Former Vice President Al Gore warned of a "climate emergency" on Tuesday as he joined forces with political activists from MoveOn.org to promote a Hollywood disaster film that shows global warming creating an ice age and causing massive destruction.It's nice to know that Big Weird Al has a hobby! Tell us more!
The Day After Tomorrow , a 20th Century Fox production set for release on Memorial Day, stars Jake Gyllenhaal and Dennis Quaid. The $125-million movie will offer "a rare opportunity to have a national conversation about what truly should be seen as a global climate emergency," Gore told reporters.Hmmm, when I hear the phrase "national conversation," I reach for my holster because there's only one kind of varmint that makes that noise.
"I hope this movie will provide many opportunities for in-depth conversations about what this issue is really all about," Gore added. Others participating in Tuesday's teleconference are also planning to use the timing of the film's release to attack the Bush administration's environmental policies.Many "in-depth conversations" yet. Is there some style sheet for wingnuts?
Emmerich's latest offering depicts global climate change wreaking havoc on the Earth by causing a rapid ice age in much of the world. Los Angeles is slammed by massive tornados, New York City receives depths of snow nearly as high as skyscrapers, New Delhi, India, is also consumed by snowstorms and Tokyo is pounded by giant hailstorms.Giant locusts are cool too, but no word on them. And what about Godzilla?
Gregg Easterbrook, a senior editor at New Republic Online and one who believes that human-caused climate change is real, said Gore is doing a disservice to the environmental cause by affiliating himself with a Hollywood disaster film.Can't you just feel the angst? Of course, there's comedy value in picturing Gore as a "serious thinker."
"Once Gore was a serious thinker on environmental issues and diligently sought out top-notch advice ... Now Gore appears ready to affiliate his reputation with a cheapo, third-rate disaster movie that makes Fantastic Voyage seem like a peer-reviewed technical paper," Easterbrook wrote.
Easterbrook assailed the movie's "imbecile-caliber" science: "By presenting global warming in a laughably unrealistic way, the movie will only succeed in making audiences think that climate change is a big joke, when in fact the real science case for greenhouse-gas reform gets stronger all the time."
Easterbrook also criticized Gore for his close affiliation with MoveOn.org, the liberal group propped up by huge donations from billionaire financier George Soros for the express purpose of defeating President Bush.Maybe Big Weird Al is bucking for Number 2 in Spectre?
"It's easy to see why MoveOn.org wants the reflection of the new movie's limelight; wild exaggeration is a good fundraising tool. But if Gore associates himself with this mindless film, he will have completed his descent from serious thinker and national leader to MoveOn.org's sock puppet," Easterbrook wrote.
Gore acknowledged that the movie contained fictional elements, but he charged that the Bush administration's climate policy was even more fictional.That's a novel one. How about a 50 megaton atomic blast going off in Big Weird Al's nether region to demonstrate the point that hanging around with idiots is a bad plan?
"There are two works of fiction that we have to deal with. One is the movie and the other is the Bush administration's presentation of global warming," Gore told reporters. He said he has read the script but not yet seen the film.
Gore explained that the movie's timeline of events is fictional; but he said it's "accurate in giving the impression that the consequences can be extremely serious.
"The Bush administration is in some ways even more fictional than the movie -- in trying to convince people that there is no real problem, that there is no real degree of certainty on the part of scientists about the issue and sort of accepting the big polluters' argument that nothing should be done to change the current practices of dumping pollution in an unrestrained way into the atmosphere," he added.I get it - it's a "conversation" where only one view is permitted and everything else is "unhealthy." That sounds way too familiar.
"This is the kind of dishonest behavior that can lead to an unhealthy debate in our democracy not dissimilar from the kind of misleading impressions that were created in the run up to the Iraq war," he added.
There's much more whining from the usual suspects by following the link, including an infestation of tofu eaters to celebrate the flick's opening day, but here's a closing quote:
David Rothbard, president of the Washington, D.C.-based free market group, Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT), rejects what he sees as climate change alarmism.And hopefully they won't get to see Big Weird Al and Tipper steaming up the windows in the next car.
"Since Al Gore had such success peddling science fiction as reality in his book Earth in the Balance, it's no surprise he's all ozoned-up about a global warming movie with similar fantasy-as-fact foundations," Rothbard told CNSNews.com.
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"Indeed, I expect many Americans, much to the environmentalists' chagrin, to be watching this movie at the drive-in with their SUV engines running and their trans-fatty buttered popcorn being washed down by a nice 32 ounce cola in a Styrofoam cup"
