Posted on 04/06/2008 1:22:29 PM PDT by vadum
Former Vice President Al Gore is angry at CRC.
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Al Gore, who famously claimed to have invented the Internet, now denies -in the face of powerful evidence to the contrary- that he is in a position to make an immense fortune from global warming-mitigation efforts.
Ian Wilhelm, a Chronicle of Philanthropy reporter, asked the private equity firm Generation Investment Management LLP (GIM) to respond to my previous post about Gore's global warming profiteering. In the post, I noted that Gore's nonprofit Alliance for Climate Protection plans to spend $300 million on an advertising campaign aimed at convincing the American public that they urgently need to embrace (economy-crippling) controls on carbon emissions and press politicians to act. Gore happens to be chairman and founder of GIM, a firm that invests money from institutions and wealthy investors in companies that are becoming environmentally-friendly, to use green parlance.
Wilhelm received what certainly seems like a snotty response. On behalf of Chairman Gore, GIM spokesman Richard Campbell said my statements were a "nonsense story." Campbell said neither Gore nor any other members of GIM's board will make a buck from the expansion of carbon trading. "To suggest then that they are somehow benefiting from the growth of this industry betrays a complete lack of knowledge of the carbon offset industry," Campbell said.
But why on Earth wouldn't Gore, as head of an investment firm focused on green products, want to make money from climate change mitigation efforts? It's his job, and he is already deeply involved in the global warming business. He has enjoyed great success in business and made oodles of money for boldly seizing the initiative in a series of successful business ventures, including green ventures. He now has a net worth greater than $100 million. As Fast Company notes:
He has made an enormous amount of money and achieved positions of influence from technology to financial services to media. He and Tipper are even setting themselves up as angel investors for a few early-stage tech companies they believe in. In doing one end run after another around the status quo, he has created a new life: a perfect amalgam of environmental activism and a new type of capitalism in which there is more than one bottom line to consider, more than one master to serve.Gore's partner at GIM, David Blood, told MarketWatch last year that "we really are focused on delivering outstanding customer results for our clients. We're also clear, avowed advocates on climate change or on sustainability." The article also states that
Blood sees climate change creating an entirely new business stratum, he said, similar to that surrounding the so-called Internet economy -- though he'd prefer that it bypass the latter's bubble phase.The way Blood and Gore are talking, they sure sound like they plan to make a lot of money off global warming."If you think about the challenges the world faces over the next 25 years," Blood said, "these factors will be integral to how business operates, and by extension how the media thinks about challenges, how civil society thinks about challenges, and how we all operate."
And let's not forget that Gore now makes $175,000 a speech. Are people paying Gore not to talk about global warming in his speeches? He sure isn't making that kind of money for his oratory by enthralling crowds with fascinating tales from his time as Vice President of the United States, an office a previous holder once described as not being worth "a bucket of warm p---." By comparison, the rhetorical gifts of both Dan Quayle and Walter Mondale go for a more affordable $30,000 (per speech), or less.
Gore, who won a Nobel Peace Prize in 2007 for his global warming Chicken Little routine, is the most famous environmental activist in the world. His (so-called) documentary, An Inconvenient Truth, won two Academy Awards and was the highest-grossing documentary movie of all time, earning $49.7 million at the box office.
Gore is also America's most prominent advocate for legislated carbon emissions controls in the form of the so-called cap-and-trade system. In a cap-and-trade system, the government creates by fiat an artificial scarcity in the right to generate carbon emissions. The idea is that there would be a fixed quantity of carbon dioxide (CO2) production allowed and that businesses or industries that wanted to exceed their allowance (in order to do the things that make them money) would have to buy the unused portions of others' allowances. These carbon credits could be traded on an exchange, as is currently done in Europe. When a financial instrument is traded in a market, people make money off it, whether directly or indirectly - investors, sellers, brokers, dealers, financial advisors - even investment executives like Al Gore.
As for carbon offsets, the U.S. market for such products and its attendant "feel-good hype" could be "as high as $100 million...up from next to nothing just a couple of years ago," reports Business Week. If you consider that global warming only arrived on the scene as a major political issue relatively recently and that it may remain an issue for years, possibly decades, to come, it appears we are only at the beginning of what may turn out to be a long period of global warming consciousness-raising (to borrow a phrase from the left).
If CO2 limits become the law of the land --as John McCain, Hillary Clinton, and Barack Obama have all promised on the campaign trail-- the market for carbon emissions rights will be huge as soon as the restrictions are signed into law. Of course the market for carbon offsets would probably grow exponentially.
There's the article by Marc Gunther and Adam Lashinsky, "Al Gore's next act: Planet-saving VC," [VC stands for venture capitalist] that ran in Fortune on February 12, 2008. The subtitle is "The recovering politician is teaming with a legendary venture capitalist and bigtime moneyman to make over the $6 trillion global energy business." The authors note that Gore has joined Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. That venture capital firm says right on its website's homepage that:
KPCB is actively working with entrepreneurs to solve our climate crisis. To accelerate our solutions, Al Gore has joined KPCB as a Partner, and KPCB has formed an alliance with Gore's Generation Investment Management. The combined network, expertise, vision and global reach of Gore, Generation and KPCB will help our entrepreneurs change the world.So, KPCB has hopped on Gore's potentially very lucrative global warming bandwagon. Did Gore get involved with KPCB to not make money?
The Fortune article implies that GIM has invested in carbon trading companies: GIM "came across a small company engaged in carbon trading that [KPCB] is analyzing, and [KPCB] has shared intelligence about which startups could threaten the established companies in [GIM]'s portfolio."
Gore has incredibly ambitious plans for the people of Earth. He wants to lead a revolution in how people and industry use energy and, in his own words, is calling for something "bigger than the Industrial Revolution and significantly faster."
Gore proclaims: "What we are going to have to put in place is a combination of the Manhattan Project, the Apollo project, and the Marshall Plan, and scale it globally. It'd be promising too much to say we can do it on our own, but we intend to do our part."
So, Gore flaunts his prowess as a savvy investor-entrepreneur by appearing in glossy business magazines, but when someone points out the obvious, that his business interests and environmentalist crusade overlap, he gets indignant?
(Note: A modified version of this entry has been posted to NewsBusters. Previously, a modified version of the original entry about Gore's global warming profiteering was also posted to NewsBusters. For more information on Gore's environmentalist business schemes, see "Al Gore's Carbon Crusade: The Money and Connections Behind It," by Deborah Corey Barnes, Foundation Watch, August 2007.)
Who’s this Al Gore guy I keep hearing about?
Blood and Gore. You just can't make this stuff up.
http://www.crn.com/security/206905641
March 25, 2008
Gore To Speak At RSA: Press Not InvitedThis year’s high-profile keynote at San Francisco’s RSA Conference will be blessed with the presence of former Vice President Al Gore, who will present a keynote speech on the event’s closing day.
However, VARs, vendors and other attendees will have to let journalists know how it goes — according to an agreement with the former Vice President, members of the press will not be allowed to attend the event. Naturally, video recordings, broadcasts and photography are all prohibited as well.
Alex Kirschner, a conference media contact, said that excluding the press from the keynote was not the decision of RSA but rather was due to a special request included in Gore’s speaking contract. Kirschner added that most of Gore’s contracts included language that prohibited press from attending his speeches.
Gore’s sudden camera shyness comes as a stark contrast to last year’s RSA keynote presented by former Secretary of State Colin Powell, who seemed to have no problem opening the doors to press and public.
Kirschner said that Gore, who received Nobel Peace Prize in 2007, will be giving a speech on emerging green technologies, but didn’t provide specifics. “When it’s somebody this high profile, it’s difficult to get or divulge any more information than that,” said Kirschner.
Likewise, RSA could not elaborate further on the terms of the contract. Thus far, Gore’s reasons for excluding the press are completely subject to speculation. A recent ecorazzi.com blog post suggested that the possibility still exists, albeit slim at best, that Democrats might actually nominate Gore as the presidential candidate that will ultimately break the insufferable Clinton-Obama deadlock. Amid the rumors that the former Vice President could be positioning himself as a potential contender to the Oval Office, it could be that Gore is simply taking advantage of the necessary security precautions granted to all presidential candidates.
Gore’s keynote will be presented Friday, April 11 in Hall D of San Francisco’s Moscone Center.
Chicken shitte Al Gore refuses to take friggin questions...someone needs to get him questioned soon!
Let’s not forget, Al Gore is just following what he saw Bill Clinton do, and helped Bill Clinton do.
Everyone is so concerned because Bill Clinton gave away technology to foreign nations.
That is merely the smoke in front of the mirror.
What he did, and taught Al to do, is to sell exclusive access to markets, even creating artificial markets (like GW) through legislation.
It is how Mochter Riady got rich. Clinton and Gore outlawed U.S. coal, and ensured Riady was the only ‘other source’.
GW and Carbon Credits are merely an Artificial Market created by legislation for the benefit of the legislators, and their investors.
Hey, y'all, Albert Arnold Gore, Jr. finally hit his stride. Give the capitalist a break.
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Generation Investment Management.....GIM-me.
He's as phony as a $3 bill.
bump for later
“Campbell said neither Gore nor any other members of GIM’s board will make a buck from the expansion of carbon trading. “To suggest then that they are somehow benefiting from the growth of this industry betrays a complete lack of knowledge of the carbon offset industry,” Campbell said.”
Actually, it’s true.
Think about Pyramid schemes. The tip of the triangle starts the original investment, and profits from that.
As the down line gets longer, there is still profit, but it is spread over a larger base, and there are too many crooked fingers in the pot.
When that happens, the original investors pull out with their profits and move on to the next scheme.
Al does profit from controlling the resources of information on the internet. That is why he is a major stockholder of Google.
Which is buying Yahoo.
I think you are right but I do think the left fully understands the coupe that would be accomplished if they succeed it implementing an environmentalist dictatorship.
Denying the ka-ching machine. Unbelievable.
“Gore proclaims: “What we are going to have to put in place is a combination of the Manhattan Project, the Apollo project, and the Marshall Plan, and scale it globally. It’d be promising too much to say we can do it on our own, but we intend to do our part.””
What a farce, but on the other hand might be a good way to conquer Asia. Try getting India, China and S.E. Asia and Korea to play that game and they’ll all die of laughter.
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