Gore is not a hypocrite

[tad]

From the Huffington Post:

*

I just talked with a reporter from CNS News -- a right-wing media site -- about the Al Gore pseudo-scandal. Who knows how my comments will end up being represented in the piece. Probably something like, "Al Gore ... does it ... with ... hogs."

But just to keep a public record, here are the talking points I shared with him. Feel free to borrow them for your own encounters with media or family and friends:

It's nice to see the conservative media taking the message of conservation and energy efficiency seriously. Hopefully they will hold their own leaders and readers to the same high standards.

The Tennessee Tax Dept. does not consider the "Tennessee Center for Policy Research," which roughly no one had heard of before this, a legitimate group. It's run by a long-time right-wing attack hack, and its only registered address is a P.O. box. Why is everyone in the media taking what it says about Gore's electricity use at face value?

Gore's electricity company has no record of being contacted about his bills.
The "average" home electricity use quoted by TCPR is a national average that includes apartments and mobile homes.

In Gore's climatic zone, the East South Central (Dept. of Energy PDF), the average is much higher, thanks to hot, humid summers and cold winters. Within that zone, Gore's usage is three (not 20) times average, and his per-square-foot usage is squarely average.

The Gores are not an average family. He's an ex-VP with special security arrangements, and has live-in security staff. He and his wife both work on their many business and charitable undertakings out of their house, so they have space for offices and office staff. All that would be tough to cram in an average size house.

Gore buys the maximum allowable green electricity from the program offered by his utility.

Most of the electricity in TN comes from hydro and nuclear, and so doesn't generate all that much CO2 anyway.

The larger point, which probably won't work well as a cable-show soundbite but is nonetheless true, is that Gore has done heroic work making global warming a top issue for governments the world over. He has prompted more individual and collective action on this issue than anyone else alive. The changes he has wrought outweigh his personal carbon emissions by many orders of magnitude.

They know Gore's message is winning. They know they are losing. Even if they're successful in tarnishing Gore, it won't change that.

 

[lakewolf]

It is exactly what I said in the other thread about this subject, a home business consumes more electricity than an standard one, I started to have my home office 2 years ago and the electricity consumption doubled as now I have computers, fax/printer and network equipement running all day long.

Also I have to use daytime lightning that otherwise wouldn't be on as during the day I'd be at the office otherwise..

 

[lawyerdad]

You've lost my vote, you f'ing hypocrite.

 

[Brian SD]

The Tennessee Tax Dept. does not consider the "Tennessee Center for Policy Research," which roughly no one had heard of before this, a legitimate group. It's run by a long-time right-wing attack hack, and its only registered address is a P.O. box. Why is everyone in the media taking what it says about Gore's electricity use at face value?

This evidence is telling enough as it is.

 

[montecristo#4]

Is there a reason we needed a new thread after this article was posted in the first one already?

Gore's per square foot usage is average.... And he has 20x the square footage of an average family. So let's just spell it out:

If Gore were NOT a hypocrite, he'd probably have average or below average square footage, and his energy consumption per square foot would certainly be BELOW average.

Seems pretty straightforward to me.

 

[montecristo#4]

Originally Posted by Brian SD

This evidence is telling enough as it is.
If you read the other thread you'd see that the info has been shown to be accurate.

 

[Charley]

Originally Posted by Brian SD

This evidence is telling enough as it is.

Brian SD,

Don't resort to the tactics of StevieBaby and attact the messenger. Do a little work and check it out to see if the reports of electricity use are factual - particularly the great increase.

I believe that you will find that that the numbers reported are pretty much correct - possibly a bit low.

When AlGore is running around the world in the private Gulfstream jet, becomming wealthy by emploring everyone that it is their moral obligation and duty to save the world by consuming less energy and emmiting less greenhouse gas, while he consumes ten times the normal and takes the way of the wealthy and purchases "dispensation offsets", then, yes he is a flaming hypocrite.

 

[gorgekko]

Democrats are never hypocrites. The rules they seek to impose on humanity merely don't apply to them.

 

[vanity]

He's trying to throw a concert in Antarctica. Flying in thousands of tons of equipment to play in a landscape mostly untouched by humans. It's not even hospitable, but this joker ignores his advisers and wants one anyway. We won't even get started on his celebrity cronines/performers and their sports cars, Bentleys, suvs, mansions, and private jets.

Him promoting the environment is like Ike Turner promoting women's rights. You'd think that if you're trying to help something, you'd have the common sense not to **** all over it in the process. Apparently years of pandering ot minorities didn't pay off so he picked a new clown project to launch himself into psuedo-relevance.

 

[johnapril]

Originally Posted by vanity

He's trying to throw a concert in Antarctica. Flying in thousands of tons of equipment to play in a landscape mostly untouched by humans. It's not even hospitable, but this joker ignores his advisers and wants one anyway. We won't even get started on his celebrity cronines/performers and their sports cars, Bentleys, suvs, mansions, and private jets.

Him promoting the environment is like Ike Turner promoting women's rights. You'd think that if you're trying to help something, you'd have the common sense not to **** all over it in the process. Apparently years of pandering ot minorities didn't pay off so he picked a new clown project to launch himself into psuedo-relevance.

This is precisely the condundrum early British travelers faced when they returned to the quiet English countryside from their adventures in Tibet and the Empty Quarter and told their tales. What they loved about those places was the absence of western influence, the "purity" of the cultures and the landscape, from their perspective. But in telling the world about those pure spaces, they blazed a trail for others to go see, and so those places lost what made them special. From an Englishman's POV.

 

[Connemara]

Originally Posted by johnapril

This is precisely the condundrum early British travelers faced when they returned to the quiet English countryside from their adventures in Tibet and the Empty Quarter and told their tales. What they loved about those places was the absence of western influence, the "purity" of the cultures and the landscape, from their perspective. But in telling the world about those pure spaces, they blazed a trail for others to go see, and so those places lost what made them special. From an Englishman's POV.

You're a Brit?!?! I had no idea, my good man.

 

[lawyerdad]

Originally Posted by johnapril

This is precisely the condundrum early British travelers faced when they returned to the quiet English countryside from their adventures in Tibet and the Empty Quarter and told their tales. What they loved about those places was the absence of western influence, the "purity" of the cultures and the landscape, from their perspective. But in telling the world about those pure spaces, they blazed a trail for others to go see, and so those places lost what made them special. From an Englishman's POV.
I feel much the same way about the SF buying and selling sub-forum.

 

[dtmt]

Originally Posted by vanity

He's trying to throw a concert in Antarctica. Flying in thousands of tons of equipment to play in a landscape mostly untouched by humans. It's not even hospitable, but this joker ignores his advisers and wants one anyway. We won't even get started on his celebrity cronines/performers and their sports cars, Bentleys, suvs, mansions, and private jets.

Him promoting the environment is like Ike Turner promoting women's rights. You'd think that if you're trying to help something, you'd have the common sense not to **** all over it in the process. Apparently years of pandering ot minorities didn't pay off so he picked a new clown project to launch himself into psuedo-relevance.
I'm betting it will end up like the typical "Earth Day" event, where you see pictures afterwards and the whole place is trashed and covered in litter...

 

[vanity]

I'm pumped for the pictures of penguins walking around with 6-pack plastic wrapped around their necks.

 

[Bona Drag]

Can we please wrap this thread up in newspaper and deposit it in CEPM?