Al Gore has a Woody Allen/Marshall McLuhan moment
Remember this satisfying scene from “Annie Hall?” Woody Allen calls on Marshall McLuhan to silence an obnoxious blowhard spouting off while waiting in a movie line:
“Boy, if life were only like this,” Allen muses at the end of the scene, shaking his head. Well folks, every now and then, life imitates art, and today we have this news:
Mr Gore, speaking at the Copenhagen climate change summit, stated the latest research showed that the Arctic could be completely ice-free in five years.
In his speech, Mr Gore told the conference: “These figures are fresh. Some of the models suggest to Dr [Wieslav] Maslowski that there is a 75 per cent chance that the entire north polar ice cap, during the summer months, could be completely ice-free within five to seven years.”
However, the climatologist whose work Mr Gore was relying upon dropped the former Vice-President in the water with an icy blast.
“It’s unclear to me how this figure was arrived at,” Dr Maslowski said. “I would never try to estimate likelihood at anything as exact as this.”
Gore’s office later said that the figure came from a ballpark estimate Dr. Maslowski gave him in a private conversation years ago. The article goes on to say that most estimates from other scientists—even those who believe the northern polar cap is going in that direction—are for a far greater period of time. And it ends with this:
Richard Lindzen, a climate scientist at the Massachusets Institute of Technology who does not believe that global warming is largely caused by man, said: “[Maslowki]’s just extrapolated from 2007, when there was a big retreat, and got zero.”
But of course, the science is settled. Copenhagen sure isn’t. It now appear likely that no decision will be reached, except for a review of the situation in six years.
Dont matter, he is going to sign to make a unilateral pre-emptive concession…
Obama: “We’ve Got 6 Months Before My Poll Numbers Start Crashing”
Team Obama: “My approval rating was inevietable…Peaple aren’t interested in what you’ve inherited…what have you done for me lately….I’m not interested in spinning my way out of it, I’m interested in being held accountable for what I do!”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2rmOUTFqbYs
and copenhagen is a great place for it.
on another note, glenn beck is sure going to rile em comparing video of nancy the despot worried as to tea parties, compared with the professional protesters in copenhagen (check out the ticket prices from the coutnries they come from, then see what jobs they hold).
We never saw this kind of violence at the Tea Parties or Town Halls!
Glenn Beck compares the violence at Copenhagen to Nancy Pelosi’s tearful concern over “rhetoric” from the Tea Partiers! This is sure to send the Beck haters into fits!
http://www.floppingaces.net/2009/12/14/left-wing-nuts-go-on-violent-rampage-at-copenhagen-climate-summit/
I just read a report at Fox News that scientists now think a large part of the Himilayan glacier melt is probably caused by soot on the ice, which absorbs heat. They mention the horrible air pollution of places like Dehli. By jumping on the CO2 bandwagon, activists may be neglecting even more serious problems that we can resolve. People like Gore have never learned that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing.
I do not believe that sheer suffering teaches. If suffering alone taught, all the world would be wise, since everyone suffers. To suffering must be added mourning, understanding, patience, love, openness and the willingness to remain vulnerable. Anne Morrow Lindbergh
At least two thirds of our miseries spring from human stupidity, human malice and those great motivators and justifiers of malice and stupidity, idealism, dogmatism and proselytizing zeal on behalf of religious or political idols. Aldous Huxley
Felix Adler
so what do we then do?
take advantage of them to walk on their heads to cross the waters…
or to sum up how they think:
You know quite well, deep within you, that there is only a single magic, a single power, a single salvation…and that is called loving. Well, then, love your suffering. Do not resist it, do not flee from it. It is your aversion that hurts, nothing else. Herman hesse
and
All the arguments to prove man’s superiority cannot shatter this hard fact: in suffering the animals are our equals.
Bah.
The fix is in. Stop kidding yourself. Just like with the govt takeover of the health care system. The Tea Parties were supposed to have killed that too. Remember? Just read that now Lieberman is finally climbing on board, because they agreed to drop the public option (For NOW, of course). It’s all been a bunch of bull-sh–t; all pure Kubuki theatre. They WILL pass something now, and then add all the sh–t they want later.
In the meant time, all the policos get their political cover. We’ve been had, and we’ve been had from the beginning.
And now, 3 months after people were crowing about the Tea Party’s defeat of ObamaCare, NOW we’re crowing about Cap and Trade being dead, due to Copenhagen’s little dramas.
Oh really?
Wow. Denial ain’t just a river in Egypt.
The little dances and shows they will put on for us, and “firm stances” the ruling classs will appear to take in our favor, (“I’ll NEVER vote for a bill that will lead to higher taxes!!”) will just be another round of Kubuki theatre. A little show they will put on for the Rubes.
And then they will pass whatever the F–k they want to pass. What they can’t do transparently, they’ll do through the EPA and IRS.
Bah Humbug to any rosy-glassed optimism.
And to anyone who trie to say “oh well just wait, we’ll vote all those bums out.”
Uh huh. And pray tell, elect WHO in their place who will change anything. My two choices for Florida Senator will be the Nanny State big government, stimulus loving, global warmist, current Governor…..and his Democratic opponent.
southernjames: I don’t think anyone here is optimistic. I’m certainly not, although I’d like to see evidence that would make me feel that way. The fact that Copenhagen is stalled however, seems to be true (at least for now). That doesn’t mean that cap and trade can’t pass, nor does it mean that similar policies can’t be successfully implemented by circumventing Congress and going the executive and/or EPA route.
Thank you Al for once again confirming what a pompous ass we always knew you were 🙂
Crazy Al stopped allowing Q & A sessions on his global warming hysteria world tour for good reason. Every time he opens his mouth, he puts his foot inside, and that’s in front of the jouranlists who agree with him. To the true believers, his errors are rationalized and replaced by newly minted myths that take time to discredit. I don’t mind the controversy; in fact, science should be filled with it if it’s to succeed. The real objection I have is labeling AGW skeptics as deniers (a la denying the Holocaust) and using other ad hominem tactics. I read Gore’s Inconvenient Truth (borrowed from the library so I wouldn’t spend a nickel on the film) and was struck by the amount of time he dwelt on the death of his sister from lung cancer. The point, I guess, was that scientists in the employ of Big Tobacco were compromised by their association and not to be believed. Ergo, reasoned Al, AGW skeptics must be minions of Evil Petroleum, why else would they not accept his theories? He overlooked the reason Big Tobacco had those scientists in its pocket: the abiliity to use them as defense witnesses in lawsuits. In a lawsuit, obfuscation is standard operating procedure. It’s an adversarial process. Scientific research, at least until the climate researchers started trying to exclude skeptics from publishing their opinions, has a tradition of encouraging debate in order to synthesize the truth, not bully opponents into submission.
The parallel in modern politics and journalism was the corruption of Dan Rather at CBS in using faked documents to prove his case that Bush 2 used political pull to avoid going to Vietnam. Everyone “knew” that Bush did it, even if the evidence was bogus. Similarly, the Mt Kilamanjaro narrative, the Mann hockey stick, the polar bear on the iceberg are all failed icons of a movement that is political, not scientific, at heart. The battleship Potemkin was the modern precursor, although Griffith’s Birth of a Nation may rival it for sheer brass balls. I could go on at length, but one final example: Silent Spring by Rachel Carlson is perhaps the best example of propaganda disguised as science. If you haven’t ever read it, do so. She offered no scientific citations; most of it is anecdotal and non-verifiable. She took one nugget of truth: the eggs of eagles are adversely affected by persistent DDT when it has been used indiscriminatly in agriculture and amplified that useful chemical into a carcinogenic plague that was going to engulf the world. In 1962, the threat of nuclear war and radioactivity (On the Beach) weighed heavily on the mind of the public and provided an easy entree for fear mongers who wanted nuclear disarmament and an end to capitalism.
We all thought the threat to liberty ended with the fall of communism in 1989, but it assumed a new form in the green movement and the anti free traders. Meet the New Boss, same as the Old Boss!
Is that even a truth?
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,202447,00.html
In addition to these reports, numerous scientific studies and experiments vindicate DDT.
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologists fed large doses of DDT to captive bald eagles for 112 days and concluded that “DDT residues encountered by eagles in the environment would not adversely affect eagles or their eggs,” according to a 1966 report published in the “Transcripts of 31st North America Wildlife Conference.”
***
There’s a good explanation of why eagle eggs are thinned out. DDT saved lives, and by banning it, we helped allow so many people to die in Africa.
Today Instapundit links to a story in the Spectator about Gore’s foot-in-mouth discussion of malaria. One can only dream about the entertainment value if Gore were called out on all his errors/misstatements/call them what you will. expat and JuliB are right — we could have done so much good with the money that’s been wasted on the AGW scam. I bet we could have already picked up the mess in all the oceanic trash vortices….
“These figures are fresh…..”
That is true. The figures were still at 101deg F from the bull that shat them out.
Enough paper to clear a forest – in Copenhagen
http://liveshots.blogs.foxnews.com/2009/12/16/mountain-of-waste-at-copenhagen/
Is the CO2 calculations of 40,000 Tons including the manufacture and shipping of all this paper and the computer and printer usage to put stuff ON the paper??? Betcha not.