Okay, Al Gore might be a nice enough guy and I'm sure he's worried about climate change in a nice middle-class baby-boomer kind of way - but the Nobel freaking Peace Prize?!! This man was vice-president of the most powerful (and polluting) nation in the world for - what was it 4 years? - and during that time he never showed the slightest serious interest in environmental issues and neither did his boss Bill "The American Way of Life is not up for Negotiation" Clinton.
The thing that really sticks in my craw though is this idea that somehow his little film has awoken the world to climate change! Everything in it has been said over and over again. Scientists and other such skruffy hippies have be talking about this for decades. As a kid in the 70's I read books about pollution and other environmental issues (including the greenhouse effect) and yet now suddenly people are saying "oh thanks for bringing this to our attention Al we had no idea".
So Al: I'm glad you've woken up and got the message at last and you've probably done some good drilling this into that intransigent section of the American public who still think it's their god-given right to munch through every last scrap of the planet like pigs at the trough. We certainly need people like you on-side, but credit where credit is due - there have been dozens of (better) documentaries over the years which have addressed these issues but were just dismissed as leftist ranting, the Nobel Peace Prize should not be given out just for having good timing and slick publicist.
RANT ENDS ....
3 comments:
"The American Way of Life is not negotiable" was Bush senior. And it was 8 years. (so I guess these cancel each other out)
But the trick is not to identify truth, or even to identify it first --- people who know the truth are a dime a dozen and we couldn't give Nobels to them all --- but to effect change. And in this case we're talking changing in the minds of middle America. Which called for bloody good luck and a bloody good publicist... and aimed in the right direction for a change.
I think you're being harsh. That's not to say I think he deserves it necessarily. Surely Charleton Heston does for his part in Soylent Green. But I do think he deserves credit for an amazing piece of advocacy. And the award leaves America in no doubt what the rest of the world thinks about their position on climate change. Whether they care enough to do anything about that (or at all) is another matter of course.
True enough (and I apologize to Mr Clinton for my incorrect attribution). As I say I, welcome his advocacy, I just don't think think it deserves the NPP. I take your point that it flags up what the rest of the world think - though of course that's not going to mean much to those that think the rest of the world is a bunch of lefty terrorist-luvin, freedom-hating surrender monkeys.
I know I shouldn't be too harsh but I just can't stand that smug self-satisfied little face of his.
Don't forget cheese eating, also! :-)
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