Fragilecologies Archives
10 July 2006
I went to see the movie “An Inconvenient Truth” narrated by Al Gore, former Vice President under Bill Clinton. It was better than I expected: much better. I was worried that the message and reason for making the movie — to bring the usable science of global warming to the American people — would get mixed up with the personal feelings that people might have about Vice President Gore. The movie, however, did separate the message from feelings about the messenger.
The truth is that I expected to see it as a large screen advertisement and preamble for Gore’s run for the presidency in 2008. I left the movie relieved of that suspicion. Gore was clearly on the high road as he presented his case that human activities are a major force behind the unprecendented contemporary heating up of the Earth’s atmosphere.
It is a different kind of movie about the environment. Gore is in front of a large audience that is listening to his presentation, which is focused around the use of PowerPoint slides. Behind him is a large screen onto which is projected the set of slides that include graphics, photos, and some film clips. The large screen, bigger than a computer monitor, makes the graphics supporting his words even more understandable.
The presentation makes a solid scientific case that humans have the potential as well as the capability to alter the chemistry of the Earth’s atmosphere, thereby heating up global temperatures. The message contains lots of facts presented in a way that most of the public can easily understand. He even makes reference to those who do not believe that humans can influence the global climate. His science-based slide show is compelling.
Usually, at the end of a movie when the credits begin to roll, the audience’s eyes start to glaze over as they get up to leave the theater. Not this time. Not many stay to see who the gaffer was, or even the associate producer, editor, etc. But these credits are different: people stayed because of the clever way the credits were interspersed with suggestions about how individuals can help to reduce the carbon dioxide emissions that result from their activities.
So why do I talk about “an inconvenient Gore”? The movie makes the science quite understandable to the public and shows that global warming is a problem with more dire consequences than most people realize. It shows how the United States has isolated itself by refusing to sign onto the Kyoto Protocol that calls on signatories to reduce greenhouse gas emissions over time. Yet, the movie shows how we — Americans — are a major part of the problem and therefore should be a major part of the solution.
Unfortunately, as with many other political issues, President Bush and his Republican-controlled Congress have buried their heads in the sand, as they have done on a number of international issues: selective support for nuclear proliferation (it’s OK for some countries but not for others); denial of a government’s obligation to help American victims of so-called natural disasters (such as victims of Hurricane Katrina in late August 2005); lack of popular support for the war in Iraq; defying existing international and domestic laws.
Bush’s go-it-alone “history will absolve me” attitude is facing a frontal challenge, at least on the global warming issue, by Gore and his movie. The timing is bad for Bush’s administration because scientific consensus squarely supports the foreseeability of human activities having a negative impact on the global atmosphere and therefore on global-to-local climates.
For the anti-global-warming Bush administration, the timing of the movie is politically inconvenient: the 2006 US Congressional election is but a few months away. The signs of global warming are mounting each month: Arctic ice cover is shrinking, glaciers from Greenland to the Antarctica are receding, sea level is rising, vector-borne diseases are migrating from the tropics and appearing in the mid-latitudes.
As a result, arguments by the so-called skeptics against those who believe that human activities (fossil fuel burning and tropical deforestation) can alter global climate are falling on increasingly deaf ears, except for some (a shrinking number) diehard conservative new sources (e.g., the Wall Street Journal, Fox News, the Washington Times).
Bush would have probably wanted “An Inconvenient Truth” to hit theaters after the 2006 mid-term elections, as he hopes that all bad news will wait until then: about the Iraq situation, the national debt, immigration, an overstretched military, and his dwindling popularity.
Ah, yes. With “An Inconvenient Truth” comes an Inconvenient Gore, as far as Bush is concerned. Although President Bush recently stated to the press that he had no intention of seeing “An Inconvenient Truth,” he cannot escape from the Inconvenient Gore.