Last Friday, with our daughter and son-in-law, we watched the dvd, 'An Inconvenient Truth.' It was powerful viewing; and I would advocate every American watch it because whether you think global warming is happening, you should see this film for its statistics, its vivid illustrations, and its logical approach to what is being done-- or not done. If you are sure there is no man-caused global warming, even more so, see this film and come back here to tell those who read this blog exactly where the statistics are wrong.
I had a minor quibble with the film, which I will mention below, but it didn't take away from the power and concern that the film evokes-- or should evoke.
Before I get into my opinion on the film, I wanted to discuss a disturbing aspect to all this. In an op-ed in the Washington Post, Laurie David wrote that the National Science Teachers Association, NSTA, refused donations of 50,000 copies of 'An Inconvenient Truth' for the schools. The argument they used in their denial was it would damage their fundraising abilities (insert Exxon) for those who donate heavily to help (propagandize) school programs.
So basically let's not confuse students with contradictory facts? School isn't there to explore arguments but rather to indoctrinate? Is it the fear that they don't want anybody arguing this on the science but instead what it means economically (insert short-term)? Is this the 'earth is flat' crowd who are now arguing against any scientific look at what is happening on economic grounds? Or maybe it is still religious with the emotional reaction that God could protect us even if there was any major climate change coming.
Does it worry you that corporations might be impacting science teaching in the schools by their 'generosity?' If it doesn't, it should. Was this what the far Right has had in mind when they have done all they can to gut public spending for schools? Are they doing what Bush has been trying to do with the news media-- insert advertisements to benefit large corporations into every lesson plan.
Searching online for more about this teacher group's policy, I found this blog, NewsBusters, that was spilling over with glee that 'An Inconvenient Truth' had been denied to the schools. Can't have our kids encouraged to think now, can we? Who knows with what they'd come up. The writer, however, did give room for this rebuttal from CommonDreams
In case you are not one for checking out links, this is a snippet from the rebuttal by John F. Borowski regarding what kind of information NSTA finds appropriate. "I am an environmental science teacher of 26 years and I have a steamer trunk of materials from past conferences: Project Learning Tree's Energy module, supported by API's Red Cavaney who wants ANWR opened, opposes the Kyoto Treaty and wants more public land opened to energy exploration; Lesson plans, coloring books, free coal samples from the American Coal Foundation: minus any substantive discussion let alone mention of climate change; Lessons and videos from a group that was called the "Greening Earth Society: funded by the Western Fuels Association. The message of the film was firm and academically clear: there is no human induced climate change."
You get the idea. What works with corporate America is what the schools should be promoting and nothing that might confuse children about disasters approaching or even such nasty subjects as consumer responsibility! Are Americans paying enough attention to what is happening to our schools?
Well back to the film-- I am no scientist but watched it with two scientists and an anthropologist (masters and doctorate between them). Yes, having degrees doesn't necessarily mean someone has commonsense, but it does mean they know how to listen to statistics. They felt it was very impressive. Me too.
Powerfully the film does not rely on hysterical or emotional arguments. It lays out in a logical format what we are facing. It shows how shallow our liveable atmosphere really is-- how the existence of the level of human life we currently know is not an easy-take-for-granted thing but rather occupying a narrow window. It illustrates with graphs what you can learn from the glaciers with the measuring of carbon dioxide levels from the last 600,000 years and how they matched with warmer or cooler temperatures. It shows where our levels are heading in the very near future.
What does that mean for what comes next? Despite right wing claims, scientists agree carbon dioxide levels are rising and climate change is happening. They aren't sure what it will mean given it has never gone to this level before-- in those 600,000 years. It could mean horrendous future storms. It could mean no wind. It could mean dying sea life and no sea currents. It could mean rising ocean levels of up to 20 feet. Statistics can suggest, can indicate trends, but cannot predict infallibly something like this.
The film asks what is being or has been done to prepare for this. Kyoto might or might not have made sense, given it didn't deal with the pollution for developing countries, but the main argument against it has been economic-- short term economics. Solid cockpit doors were too expensive too-- once.
Did you know that in the United States, we have the lowest standards for automobile fuel economy of pretty near anywhere? We've all heard how unfair it would be to demand better fuel economy. It would destroy the automotive industry. Well it didn't seem to hurt in Europe, China or other places around the world. Why haven't the levels been raised here too? Money! And not any that will line your pockets.
Some will say there is too much emphasis on Al Gore in this film, but this has been his cause. He is part of this story because it is how he learned about it, what his background is, what he is doing about his beliefs, and I think the human element was an important part. This is a man on a crusade to convince people before it's too late-- if it isn't already.
My minor quibble came from the way the loss of life in New Orleans was pushed as being due to Global Warming (instead of dike failure and flooding). The certainty of future catastrophic storms isn't a given of what will come from these rising carbon dioxide levels. It's a quibble but due to a light hurricane season this year, it has allowed naysayers to say-- SEE!!! And, of course, as usual ignore the more serious possibilities looming.
What the film mentioned but could have emphasized more was how New Orleans illustrated heartbreakingly the consequences of massive flooding. If many scientists are right, this will be around the world in many areas with no economic resources to do anything to help the people. Heck, with our great economic resources, how much have we really helped New Orleans to date? We can build dikes for big cities and in richer areas, but will they be high enough to keep back what is coming if the glaciers in the Arctic, Greenland and Antarctica melt and the oceans rise 20 feet? They showed what New York City alone would face.
People keep saying the earth will always be there. That is not our concern. Our concern is us being here and maintaining a healthy lifestyle for the numbers currently here. One scientist has said he believes with what is coming, the earth could support half a million people. What happens to the rest?
Even if it what is coming doesn't reach that level, we could still be facing refugee problems with potential Ice Ages one place and global flooding in others. Are any of us preparing for any part of this? It's too expensive? You have no idea what expensive could look like if we get the kind of massive shifts that are being predicted by many experts.
So decide for yourself what is going on. Watch this film, please. And if you have kids or grandkids, make sure they see it. Those 50,000 copies of the DVD sitting in a warehouse, as things currently stand, won't get to them but you can!
I had a minor quibble with the film, which I will mention below, but it didn't take away from the power and concern that the film evokes-- or should evoke.
Before I get into my opinion on the film, I wanted to discuss a disturbing aspect to all this. In an op-ed in the Washington Post, Laurie David wrote that the National Science Teachers Association, NSTA, refused donations of 50,000 copies of 'An Inconvenient Truth' for the schools. The argument they used in their denial was it would damage their fundraising abilities (insert Exxon) for those who donate heavily to help (propagandize) school programs.
So basically let's not confuse students with contradictory facts? School isn't there to explore arguments but rather to indoctrinate? Is it the fear that they don't want anybody arguing this on the science but instead what it means economically (insert short-term)? Is this the 'earth is flat' crowd who are now arguing against any scientific look at what is happening on economic grounds? Or maybe it is still religious with the emotional reaction that God could protect us even if there was any major climate change coming.
Does it worry you that corporations might be impacting science teaching in the schools by their 'generosity?' If it doesn't, it should. Was this what the far Right has had in mind when they have done all they can to gut public spending for schools? Are they doing what Bush has been trying to do with the news media-- insert advertisements to benefit large corporations into every lesson plan.
Searching online for more about this teacher group's policy, I found this blog, NewsBusters, that was spilling over with glee that 'An Inconvenient Truth' had been denied to the schools. Can't have our kids encouraged to think now, can we? Who knows with what they'd come up. The writer, however, did give room for this rebuttal from CommonDreams
In case you are not one for checking out links, this is a snippet from the rebuttal by John F. Borowski regarding what kind of information NSTA finds appropriate. "I am an environmental science teacher of 26 years and I have a steamer trunk of materials from past conferences: Project Learning Tree's Energy module, supported by API's Red Cavaney who wants ANWR opened, opposes the Kyoto Treaty and wants more public land opened to energy exploration; Lesson plans, coloring books, free coal samples from the American Coal Foundation: minus any substantive discussion let alone mention of climate change; Lessons and videos from a group that was called the "Greening Earth Society: funded by the Western Fuels Association. The message of the film was firm and academically clear: there is no human induced climate change."
You get the idea. What works with corporate America is what the schools should be promoting and nothing that might confuse children about disasters approaching or even such nasty subjects as consumer responsibility! Are Americans paying enough attention to what is happening to our schools?
Well back to the film-- I am no scientist but watched it with two scientists and an anthropologist (masters and doctorate between them). Yes, having degrees doesn't necessarily mean someone has commonsense, but it does mean they know how to listen to statistics. They felt it was very impressive. Me too.
Powerfully the film does not rely on hysterical or emotional arguments. It lays out in a logical format what we are facing. It shows how shallow our liveable atmosphere really is-- how the existence of the level of human life we currently know is not an easy-take-for-granted thing but rather occupying a narrow window. It illustrates with graphs what you can learn from the glaciers with the measuring of carbon dioxide levels from the last 600,000 years and how they matched with warmer or cooler temperatures. It shows where our levels are heading in the very near future.
What does that mean for what comes next? Despite right wing claims, scientists agree carbon dioxide levels are rising and climate change is happening. They aren't sure what it will mean given it has never gone to this level before-- in those 600,000 years. It could mean horrendous future storms. It could mean no wind. It could mean dying sea life and no sea currents. It could mean rising ocean levels of up to 20 feet. Statistics can suggest, can indicate trends, but cannot predict infallibly something like this.
The film asks what is being or has been done to prepare for this. Kyoto might or might not have made sense, given it didn't deal with the pollution for developing countries, but the main argument against it has been economic-- short term economics. Solid cockpit doors were too expensive too-- once.
Did you know that in the United States, we have the lowest standards for automobile fuel economy of pretty near anywhere? We've all heard how unfair it would be to demand better fuel economy. It would destroy the automotive industry. Well it didn't seem to hurt in Europe, China or other places around the world. Why haven't the levels been raised here too? Money! And not any that will line your pockets.
Some will say there is too much emphasis on Al Gore in this film, but this has been his cause. He is part of this story because it is how he learned about it, what his background is, what he is doing about his beliefs, and I think the human element was an important part. This is a man on a crusade to convince people before it's too late-- if it isn't already.
My minor quibble came from the way the loss of life in New Orleans was pushed as being due to Global Warming (instead of dike failure and flooding). The certainty of future catastrophic storms isn't a given of what will come from these rising carbon dioxide levels. It's a quibble but due to a light hurricane season this year, it has allowed naysayers to say-- SEE!!! And, of course, as usual ignore the more serious possibilities looming.
What the film mentioned but could have emphasized more was how New Orleans illustrated heartbreakingly the consequences of massive flooding. If many scientists are right, this will be around the world in many areas with no economic resources to do anything to help the people. Heck, with our great economic resources, how much have we really helped New Orleans to date? We can build dikes for big cities and in richer areas, but will they be high enough to keep back what is coming if the glaciers in the Arctic, Greenland and Antarctica melt and the oceans rise 20 feet? They showed what New York City alone would face.
People keep saying the earth will always be there. That is not our concern. Our concern is us being here and maintaining a healthy lifestyle for the numbers currently here. One scientist has said he believes with what is coming, the earth could support half a million people. What happens to the rest?
Even if it what is coming doesn't reach that level, we could still be facing refugee problems with potential Ice Ages one place and global flooding in others. Are any of us preparing for any part of this? It's too expensive? You have no idea what expensive could look like if we get the kind of massive shifts that are being predicted by many experts.
So decide for yourself what is going on. Watch this film, please. And if you have kids or grandkids, make sure they see it. Those 50,000 copies of the DVD sitting in a warehouse, as things currently stand, won't get to them but you can!
17 comments:
Thanks. Will look for the DVD. Any time you see something that doesn't make sense, doesn't seem right, look for the greed factor. Follow the money. Corporate interests, often masked as "Special interests", are behind so much of what is wrong with this country and this world now. The Bush administration has greatly exacerbated this with all of its no-bid-required multi-billion dollar contracts to Halliburton and others in the "rebuilding" of Iraq. Follow the money... In this case it is a very short trip and well marked. How stupid do they think we are?
I have heard of it,but I have not seen it. I watched " Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom " with my brother yesterday. Sometimes fantasy is good medicine. :)
The Bush administration has been gung ho about privatizing just about everything. Once public education is owned by corporations, you might as well kiss open-mindedness good bye. They have no legitimate argument, so they buy the pulpit, the lectern, the blackboard, and finally the mind.
We watched the movie a while back. It's quite well done. It delights me that Al Gore has become an outspoken voice for saving the planet.
I was planning on that this weekend even BEFORE I read your blog. I saw Al Gore on Tonight show and he mentioned that it was out on DVD.
I have not seen this film yet, but have planned to for a long time. The information you have divulged here regarding the refusal of the free DVDs for the schools is simply appalling, but why am I surprised? The private school I work for has endorsed this film, but we are very involved in environmental issues.
That is too bad about the schools refusing the dvd. Schools teach about plenty of other politically charged issues why not this one. The teachers unions must be more interested in getting corporate money than seeing the movie. I have only seen parts of it so I need to see the entire thing before I can fully comment on it but what I saw I am a little concerned with. One of Gore's comments was about the Carbon dioxide levels being the highest "for as looonnnngg as they have been keeping records" How long have we been keeping records? 20 to 40 years? The entire time climate records have been kept is a blink of an eye in the time man has been on the planet (150,000 years) and time man has been on the planet is a blink of an eye in the life of the planet (5 billion years). Personally I think it is arrogant to think we can change the climate in a hundred years of burning fossil fuels, but I would like to see the data presented scientifically not in scare tactic format. Another thing when he was talking about the ocean currents changing that moved the ice age from north america to Europe (still had ice and sea levels didnt change much) he said it could have happened in as little as a decade, but what is the longest it could have took or what was the likely period that it took? Again scare tactics.
And Winston please enough with the Halliburton. What other company could have done the work? And they go back to the LBJ days as a wartime contractor. They are not just friends of W to get work in Iraq.
They used ice to measure the carbon dioxide levels, ingineer, glaciers and went back 600,000 years. You really do need to see it all and then you can discuss it better as it wasn't something to think you could pick up by glancing at. It took watching and thinking as you went. Also considering how much whoever got these results was looking for what was there or seeing what they wanted. Science is exact but can be manipulated-- by either side. So it's worth your taking time with it and probably any of us would have to watch it a couple of times if we wanted to be sure of what we thought, comparing to other data, etc.
As for Halliburton, they were not huge (from what I have read) until Cheney with his government connections got in there. Good ol' boy networking got them where they are today.
If there has been profiteering (by anybody) in Iraq, doesn't that deserve to be investigated? To date, it has not been because Republicans blocked anybody outside looking.
Remember what Eisenhower warned about at the end of his presidency-- the power to be watched out for was the corporate military connection. There are those who profit from wars and to try and ignore that is to put on rose colored glasses that all big companies are nice guys. Tell that to those who lived in Love Canal. People are people whether they are rich and powerful or poor and weak and there are good and bad in all groups.
All corporations who worked in Iraq and are still there should be investigated as to what they did and how much they charged, whether it was work accomplished or not and what did they end up marking up and not doing? You can't contract for any big company in this country and not expect to have your work looked over with a fine tooth comb (unless there was corruption involved in the contract); why should this be different?
I have no problem investigating fraud and ripoffs of government money. I am on the front lines of making sure the tax payers get what they are paying for.
I am curious where you got the Halliburton information. From their own website they acquired Brown and Root (who had been contracting with the military since WWII) in 1961 and that is when they really became a military contractor. Then in Gulf 91 they had contracts in Kuwait then because they did so well there they got a major contract for work during the Balkans war in the 90's (under Clinton). The company's last major growth spurt appears to be in 1998 (before W was president) when they bought Dresser Industries a major oil supply management company.
And I know all about Love Canal. I did a case study on it in my Hazardous Waste Management class in college. It was caused by Occidental Petroleum which was owned by Armand Hammer who was ironically enough a very close friend of Senator Albert Gore Sr.
do a search online for halliburton growth under cheney to see what is out there. This is one example-- naturally from the left but it deals with what people are talking about regarding Halliburton. Don't forget today they do a lot under subsidiaries and it hides a lot of what goes on... http://multinationalmonitor.org/mm2001/01may/may01corp10.html
As for the rich having friends with the rich. That's just how it goes. Did you find it disturbing that the Bushes have friendships of longstanding with the bin Laden family? Some suspect it related to not going after bin Laden to the degree our military could have... Not that i'd say that but you did bring up Gore's father... not sure if you believe he was encouraging what happened at Love Canal or exactly what that related to.
I just discovered that the FBI was told not to investigate Armand Hammer for socialist activities because he was "protected" by Al Gore Sr. My main point there is that republicans dont have the corner on the market for protecting their friends. Politicians are politicians no matter what party. Also for being such an environmentalist Al Gore Jr. owns a zinc mine that he bought from his father who had bought it from Armand Hammer.
And no I dont find it disturbing that the Bushes had dealings with the Bin Laden Construction company. The Bush family was involved in oil and the Bin Laden family was involved in construction in Saudia Arabia where they have a lot of oil. Mohammed Awad bin Laden had about 54 children and Osama was one of those. I would guess that if you had 53 brothers and sisters there might be 1 that you didnt get along with or maybe even one that did something illegal. Several members of the Bin Laden family signed papers disowning Osama in 1994, long before most of us even knew who he was.
From what I have read most of the Saudi and Egyptian Bin Laden family would have prefered to have him killed because he is an embarrassment to them. The reason the military let him get away was because we didnt want our military actively operating in Pakistan and the warlard that was supposed to be helping us corral him actually let him slip through. I would guess the CIA will get that warlard eventually if he isnt already dead.
You basically justify what is convenient for you to justify and believe one side is good and the other bad-- no matter what they do. That's the division in this country as well. Oh and if you believe that one senator could stop an investigation secretly, then you also believe in conspiracy theories...
What is the truth ?
There probably is a 'truth' that is above all, Paul, but we do manipulate what it is a lot as a people. I'd say if the waters rise and my home is flooded out, that was a truth, but others would say it was only because I saw it that way. and if I said I never wanted that to happen, they would say I drew it to me. I believe there is truth but I also know that it is reinterpreted a lot by people to suit their own agendas. Makes it tough
I've been meaning to rent this from Netflix and will do so when my grandchildren are here during Christmas, if possible.
I saw Gore on Oprah the other day but was wrapping gifts and unfortunately didn't get to hear the program.
I've always believed in global warming for scientific reasons and if more proof is needed....gee, what about that tornado in LONDON the other day? Just a coincidence? I think not!
So if the recent London Tornado is from global warming then what caused the tornado that hit London in 1091 I am pretty sure that one wasnt caused by internal combustion engines burning fossil fuels. The UK gets about 30 tornados a year which puts it on pace with the US plains by area. But they are typically not as severe as US tornados.
Global climate change will have a lot of meanings. Extreme weather might be one of them. It's hard to know. Just change is coming and who knows exactly what all that might mean.
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