name is Earl" and "30 Rock," the hit drama "Heroes" and "Deal or No Deal."

NBC News' platforms including "Today," "Nightly News," "Dateline," MSNBC and MSNBC.com, will support a week of special programming, including in-depth looks at the issues and some unique special broadcast events. NBC News' Chief Environmental Affairs Correspondent Anne Thompson will be featured throughout this special week of programming.

NBC Sports kicks-off "Green is Universal" week November 4th with its Sunday Night Football match-up between the Dallas Cowboys and Philadelphia Eagles. The broadcast will feature additional announcements about "Green is Universal," as well as incorporate the themes throughout its telecast on Sunday and the following Saturday's Air Force vs. Notre Dame game.

And it goes on like this.

Can you imagine if Fox did something like this for, say, capitalism, or individual rights, or the Second Amendment? Incorporating it across every aspect of its programming? Liberals would be marching in the streets. But do something politically correct like this, and nobody says nary a word.

This is bad business, bad policy, and bad politics all at the same time. And I hope they get trounced in the ratings for it. Not that there is anything worth watching on NBC anymore anyway...

The Ugly Truth

Yes folks, while promoting the cause of saving the environment, Live Earth and its participants are...well....killing the planet:

The Live Earth event is, in the words of one commentator: "a massive, hypocritical fraud".

For while the organisers' commitment to save the planet is genuine, the very process of putting on such a vast event, with more than 150 performers jetting around the world to appear in concerts from Tokyo to Hamburg, is surely an exercise in hypocrisy on a grand scale.

Matt Bellamy, front man of the rock band Muse, has dubbed it 'private jets for climate change'.

A Daily Mail investigation has revealed that far from saving the planet, the extravaganza will generate a huge fuel bill, acres of garbage, thousands of tonnes of carbon emissions, and a mileage total equal to the movement of an army.

The most conservative assessment of the flights being taken by its superstars is that they are flying an extraordinary 222,623.63 miles between them to get to the various concerts - nearly nine times the circumference of the world. The true environmental cost, as they transport their technicians, dancers and support staff, is likely to be far higher.

The total carbon footprint of the event, taking into account the artists' and spectators' travel to the concert, and the energy consumption on the day, is likely to be at least 31,500 tonnes of carbon emissions, according to John Buckley of Carbonfootprint.com, who specialises in such calculations.

Throw in the television audience and it comes to a staggering 74,500 tonnes. In comparison, the average Briton produces ten tonnes in a year.

The concert will also generate some 1,025 tonnes of waste at the concert stadiums - much of which will go directly into landfill sites.....

....Let us start with some facts. Worldwide, an audience of around 1,268,500 is expected to attend the concerts - making it one of the largest global events in history.

Dr Andrea Collins, an expert in sustainability from Cardiff University, has researched the impact of such mass gatherings on the environment.

"An event of this size at Wembley - which holds 65,000 at a rock concert, will generate around 59 tonnes of waste," she says. "That is largely composed of the rubbish from food and drink consumption."

She found that a Wembley-sized football match generated an 'ecological footprint' of 3,000 global hectares - an area the size of 4,166 football pitches. This is the amount of bioproductive land required to absorb the C02 emissions produced by such an event.

Here is the most relevant quote:

But Dr Barrett says: "It would be far better for these celebrities to stay at home. Holding large concerts to highlight environmental concerns and cut carbon emissions just seems ridiculous. What planet do these people live on?"

And it is 100% true. The Guardian, Times of London, and Investor's Business Daily also pile on, while some wonder if Global Warming has Jumped the Shark.

While trying to do what they do best and tell us how to live, Live Earth participants are being exposed as hypocrites, much like their hypocrite-in-chief. Nobody is saying that these celebrities are not entitled to live the "rock and roll lifestyle" because they have for the most part earned their station in life. But for God's sake, don't stand there and become part of this massive global event to preaching climate change to the proles while living your carbon-emitting life of luxury.

And it is no wonder that Gore has had to go on the defensive against the charges of hypocrisy leveled by some musicians, including Live Aid/Live8 organizer and former Boomtown Rats frontman Bob Geldof, British band Arctic Monkeys, and The Who frontman Roger Daltrey.

If these rock stars were truly serious about combating climate change, they would not fly around the world on private jets to concerts designed to fight the pollution they just dumped into the atmosphere. They would be better off starting a charity or an interest group than by doing what they are doing. And if Al Gore were functionally capable of toning down the rhetoric, toning down the hypocrisy, and occasionally tell the truth, maybe some of us would be a little less skeptical of not only his message that global warming is the end of us all, but what his motives actually were....

EDIT: Take that (H/T Instapundit:)

Tomorrow’s Live Earth concerts all over the world are part of Al Gore’s plan to save, well, the Earth. But they could end up generating more carbon dioxide than was produced by all of Afghanistan in 2006.

Following the Data

There has to be a lack of consensus on global warming when politically connected French socialists come out as skeptics(H/T RedState):

Claude Allegre, one of France's leading socialists and among her most celebrated scientists, was among the first to sound the alarm about the dangers of global warming....

...With a wealth of data now in, Dr. Allegre has recanted his views. To his surprise, the many climate models and studies failed dismally in establishing a man-made cause of catastrophic global warming. Meanwhile, increasing evidence indicates that most of the warming comes of natural phenomena. Dr. Allegre now sees global warming as over-hyped and an environmental concern of second rank.

His break with what he now sees as environmental cant on climate change came in September, in an article entitled "The Snows of Kilimanjaro" in l' Express, the French weekly. His article cited evidence that Antarctica is gaining ice and that Kilimanjaro's retreating snow caps, among other global-warming concerns, come from natural causes. "The cause of this climate change is unknown," he states matter of factly. There is no basis for saying, as most do, that the "science is settled."

Dr. Allegre's skepticism is noteworthy in several respects. For one, he is an exalted member of France's political establishment, a friend of former Socialist president Lionel Jospin, and, from 1997 to 2000, his minister of education, research and technology, charged with improving the quality of government research through closer co-operation with France's educational institutions. For another, Dr. Allegre has the highest environmental credentials. The author of early environmental books, he fought successful battles to protect the ozone layer from CFCs and public health from lead pollution. His break with scientific dogma over global warming came at a personal cost: Colleagues in both the governmental and environmental spheres were aghast that he could publicly question the science behind climate change.

Read the whole thing, and the others in the National Post series. But I can assure you that with more and more evidence that there is no consensus on global warming, the more and more one has to come the conclusion that only the true believers, the megalomaniacal, and the ostrich-like can claim that there is any sort of "consensus." It also shows that there are, in fact, people in the global warming debate who do follow the data, not political talking points, when speaking on the issue.

Missing the Point

No Al Gore apologists seem to get the point these days.

Daffodil Lane meekly attempts to defend Al Gore's energy consumption by recycling Keith Olbermann's talking points and trying to change the topic to that Gore's energy costs more because they are using green power. Oh, and it's all OK because Gore buys "carbon credits,"; we'll get to those later.

As we noted, the original report does not deal with the cost of Gore's energy, by that Gore uses 20 times as many kilowatt-hours of electricity as the average consumer. Something Gore, as of yet, has not denied. And Bill Hobbs notes:

As the news media swarmed around the story of Gore's gargantuan energy consumption yesterday, Gore's people touted his purchase of "carbon offsets" as evidence that he lives a "carbon-neutral" lifestyle, but the truth is Gore's home uses electricity that is, for the most part, derived from the burning of carbon fuels. His house gets its electricity from Nashville Electric Service, which gets its from the Tennessee Valley Authority, which produces most of its power from coal-burning power plants. Which means most of the power being consumed at the Gore mansion comes from carbon-emitting power sources.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, check out this complete stupidity. TaxProf Blog notes this from the New York Post:

HOLLYWOOD'S wealthy liberals can now avoid any guilt they might feel for consuming so much non-renewable fossil fuel in their private jets, their SUVs, and their multiple air-conditioned mansions. This year's Oscar goodie bag contained gift certificates representing 100,000 pounds of greenhouse gas reductions from TerraPass, which describes itself as a "carbon offset retailer." The 100,000 pounds "are enough to balance out an average year in the life of an Academy Award presenter," a press release from TerraPass asserts.

Yes...free carbon credits. The Hollywood crowd now even gets their indulgences for free, while lecturing the rest of us about the need to be carbon neutral. The Virginian compares them to sumptuary laws that regulated the social hierarchy.

Then there are Dianne Feinstein and Arnold Schwarzenegger, from the LA Times:

Sen. Dianne Feinstein offers plenty of tips on how California households can combat global warming, such as carpooling and running only a full dishwasher.

But one bit of information Feinstein declines to share is the number of times that she flew last year on her husband's Gulfstream jet, which burns much more fuel per passenger-mile than commercial airliners.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger also has asked constituents to do their part to conserve energy — including cutting summertime power consumption — even though he takes to the skies on leased executive jets.

Aides say there is nothing contradictory between the pro-green pronouncements and the flying habits of the Democratic senator and Republican governor.

Some environmentalists aren't so sure.

"There appears to be a discrepancy between calling on people to make personal reductions and using a private jet that exacerbates the problem," Clean Air Watch President Frank O'Donnell said.

Flying on a Gulfstream rather than an airliner is like driving a sport utility vehicle instead of riding a bus, O'Donnell and others say.

In a lot of these cases, the moral of the story is "Do as I say, not as I do." Sadly, their apologists cannot see the forests for the trees and really understand what is going on here.

One Brief Fit of Praise

Look, Al Gore, his movie, and his acolytes deserve all of the criticism that they get. However, I would like to say that the Virgin Earth Challenge is a good idea. Why? Because it is an attempt at a private sector solution to climate change, instead of the government-led solution that is usually the starting point for global warming true believers.

I can pretty much give a pass to any movement (that is legal, of course) that wants to encourage people to change their habits or use new technologies through private sector prizes and grants. Why not? It worked for transatlantic flight and space flight. It's when people want to parlay unscientific data intro strict government regulation that it's time to throw the brakes on...

Piling On

I'd be remiss if I didn't mention (via RedState and Instapundit):

Last night, Al Gore’s global-warming documentary, An Inconvenient Truth, collected an Oscar for best documentary feature, but the Tennessee Center for Policy Research has found that Gore deserves a gold statue for hypocrisy.

Gore’s mansion, located in the posh Belle Meade area of Nashville, consumes more electricity every month than the average American household uses in an entire year, according to the Nashville Electric Service (NES).

In his documentary, the former Vice President calls on Americans to conserve energy by reducing electricity consumption at home.

The average household in America consumes 10,656 kilowatt-hours (kWh) per year, according to the Department of Energy. In 2006, Gore devoured nearly 221,000 kWh—more than 20 times the national average.

Last August alone, Gore burned through 22,619 kWh—guzzling more than twice the electricity in one month than an average American family uses in an entire year. As a result of his energy consumption, Gore’s average monthly electric bill topped $1,359.

Since the release of An Inconvenient Truth, Gore’s energy consumption has increased from an average of 16,200 kWh per month in 2005, to 18,400 kWh per month in 2006.

Of course, apparently that makes Bill Frist more of the conservationist...