http://www.katu.com/news/story.asp?ID=70792
Posted on 10/26/2005 1:32:18 PM PDT by Kieri
Gore skips politics for science in U-M speech on climate change
Ex-vice president talks on global warming
Tuesday, October 25, 2005
BY DAVE GERSHMAN
News Staff Reporter
Al Gore introduced himself as a "recovering politician - on step nine'' before making his case Monday night that global warming presents a moral challenge.
Gore steered clear of politics and embraced scientific data for most of his 90-minute talk in front of a packed crowd of 1,300 people at the Power Center for the Performing Arts on Monday evening.
The former vice president had been asked by the University of Michigan to talk about climate change, and he responded by making a painstaking case that global warming is happening, and going to get worse. He used enough charts, graphs and multimedia visuals to make any professor envious. Two screens behind him displayed dozens of images, and he described scientific studies of ocean and atmospheric temperatures going up, and glaciers and polar ice breaking up and retreating. And if you think this is all part of a normal cycle, Gore said, it's not.
It's not too late to avert the worst consequences, Gore said: "It's up to us to keep our eyes on the prize and act to save our planet.''
He briefly touched on solutions, such as becoming more efficient in the way we use energy and using cleaner-burning energies. Curbing the emission of greenhouse gases shouldn't pit the economy against the environment, Gore said.
Gore confessed that he thinks the hybrid-powered Toyota Prius is the "best car made'' but that he doesn't drive it; he said he is still loyal to General Motors Corp. and Ford Motor Co.
He used most of his time to talk about the science of global warming, saying the phenomenon presents a moral challenge. Convincing people that global warming is real and is a threat are two of the biggest tasks ahead, Gore said. We are still in denial, he said, even as we are seeing some of the consequences already. He pointed to record floods and more intense hurricanes.
"Glaciers don't care about politics or partisanship; they just melt and freeze,'' said Gore. He complained of an effort to discredit global warming as theory, comparing it to the cigarette industry denying links between smoking and disease.
Projections show the atmosphere's level of carbon-dioxide, the greenhouse gas, continuing to skyrocket. In the worst-case scenarios, ocean levels would rise to put whole coastal areas underwater, he said, and agriculture would be disrupted, he indicated.
In front of this audience, at least, Gore received an enthusiastic response. "I think he presented a very strong scientific basis for the reality of what we're experiencing and what we're going to experience,'' said Bill Holmes, a researcher at U-M.
"The scale of it is something as a researcher I have some understanding of,'' he added, "but I think he laid out a very complete picture.''
Alison White, a graduate student at U-M, agreed. "I think it should be convincing to people,'' she said. She came because global warming "is an issue I'm interested in, but don't know a whole lot about.''
Gore was giving U-M's annual Peter M. Wege Lecture. Wege is an environmentalist and major donor to the U-M School of Natural Resources. Gore's talk was sponsored by the School of Natural Resources, among other academic units. He did not receive an honorarium.
The tickets to his lecture at the Power Center, which were free, had been snapped up early. Overflow seating for several hundred people was arranged at another auditorium, where attendees watched Gore live on video.
He left no time for questions and only briefly touched on politics. He criticized the environmental record of two of President Bush's appointees without mentioning Bush by name. At the start of his talk, the audio-visual display didn't work, so he smiled at a technician and quipped: "Brownie, you're doing a hell of a job.'' Gore was parodying President Bush, who in the early aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, had praised former FEMA director Michael Brown, saying "Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job.'' Brown later resigned his post as criticism of the relief effort mounted.
Dressed in a dark suit, Gore was at ease in front of the crowd. "I am Al Gore,'' he said soon after appearing on stage, drawing laughs from the audience. "I used to be the next president of the United States.''
In another light moment, Gore asked the audience members to put themselves in his shoes. (He is now president of the new Cable network for youths, Current TV, and chairman of an investment firm with environmentally friendly portfolios.)
"I flew on Air Force One for eight years,'' he said. "Now I have to take off my shoes to get on an airplane.''
Reporter Dave Gershman can be reached at (734) 994-6818 or dgershman@annarbornews.com.
Gore's remark on the Prius reminds me of the commercial, "I'm not a meteorologist or a scientist, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn last night!"
He learned so much growing up in that hotel and never holding a job in the private sector. I was at first skeptical but he really could be a modern day Ben Franklin.
Hey come on, give the guy a break. He did invent the Internet...
"I flew on Air Force One for eight years,''
Dont remind me.
"Al Gore introduced himself as a "recovering politician - on step nine'' before making his case Monday night that global warming presents a moral challenge."
If he's talking global warming then it's from national politics back into global politics.
laughing........coughing........gagging........BARF ALERT!!!!!
Thank God this mental midget was never President of the United States.
Yeah...he's in favor of LARGE AMERICAN-MADE SUVS (gasp..like his good friend Arianna Bluffington)...over the Toyota Prius.
Why didn't this genius inventor INVENT an alternative fuel during his 8 years of "flying around on Air Force One"?
LMAO...
He was VP. He flew on Air Force 2 - unless he was tagging along with clinton somewhere.
This doesn't sound right. I thought the President and Vice President didn't normally travel together. And Clinton would have been in Air Force 1. Is he pulling another "I invented the Internet" moment?
Hey at least THIS time his speech wasn't ont he coldest day of the year.
AS for the projections about greenhouse gasses I pose two questions.
1) Is removing Gore's shoes resulting in emissions.
2) Are these the same folks that did the projecting on the budget surplus?
"I am Al Gore,'' he said soon after appearing on stage, drawing laughs from the audience. "I used to be the next president of the United States.''
They’ve found bread in ancient egyptian tombs that was fresher than that joke.
In Mr. Gore's mind, there is no difference between Science and Politics. Politics is his Science. It is his Religion. Everything comes back to politics as far as he and his Liberal buddies are concerned. There is nothing else in their lives but Politics. Where they shop, who they associate with, where they take their vacations, even maintaining good family relations are all determined by their politics. This is a very small and petty way in which to live life. But then, Mr. Gore and his buddies have proven, in the years following his defeat, they are very small and petty people.
O.K. how about that hybrid Ford Escape? Put your money where your mouth is.
"Thank God this mental midget was never President of the United States."
I include that in my evening prayers every night
But first a Foggy Mountain Breakdown:
Gore is, after John Kerry, the second biggest looser in American politics.
No politics here. Move along.
Repeat after me:
Man-made Global WarmingTM is a MYTH!
Man-made Global WarmingTM is a MYTH!
Man-made Global WarmingTM is a MYTH!
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