Inconvenient Falsehoods

Here are some excerpts from recent Times Online articles concerning An Inconvenient Truth (See link at bottom of page for actual article):

‘Al Gore told there are nine inconvienient truths in his film. Not everything Al Gore says in his documentary is a proven fact. A High Court judge today ruled that An Inconvenient Truth can be distributed to every school in the country but only if it comes with a note explaining nine scientific errors in Al Gore’s Oscar-winning film.

The Government had pledged to send thousands of copies of the film to schools across the country, but a Kent father challenged that policy saying it would “brainwash” children.

A judge was asked to adjudicate between Stewart Dimmock and the Department of Children, Schools and Families. Mr Justice Burton ruled that the film could be sent to schools, but only if it was accompanied by new guidlines to balance the former US vice-president’s “one-sided” views

The judge said some of the errors were made in “the context of alarmism and exaggeration” in order to support Mr Gore’s thesis on global warming.’

As a result, the film is now only viewable in public schools along with its attached disclaimer, which lists the controversy surrounding its publication and the erroneous science upon which its arguments are based. The untruths are as follows:

* The film claims that melting snows on Mount Kilimanjaro evidence global warming. The Government's expert was forced to concede that this is not correct. * The film suggests that evidence from ice cores proves that rising CO2 causes temperature increases over 650,000 years. The Court found that the film was misleading: over that period the rises in CO2 lagged behind the temperature rises by 800-2000 years. * The film uses emotive images of Hurricane Katrina and suggests that this has been caused by global warming. The Government's expert had to accept that it was "not possible" to attribute one-off events to global warming. * The film shows the drying up of Lake Chad and claims that this was caused by global warming. The Government's expert had to accept that this was not the case. * The film claims that a study showed that polar bears had drowned due to disappearing arctic ice. It turned out that Mr. Gore had misread the study: in fact four polar bears drowned and this was because of a particularly violent storm. * The film threatens that global warming could stop the Gulf Stream throwing Europe into an ice age: the Claimant's evidence was that this was a scientific impossibility. * The film blames global warming for species losses including coral reef bleaching. The Government could not find any evidence to support this claim. * The film suggests that the Greenland ice covering could melt causing sea levels to rise dangerously. The evidence is that Greenland will not melt for millennia. * The film suggests that the Antarctic ice covering is melting, the evidence was that it is in fact increasing. * The film suggests that sea levels could rise by 7m causing the displacement of millions of people. In fact the evidence is that sea levels are expected to rise by about 40cm over the next hundred years and that there is no such threat of massive migration. * The film claims that rising sea levels has caused the evacuation of certain Pacific islands to New Zealand. The Government is unable to substantiate this and the Court observed that this appears to be a false claim.


Distributing the film and screening it in English schools is irrational, illogical, irresponsible, unfathomable and a host of other negatively-prefixed adjectives, and these are still understatements. The only positive aspect of this story is the high court’s adjudication and labeling of the film as unilaterally biased, relying on “alarmism and exaggeration” to prove its silly point. Alarmism? Exaggeration? How about adding “gross fabrication” to the list of despicable flaws in this supposed DOCUMENTARY. If the peace prize were usually reserved for ghoulish charlatans, I would have no qualms with its being bestowed upon the likes of Gore. But here is a man who is being celebrated for inducing mass delusion and hysteria. This I cannot tolerate.
In response to Global Warming’s recent popularity, there has been a surge in public service messages that also preach sermons of false doomsday. Even my fourteen-year-old brother saw the lunacy in a recent NBC public service message depicting people camping in a forest fire, washing their car in a flood, and walking a baby stroller through a hurricane. The narration was simply: “ignoring global warming won’t make it go away.” Well, neither will putting up a clothesline or installing those ridiculous curly lightbulbs. And if you choose to walk your infant during a major hurricane, you have bigger problems to deal with than the inconvenient fallacies delineated in Mr. Gore’s film.

Here are some other points to consider: The health of our environment has always been a human concern. The negative effects of pollution, littering, toxic waste dumping, and other irresponsible industrial practices were at the forefront of the American civic conscience during the 1970’s. The long-term environmental prognosis of the time, however, was that the earth was spiraling rapidly into a second ice age.

The post 9/11 terrorism scare was punctuated by several acts of violent terrorism in places like Spain and England. But terrorism is not our primary fear at this time. Even though these things actually happened, the American public is no longer compelled into fright by the ever-orange threat level. These events are merely distant figments of a lost history, obliterated by whatever threat the media deems most popular (and lucrative) in the here and now. It seems we as Americans are plagued by periodic bouts of collective amnesia, forgetting past fears and replacing them with countless others in an endless parade of terrorizing ideas, each having its turn in the spotlight of our fearmongering vogue.

The August 2006 issue of National Geographic’s cover shows a satellite photo of Katrina, and reads “No End in Sight – Killer Hurricanes." One year later, we have seen a remarkably inactive hurricane season with remarkably feeble storms dissipating in the Atlantic.

A recent TIME Magazine cover depicted a cute polar bear standing on a shrinking iceberg about to drown in a warming ocean, and read “Be Afraid. Be Very Afraid.” The subtext: “You’re Next!”

Since this post was so long, it should count as two blogs!

Nobel Nonsense: Al Gore Wins Peace Prize

My world was turned upside down when I heard of Al Gore's acceptance of the Nobel Peace Prize, which was awarded to both him and his partners-in-propaganda, the UN International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). This prestigious award has, in previous years, been awarded to select individuals or organizations who have devoted their lives to promoting peace and affecting positive change for the globe. Such recipients include: Martin Luther King Jr., Theodore Roosevelt, the Dalai Lama, and Mother Teresa; heroic people who have made monumental contributions to humanity. Now the worthy Al Gore is among them, for his mass-media propagandizing and globally celebrated fearmongering. Of course, the IPCC venerates him as "probably the single individual who has done the most to promote global understanding of climate change." Dr. Michael Oppenheimer, a geo-science professor and co-conspiring member of IPCC, offered his praises of Gore’s achievement on the PBS news hour Friday. “Climate change is about to hit us in the face, and Gore is helping to spread the word. Major environmental events like Hurricane Katrina, ALTHOUGH NOT DIRECTLY CAUSED BY CLIMATE CHANGE, help to show people what the future could hold,” he said. Oppenheimer, like Gore, believe that we are in the midst of a “planetary emergency requiring immediate action.” Oppenheimer continued in his interview, saying “Let’s face it. Climate change is here. We have to learn to deal with it. We have to learn how to respond when major climate-change events like Hurricane Katrina threaten us again.” Thank you Dr. Oppenheimer. Thank you Al Gore. Thank you IPCC for helping to show me, a concerned citizen of Earth, that climate events NOT related to global warming may or may not happen again in the future. This is clearly a newfound understanding of climate change you have furnished – one continually wrought of twisted, self-contradictory logic. Thank you for scaring me into believing that one active hurricane season is grounds to declare the world in a state of “planetary emergency.” Now tell me why you won the Nobel Peace Prize? According to Oppenheimer, “a stable climate helps keep the peace. A shortage of resources is a contributing factor in places like Darfur.” Now one begins to understand that climate change causes war and genocide. Thus, Al Gore’s intrepid efforts to “stabilize the climate” will halt human suffering. I am personally holding Al Gore accountable for this outcome. If within the next twenty to thirty years the climate is still changing and people are still dying despite all of the regulations and “elevated global understanding” that Al Gore has promoted, his prize should be revoked. More realistically, he should be imprisoned for treason. Until then, we should acknowledge the REAL way Al Gore promotes peace –indoctrination, predictability, subjugation, and FEAR in the hearts of Earthlings. Across the world, Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth” is screened in college classrooms as propaganda material. I think Sterling Burnett put it best on FOX News recently: “BURNETT: If I thought Al Gore's movie was, as you like to say, "fair and balanced," I'd say everyone should go and see it. But why go see propaganda? You don't go see Joseph Goebbels' films to see the truth about Nazi Germany. You don't want to go see Al Gore's film to see the truth about global warming.”
Read Michael Crichton’s “State of Fear”, send a copy to Gore, then decide the truth of the matters at hand for yourself. As you can probably tell, I have become increasingly cynical with every week that goes by, as America descends needlessly into madness at the hands of idiot politicians. The sad thing is, he probably BELIEVES he is really saving the world. Poor thing…

Wildlife Woes: Evolution in Progress

At least once a week, the major nightly news broadcasts a story on global warming. Last week it was a wildlife spotlight that showcased the plight of "thin whales"; gray whales that are slowly losing blubber mass as a "direct result" of global warming. The argument is that gray whales and a select few additional species are unable to adapt to the rapid cimate change caused by humans in the last few years. Although humans have been blasting out noxious emissions for over a century, scientists are just now trying to connect industry to evolution. There are, of course, a number of flaws in their logic. Thousands of species (if not more) have died out through the history of life because of simple maladaptive Darwinian principles. The world is changing, and it is time to admit it. Evangelicals and biblicists are mocked for their desperately ignorant insistance that today's world is exactly as created by God from the beginning of time. Come on, people. The world has been changing for eons-the "dawn of creation" marked the dawn of change, and our earth has undergone massive and continual alterations ever since. Yes, this occured even before the industrial revolution. Yes, this occured even before man roamed the earth. Our modern age is, like the paleolithic and neolithic times, merely a transitory phase in the evolution of life. It is not only expected but biologically NECESSARY that some species struggle, become endangered, and then disappear altogether. This is a primordial fact of life. If global warming were putting such a strain on nature, we would be seeing EVERY species rapidly decline in health and number. Thinning whales are hardly a cause for alarm.
The Discovery Channel article (see link at bottom of page) says that the whales are now "facing a new crisis" after recovering in the mid 1990's and graduating from the endangered species list. Are you kidding me? And now, less than ten years after the species' proliferation and burgeoning health, global warming swoops in to kill them outright? How is this possible? Perhaps global warming was in remission in the mid 1990's, and allowed the godly gray whales to thrive out of some divine environmental clemency. Or perhaps, more logically, global warming is just the current (and terrifying) scapegoat for all of the world's problems. Wildlife issues have always existed, but never have so many been blamed on one cataclysmic myth. It seems global warming has become an ecological shortcut to thinking.