Airborne Combat Engineer

Whose ox is Gored?

The media are finally catching up with Al Gore. Criticism of his anti-global-warming franchise and his personal environmental record has gone beyond ankle-biting bloggers. It's now coming from the New York Times and the Nashville Tennessean, his hometown paper that put his birth, as a senator's son, on its front page back in 1948, and where a young Al Gore Jr. worked for five years as a journalist.

Mr. Gore has called the campaign to combat global warming a "moral imperative." But Mr. Gore faces another imperative: to square his sales pitches with the facts and his personal lifestyle to more align with what he advocates that others practice. "Are you ready to change the way you live?" asks Mr. Gore's film. It's time people ask Mr. Gore "Are you ready to change the way you live, as well as the way you lecture the rest of us?"

[JF, WSJ]

How much could the sea level rise by 2100?

The average American, who doesn't follow the "global warming" issue all that closely, remembers Al Gore saying sea levels could rise 20 ft. and innundate cities and plains near sea level.

The IPCC report "estimated that the world's seas would rise a maximum of 23 inches by 2100 (if no changes are made).

Media Matters explains the two predictions are "apples and oranges" (see continuation).

The problem for Al (and all who want to influence change) is the average person (to whom the whole "global warming" thing is a low priority vs. paying the bills, raising the kids, and other more proximate priorities) doesn't understand these technical differences. He/she just remembers the sound bites. And to many, Al Gore is coming across as an alarmist who selects his facts to make his points.

Then again, the problem is we have to be SHOCKED into making changes. 23 inches in 93 years (a quarter inch per year) won't do it.

St. Patty's Day 2017

Enjoy it while you can.

See more PS entries at Cowboy Blob

Seriously, though, see the continuation

Carbon offsets explained

How do "carbon offsets" work? Well, let's say you're a former vice president and you want to reduce your "carbon footprint," but the gorgeous go-go Gore gals are using the hair dryer every night. So you go to a carbon-credits firm and pay some money and they'll find a way of getting somebody on the other side of the planet to reduce his emissions and the net result will be "carbon neutral."

It's like in Henry VIII's day. He'd be planning a big ox roast and piling on the calories but he'd give a groat to a starving peasant to carry on starving for another day and the result would be calorie-neutral.

And, in fact, in the Reverend Al's case it's even better than that. Al buys his carbon offsets from Generation Investment Management LLP, which is "an independent, private, owner-managed partnership established in 2004 and with offices in London and Washington, D.C.," that, for a fee, will invest your money in "high-quality companies at attractive prices that will deliver superior long-term investment returns." Generation is a tax-exempt U.S. 501(c)3. And who's the chairman and founding partner? Al Gore.

So Al can buy his carbon offsets from himself. Better yet, he can buy them with the money he gets from his long-time relationship with Occidental Petroleum.

[Mark Stein, Chicago Sun]

A deeper look at "carbon offsets"

"As the controversy over global warming doomsayer Al Gore’s voracious energy-eater mansion rolls on, there’s an angle I think merits deeper investigation than it is currently getting. While much of the focus has been on whether or not Gore is an environmental hypocrite, the story has raised the profile of the role of “carbon offsets” in achieving a “greener,” more environmentally friendly world."

[Ecotality]

This blogger has already done the research ACE was planning to do.

In related news, Stephen Colbert finds more evidence of Gore hypocrisy.

Gore should win hypocrisy award

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).

[HotAir]

As ACE recalls, Al explains he buys "carbon offsets" to give his family a net neutral "carbon footprint."

UPDATE: Confirmed  at Riehl World View.

If you buy into the "carbon footprint" concept, you can calculate yours at carbonfootprint.com. You can buy unused credits from those who are positive. In other words, if you can afford it, you can look good without actually reducing your conspicuous consumption, as you preach that others should.

For just $8, a Sydney-based company, Easy Being Green, can now make your cat carbon-neutral, so it can "live guilt-free for a year". [The Australian, 17FEB07].

What was all the Scarecrow needed?

Minneapolis, MN (AHN) - Former Vice President and current environmental activist Al Gore is under consideration to receive an honorary degree from the University of Minnesota for his work in climatology.

University [of Minnesota] President Bob Bruininks spilled the beans at the February Board of Regents meeting, saying that "two of our colleges are working with Vice President Gore to provide, we hope, an honorary doctorate."

[All Headline News]

The Wizard of Oz, speaking to the scarecrow :

"Back where I come from we have Universities...seats of great learning, where men go to become great thinkers...and when they come out they think deep thoughts, and with no more brains than you have. BUT, they have one thing you haven't got...A DIPLOMA."

Climate change news

COLUMBUS , Ohio – A new report on climate over the world's southernmost continent shows that temperatures during the late 20th century did not climb as had been predicted by many global climate models.

Eurekalert

January was the warmest January ever recorded, worldwide. [AFP]

Are cosmic rays the main cause of climate change?

Man-made climate change may be happening at a far slower rate than has been claimed, according to controversial new research.

Scientists say that cosmic rays from outer space play a far greater role in changing the Earth's climate than global warming experts previously thought.

In a book, to be published this week, they claim that fluctuations in the number of cosmic rays hitting the atmosphere directly alter the amount of cloud covering the planet.

[RG, Telegraph, 11FEB07]

Global warming tradeoff

Public policy is all about trade-offs. Economists understand this better than politicians.

... in the history of trade-offs, never has there been a better one than trading a tiny amount of global warming for a massive amount of global prosperity. Earth got about 0.7 degrees Celsius warmer in the 20th century while it increased its GDP by 1,800 percent, by one estimate

Skeptics are heckled for calling attention to global warming scare tactics. But the simple fact is that activists need to hype the threat, and not just because that's what the media demand of them. Their proposed remedies cost so much money - bidding starts at 1 percent of global GDP a year and rises quickly - they have to ratchet up the fear factor just to get the conversation started.

China alone plans on building an additional 2,200 coal plants by 2030. Oh, but because China (like India) is exempt from Kyoto as a developing country, the West will just have to reduce its own emissions even more.

The costs are just too high for too little payoff.

[Jonah Goldberg, Salt Lake Tribune, 08FEB07]

He's obviously working off different assumptions than Al Gore about the impact of not making a significant change.  According to Al, we need to move FAST, or our children will feel the consequences.

The easiest way to avoid problems is to not create them in the first place, so why give China and India a pass? Implement the optimum solution there to begin with.