If You Take Al Gore at His Word, You Are Insane

Hello Thinkers,

Yes, I have been busy lately. The usual time-sinks have been augmented lately by a vigorous swath of travel for work. I now consider myself an expert in low-end business expeditions; sort of a Liberace of the Hampton Inn circuit, except with no musical talent, no flamboyant attire and no desire for other men. Last week I traveled through the diabetes belt and this week I was on the far-left coast. While there, the brave city officials from San Francisco banded together to fight the greatest threat to humanity we have ever faced. Somehow the land of Haight-Ashbury dug deep and decided to ban plastic bags:

Shopper after San Francisco shopper had praise Wednesday for the Board of Supervisors' vote banning plastic checkout bags at supermarkets and chain drugstores.

Some were so excited they put down their plastic checkout bags to talk about it.

"We need to get rid of a hell of a lot of this stuff," Ora Gosey, 56, said outside an Albertsons in the Western Addition. As the retiree spoke, she inched away from a case of grape soda she had placed on the ground as if it didn't belong to her. It was double-bagged in plastic.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/03/29/BAGOGOTSAS1.DTL

Priorities are an incredible thing. You go girls.

And while waiting at my SFO departure gate for my flight to LAX, I was graced by the presence of none other than Paula Abdul. She's much shorter than I imagined, despite the heels (which would make any self respecting stripper jealous). Paula had a bit of a problem standing still though. She looked like she made the trip from Los Angeles in a small sailboat, not an airplane. Must have been the stilettos. So much for my brush with fame. Funny how things aren't quite what they seem on TV.

It's like that with nomenclatures. Is it just me, or has anyone else noticed that the scam of the century has undergone a naming shift? It seems that the term 'global warming' is starting by get bumped in favor of the much more fashionable 'climate change'. I wonder why? I suspect it could be that the global warming skeptics (you know, the sane people among us) have started to bubble up to the point where the Al Bore's of the world are getting a little nervous. Lord knows they have staked their political and financial futures on this snake-oil. Even a recent editorial in the NY Times has dared to question the extreme nature of the Gorebot's fire and brimstone claims. (And yes I know, referring to the editorial section of the NY Times is like referring to the cooking section of a Julia Child book):

In talks, articles and blog entries that have appeared since his film and accompanying book came out last year, these scientists argue that some of Mr. Gore’s central points are exaggerated and erroneous. They are alarmed, some say, at what they call his alarmism.

“I don’t want to pick on Al Gore,” Don J. Easterbrook, an emeritus professor of geology at Western Washington University, told hundreds of experts at the annual meeting of the Geological Society of America. “But there are a lot of inaccuracies in the statements we are seeing, and we have to temper that with real data.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/13/science/13gore.html?ei=5070&en=f873cd1bf8e2367a&ex=1175486400&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1175390419-ROXQh2l0+39p6I4GLfyrGQ

Uh-oh... Maybe just in case we get a cooler than usual summer, the alarmist crowd can always blame the freak May snow storm, the higher than normal number of tornadoes or the spike in possum carcasses splattered along the interstate on the Karl Rove CO2 factory buried in the foothills of Colorado (right next to where Dick Cheney keeps his secret levy-crushing ray gun).

But let's cut to the chase. Why do I think that if you believe Al Gore, you are insane? Do I spend all my spare time tracking weather patterns? Have I debunked the greenhouse gas theory with a Mister Science kit in my basement? Did an aparition of Shirley Mclain appear in the vapors spewing from the twin tailpipes of my 8 Cylinder Ford giving me near-celestial enlightenment? No, no and no. Do I think our climate is changing? You betcha! Four times a year!

I think people who take Al Gore at his word are insane for one simple reason, he REFUSES to debate anyone who disagrees with him:

"I believe that is one of the principal reasons why political leaders around the world have not yet taken action," Gore said. "There are many reasons, but one of the principal reasons in my view is more than half of the mainstream media have rejected the scientific consensus implicitly — and I say 'rejected,' perhaps it's the wrong word. They have failed to report that it is the consensus and instead have chosen … balance as bias.

"I don't think that any of the editors or reporters responsible for one of these stories saying, 'It may be real, it may not be real,' is unethical. But I think they made the wrong choice, and I think the consequences are severe.

"I think if it is important to look at the pressures that made it more likely than not that mainstream journalists in the United States would convey a wholly inaccurate conclusion about the most important moral, ethical, spiritual and political issue humankind has ever faced."

http://www.dicksonherald.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070228/NEWS01/702280434/1297/MTCN02

Hmmm. That's some pretty tough language. Until you read this part:

Gore would not answer any questions from the media after the event.

And what is a "scientific consensus" anyway? If a bunch of scientists agree that something is true, does that make it a fact? If it requires a vote, then by definition, it has not been proven. But if politico-climate hacks convince enough people that "climate change" has more dire consequences than oh, say Islamic terrorists, they have an edge in the election cycle. Why? Because when defense against terrorism is the defining election issue, these same liberal hacks lose big. You could almost say there is a scientific consensus building around it.

Well here's a guy who probably agrees with Gore, and I'm sure he considers himself quite sane:

Wed Feb 28, 2:45 PM ET
OTTAWA (AFP) - A former Canadian defense minister is demanding governments worldwide disclose and use secret alien technologies obtained in alleged UFO crashes to stem climate change, a local paper said Wednesday. "I would like to see what (alien) technology there might be that could eliminate the burning of fossil fuels within a generation ... that could be a way to save our planet," Paul Hellyer, 83, told the Ottawa Citizen.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070228/wl_canada_afp/canadaenvironmentkyoto_070228180440

So if this space alien technology is so great, why the hell did they crash on earth? Did Baldar let the Mrs. take the flying saucer to the mall? She never did check the rear view mirror.