Accusing Al Gore of hypocrisy

Take a look at this paper:

http://icecap.us/images/uploads/OCregGoreHypocrisy051609.pdf

May 16, 2009 

 

 

 

 

Al Gore’s Hypocrisy Astounding 

 

By Jay Ambrose  

 

 

 

Here’s the first thing you shouldn’t do in front of Al Gore: Be skeptical about catastrophic, human-caused global warming. He will rip your reputation apart, just as he once did to reputable, honorable scientists in congressional hearings. (1)

 

Here’s the second thing you shouldn’t do in front of Al Gore: Ask him whether he himself might have the kind of conflict of interest that he takes for granted in others. For heaven’s sake, do not get into the question of whether he might make a lot of money with the passage of a global warming cap-and-trade tax that he has been fighting for. (2)

 

Republican Rep. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee thought it might be interesting to find out. (3) After all, Gore is associated with a venture capital company that has invested about $1 billion in companies that just might make a bundle should cap-and-trade become law. So she asked if he would benefit.

Emitting a sigh made infamous in a debate way back when, Gore first replied that “a green economy . . . is good for all of us.” He then said yes, he was a partner in the venture capital company, adding quickly and emphatically that “every penny” he made from environmental investments went to the non-profit Alliance for Climate Protection. (4)

With a smirk on his face, he huffed that no one who knew him would ever think he had been working on the global warming issue for 30 years for “greed.” (5) When Blackburn said she wasn’t making accusations, he said, “I understand exactly what you’re doing, Congresswoman. Everybody here does.”

Blackburn called it quits at about that point, although she could have noted that Gore was founder and chairman of the non-profit group he mentioned. She could have explored whether some of the money he gives to the group redounds to him in other ways, such as expense-paid trips. She could also have gotten into reports that his net worth is now $100 million, when it was put at $2 million when he left politics. (6) She could have pursued the tax advantages of his charitable donations.

But she didn’t, and I think it is just as well she didn’t. The money Gore’s made since he was vice president seems to come mostly from Internet ventures and speeches given at $175,000 a whack, and I doubt seriously that his campaign on global warming has anything much to do with money. The man is a true believer, or so I believe.

And yet, his hypocrisy is astounding. While he cannot believe anyone could ever conceivably have reason to question his motives, he has never hesitated to question the motives of those who differed with him. In that case, you were bought out by ExxonMobil (7) or are an equivalent of Bernie Madoff, the Ponzi-scheme swindler.

Congressional hearings he conducted in 1992 have been described as inquisitorial show trials. One victim, Professor Richard Lindzen of MIT, has written about scientists being “in the crosshairs” of Gore, who “tried to bully” them into changing “their views and supporting his climate alarmism.” (8) Lindzen also refers to a failed Gore effort to “enlist Ted Koppel (then a TV host) in a witch hunt to discredit anti-alarmist scientists.”

Lindzen is viewed by some as one of the nation’s foremost climatologist. Unlike Gore – whose movie and slide show have been rife with error (9) - he knows what he is talking about, probably a major reason Gore won’t debate him. Lindzen years ago did about $10,000 worth of work as a witness for fossil-fuel companies. There was nothing wrong with that, and he clearly was not corrupted by it. (10)

Whatever Gore believes, the global warming debate is not over, (11) but what should be over is waging it as an ad hominem contest in which science itself is hurt along with scientists whose arguments should be weighed on their merits.

(The numbers in parentheses are not in the original paper, but are added by me to direct the readers to my responses.)

 

1. Assumption. What if Gore’s opponents were not so honorable?
2. If it is a tax, then it will be going to the government, not Al Gore. Oops!
3. Here’s the classic Republican vs Democrat dichotomy.
4. Which Gore founded. Of course, if that bothers the skeptics, would it have been better for Gore to wait for someone else to have founded it? Even so, he most likely would have been given a leadership position within it.
5. Based on the fact that Gore gave up running for President or any other public office after 2000.
6. Here we find a double standard: Environmentalists are not expected to make money from their work. Why don’t critics of Gore also go after ExxonMobil, the world’s biggest oil company and therefore one of the world’s worst pollutors? It made BILLIONS in 2008!  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/01/30/exxon-mobil-reports-recor_n_162468.html
7. See this: http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/campaigns/global-warming-and-energy/exxon-secrets
8. Gee, what did Gore do, threaten to have Lindzen dragged into a back alley and beaten?  If not, this sort of hyperbole is just silly.
9. Alleged errors by denialist sources. Slight inaccuracies can be improved, but most of Gore’s statements were as accurate as one could have reasonably expected, given the uncertainties that climate science by nature must allow for.
10. Assumption.
11. No, it will never be over as long as there are denialists out there, just as the Creationism-evolution controversy will last as long as there are Creationists.

Statutory rape, a legal absurdity

In many states in the United States, is it considered a crime, specifically statutory rape, for an adult of either sex to engage in sexual intercourse with a minor of either sex, even if the minor gives consent to the act. Legally, the minor is considered incapable of giving consent just because he has not reached a certain chronological age, even if he or she has already passed puberty and would otherwise be sexually mature.

I find this legal standard to be insulting to all parties involved and want it abolished, IMMEDIATLY!

I beleive that once a minor has shown physical evidence of puberty, he or she should be held responsible for any sex acts that the minor chooses to participate in, regardless of the gender of the minor, gender of the other partner, the nature of the act, or even the age of the other partner.

Minors are not “protected” by statutory rape laws, they are insulted, treated the same as children who have NOT reached puberty. Most teenagers themselves know how wrong that is and that in turn results in lack of respect for the law in general from teenagers as well as others in different age groups.

There is no question that sexual relations between a pre-pubescent child and an adult is totally inappropriate and the adult should be punished by imprisonment, since such children are indeed not capable of giving consent to sexual acts, lacking a sex drive and fully developed genitals.

There is also no question that sexual relations between a teacher and one of his or her own adolescent students, regardless of their genders, is immoral, being disruptive to the educational process. In such a case, the teacher should be fired and blacklisted from teaching in any school, and the student who took part in the sex acts should also be expelled permenantly from the school.

What I’m writing about is an adult being charged with a sex crime merely for having sex with someone, regardless of physical development, JUST BECAUSE THE MINOR HAD NOT REACHED AN AGE LEGALLY DEFINED AS “ADULT”! In most states, that age is 18. But is it common knowledge that some 15 or 16 year olds are mature enough to handle sex with either members of their own age group, or older partners, while some 18 year olds are not. There is nothing magical about the age of 18.

So abolish the statutory rape laws! They are not based on reality. Only prejudice.

The sad downfall of Silly Old Bear in Care2

Silly Old Bear, also known as Henric Jensen, is one of my best online friends. He is Jewish, Swedish, married, a transexual, and one of the best human rights activists I’ve ever known. He was also one of the most hated people in Care2. Hated because he was a firm opponent of Israel-bashing, which he saw as anti-Semetic, and was just as eager to defending men’s rights even before angry feminists who seemed to have a grudge against all men.

Obama-bashers are bigots

Take a look at this first:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6FnTXmYyUMY

I once swore that I would NEVER vote for Hillary Clinton to be the next President, for two reasons:

1. She chose to remain married to Bill despite his infidelities, which struck me as a weakness in her character.
2. She “carpetbagged” her way to New York to grab an available Senate seat rather than return to Arkansas. To me, that suggested opportunism and disloyalty to her home.

But after hearing from so many former Hillary supporters that they still would never vote for Obama, I understand why. Voting for Obama now for them would be swallowing their pride, and that’s even more painful for some people, male or female, than giving birth. It would be unfair of me to demand of them what I wouldn’t do myself if the situation was reversed.

We don’t know enough?

I can’t stand anyone who employs a double standard to attack and deny an idea he hates. Nowhere is this more obvious than in the debate over global warming.

One of the arguments used by denialists on the issue is, “We don’t know enough about this issue to make changes to our economies that will affect the lives of millions.” There are two problems with that claim. First, the emissions of greenhouse gases we made in the past were done in total ignorance of how they would affect the global climate. Only in the past few decades have we gained enough knowledge to understand how the various factors work together over time to change the climate. Second, the denialists NEVER define when we WOULD have enough knowledge to conclude that man’s pollution must be curbed to stop global warming. Since they haven’t done this, how can their claim that we don’t know enough be justified?

Another claim made by the denialists is that “The movement to stop global warming is a scam to destroy capitalism.” Well, how can anyone know that, since there is no proof that anyone can read the minds of Al Gore and others on his side of the debate? Nor has there been any documentation produced to prove that claim.

Seriously, how can one claim that we don’t know enough about the science of climate change to conclude that humans are the main cause of the problem, yet at the same time claim dogmatically that the efforts to combat global warming are a scam? There is one word to describe such an attitude: HYPOCRISY!