Will Al Gore Melt?

Al Gore is traveling around the world telling us how we must
fundamentally change our civilization due to the threat of global
warming. Today he is in Denmark to disseminate this message. But if we
are to embark on the costliest political project ever, maybe we should
make sure it rests on solid ground. It should be based on the best
facts, not just the convenient ones. This was the background for the
biggest Danish newspaper, Jyllands-Posten, to set up an investigative
interview with Mr. Gore. And for this, the paper thought it would be
obvious to team up with Bjorn Lomborg, author of "The Skeptical
Environmentalist," who has provided one of the clearest counterpoints
to Mr. Gore's tune.

The interview had been scheduled for months. Mr. Gore's agent yesterday
thought Gore-meets-Lomborg would be great. Yet an hour later, he came
back to tell us that Bjorn Lomborg should be excluded from the
interview because he's been very critical of Mr. Gore's message about
global warming and has questioned Mr. Gore's evenhandedness. According
to the agent, Mr. Gore only wanted to have questions about his book and
documentary, and only asked by a reporter. These conditions were
immediately accepted by Jyllands-Posten. Yet an hour later we received
an email from the agent saying that the interview was now cancelled.
What happened?


One can only speculate. But if we are to follow Mr. Gore's suggestions
of radically changing our way of life, the costs are not trivial. If we
slowly change our greenhouse gas emissions over the coming century, the
U.N. actually estimates that we will live in a warmer but immensely
richer world. However, the U.N. Climate Panel suggests that if we
follow Al Gore's path down toward an environmentally obsessed society,
it will have big consequences for the world, not least its poor. In the
year 2100, Mr. Gore will have left the average person 30% poorer, and
thus less able to handle many of the problems we will face, climate
change or no climate change.

Clearly we need to ask hard questions. Is Mr. Gore's world a worthwhile
sacrifice? But it seems that critical questions are out of the
question. It would have been great to ask him why he only talks about a
sea-level rise of 20 feet. In his movie he shows scary sequences of
20-feet flooding Florida, San Francisco, New York, Holland, Calcutta,
Beijing and Shanghai. But were realistic levels not dramatic enough?
The U.N. climate panel expects only a foot of sea-level rise over this
century. Moreover, sea levels actually climbed that much over the past
150 years. Does Mr. Gore find it balanced to exaggerate the best
scientific knowledge available by a factor of 20?

Mr. Gore says that global warming will increase malaria and highlights
Nairobi as his key case. According to him, Nairobi was founded right
where it was too cold for malaria to occur. However, with global
warming advancing, he tells us that malaria is now appearing in the
city. Yet this is quite contrary to the World Health Organization's
finding. Today Nairobi is considered free of malaria, but in the 1920s
and '30s, when temperatures were lower than today, malaria epidemics
occurred regularly. Mr. Gore's is a convenient story, but isn't it
against the facts?

He considers Antarctica the canary in the mine, but again doesn't tell
the full story. He presents pictures from the 2% of Antarctica that is
dramatically warming and ignores the 98% that has largely cooled over
the past 35 years. The U.N. panel estimates that Antarctica will
actually increase its snow mass this century. Similarly, Mr. Gore
points to shrinking sea ice in the Northern Hemisphere, but don't
mention that sea ice in the Southern Hemisphere is increasing.
Shouldn't we hear those facts? Mr. Gore talks about how the higher
temperatures of global warming kill people. He specifically mentions
how the European heat wave of 2003 killed 35,000. But he entirely
leaves out how global warming also means less cold and saves lives.
Moreover, the avoided cold deaths far outweigh the number of heat
deaths. For the U.K. it is estimated that 2,000 more will die from
global warming. But at the same time 20,000 fewer will die of cold. Why
does Mr. Gore tell only one side of the story?

Al Gore is on a mission. If he has his way, we could end up choosing a
future, based on dubious claims, that could cost us, according to a
U.N. estimate, $553 trillion over this century. Getting answers to hard
questions is not an unreasonable expectation before we take his project
seriously. It is crucial that we make the right decisions posed by the
challenge of global warming. These are best achieved through open
debate, and we invite him to take the time to answer our questions: We
are ready to interview you any time, Mr. Gore -- and anywhere.

Mr. Rose is culture editor of Jyllands-Posten, in Copenhagen. Mr.
Lomborg is a professor at the Copenhagen Business School.

In article om,
says...


Yes he will, if he ever tries to return to the US.

You sound worried Evleth.

In article . com,
says...
You sound worried Evleth.


You look stupid, Stephen Bach. I'm exador and you're a very dim bulb
indeed.

"Fred Bloggs" kirjoitti
. com...
In article . com,
says...
You sound worried Evleth.


You look stupid, Stephen Bach. I'm exador and you're a very dim bulb
indeed.

Two is needed for tango. stop crossposting this filth. go away.

In article ,
says...

"Fred Bloggs" kirjoitti
. com...
In article . com,
says...
You sound worried Evleth.


You look stupid, Stephen Bach. I'm exador and you're a very dim bulb
indeed.

Two is needed for tango. stop crossposting this filth. go away.


LOL, did the reindeer stand you up again, markku?

shaking in their boots they are (snicker)

He's not worried because all the things Gore is talking about are not going
to affect us in our lifetime so who cares?

Besides, according to Putin, global warning is good for Russia because it
saves on heating costs. Heck, there's no snow in Moscow right now, very
strange for this time of year.

"Capitalist Pig" wrote in message
ups.com...
You sound worried Evleth.

In article . com,
says...

Not likely, I'd say, once they discover Stephen's past. Tick, tock,
little piggy.

Fred Bloggs wrote:

In article . com,
says...

Not likely, I'd say, once they discover Stephen's past. Tick, tock,
little piggy.


At the very least Piggosh may join his pal Runge in internet "purgatory"...

--
Best
Greg