Text 20628, 87 rader
Skriven 2006-06-02 22:00:00 av Jeff Binkley (1:226/600)
Ärende: Gore
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http://www.nypost.com/movies/66485.htm

GORE'S HOT AIR


FLAKY FLICK SUFFERS FROM 'TRUTH' DECAY

AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH

AL GORE'S global-warming documentary, "An Incon venient Truth," is sure to get
an Oscar nomination for Best Documentary, but Gore should campaign for Best
Actor, too.

Avoiding the usual vein-popping diatribes, he comes across as learned, calm and
folksy. But much of what Gore says in this slide show he gives to people whose
minds are not yet fully formed (undergraduates, actors) is absurd, and his
assertions often contradict each other.

He implies that no reputable scientists dispute anything he says - basically,
that the ice caps are melting and people on the 50th floor of the Empire State
Building had better learn to swim. But there is wide disagreement about whether
humans are causing global warming (climate change preceded the invention of the
Escalade) and about whether we should be worried about the trends. Look
carefully at Gore's charts and you'll see that the worst horrors take place in
the future of his imagination.

His implication that he is our only hope - every ticket bought for this movie
amounts to a soft-money contribution to his 2008 campaign - is ridiculous. He
and his friends were in charge for eight years. His charts say global warming
got worse in that time. The environment doesn't seem to care whether the
president is a Texas oilman or the Man from Hope.

Global warming hasn't noticed that we got the lead out of our gasoline or that
Stage One smog days in Los Angeles fell from 121 in 1977 to zero in 2004. All
regulations and taxes to date have done nothing. Does this hint that pollution
isn't the cause?

Gore claims, with pie-chart-in-the-sky dreaminess, that unspecified measures
can reduce emissions to 1970 levels. He assesses the tradeoff between the
economy and the environment with the kind of buffoonery you'd expect in a
Marxist comic book, displaying a cartoon of a scale with Earth on one side and
bars of gold on the other. "OK, on one side we have gold bars," he says. "Mmm,
mmm, don't they look good!"

Why doesn't he get specific and replace the "gold bar" side of the scale with,
say, a $50,000 tax on SUVs? The ensuing destruction of the car business would
hurt blue-collar workers, not the rich. What if global warming continued
unabated? Gore's faith-based pessimism would lead him to call for even more
taxes.

People are skeptical about global warming because it builds up to the same
chorus as every other lefty hymn: more taxes, more hypocritical scolding (the
film is the brainchild of Larry David's wife, Laurie, part of the community of
people who drive a Prius to the private plane) and especially more
America-bashing.

Gore says that America, alone, is the problem. Taking us to China, he ignores
the filth spewed into the air by its coal-fired cities. He does not meet with
bronchitic citizens who wear surgical masks outdoors and pause to hawk up brown
gunk every few minutes. Instead, he tells us America is lagging behind.
"China," he says, "is on the cutting edge" of environmentalism. Nonsense.

Gore is a dangerous evangelist for whom all roads lead to his sole, holy
revelation. Remember how his son was injured in a car accident, the story he
told at the 1992 convention? He's still telling it, and what was once touching
has become exploitative. This time, the accident's meaning is that he wondered
whether the Earth would still be there for his son. (Never mind that earlier in
the film, he dates his eco-awakening to his Harvard years).

A sister who smoked and died of lung cancer? The lesson is that those who used
to deny that smoking caused disease were wrong, so anyone who doubts
catastrophic global warming must also be wrong.

Still not convinced that Gore's mind has only one emission? "We have to think
differently about war," he says, referring to environmental effects of weapons.
"We can't just mindlessly continue the patterns of the past." It's a chilling
statement: Even when bombs are flying, Gore promises to measure CO2 first.

The man's shamelessness is astounding when he compares himself to Churchill,
but that's not the worst of it. The final shot of Gore shows him bravely
silhouetted against the cosmos, a lone figure tenderly surveying the firmament.
The job he really wants, no recount can give him.

kyle.smith@nypost.com

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