Quote :

"POWER: GORE MANSION USES 20X AVERAGE HOUSEHOLD; CONSUMPTION INCREASE AFTER 'TRUTH' Mon Feb 26 2007 17:16:14 ET The Tennessee Center for Policy Research, an independent, nonprofit and nonpartisan research organization committed to achieving a freer, more prosperous Tennessee through free market policy solutions, issued a press release late Monday: Last night, Al Gore’s global-warming documentary, An Inconvenient Truth, collected an Oscar for best documentary feature, but the Tennessee Center for Policy Research has found that Gore deserves a gold statue for hypocrisy. Gore’s mansion, [20-room, eight-bathroom] located in the posh Belle Meade area of Nashville, consumes more electricity every month than the average American household uses in an entire year, according to the Nashville Electric Service (NES). In his documentary, the former Vice President calls on Americans to conserve energy by reducing electricity consumption at home. The average household in America consumes 10,656 kilowatt-hours (kWh) per year, according to the Department of Energy. In 2006, Gore devoured nearly 221,000 kWh—more than 20 times the national average. Last August alone, Gore burned through 22,619 kWh—guzzling more than twice the electricity in one month than an average American family uses in an entire year. As a result of his energy consumption, Gore’s average monthly electric bill topped $1,359. Since the release of An Inconvenient Truth, Gore’s energy consumption has increased from an average of 16,200 kWh per month in 2005, to 18,400 kWh per month in 2006. Gore’s extravagant energy use does not stop at his electric bill. Natural gas bills for Gore’s mansion and guest house averaged $1,080 per month last year. “As the spokesman of choice for the global warming movement, Al Gore has to be willing to walk to walk, not just talk the talk, when it comes to home energy use,” said Tennessee Center for Policy Research President Drew Johnson. In total, Gore paid nearly $30,000 in combined electricity and natural gas bills for his Nashville estate in 2006. For Further Information, Contact: Nicole Williams, (615) 383-6431 editor@tennesseepolicy.org"

This deserves its own thread. What a fucking hypocrite. He must not be that scared of global warming. That smug piece of shit needs to quit this fearmongering he accuses the Republicans of routinely using.

2/26/2007 8:47:50 PM

^Gore and family aren't comparable to an average American household?!?!?

I never woulda guessed!

2/26/2007 9:06:12 PM

Therefore, climate change is a fraud.

QED

2/26/2007 9:06:26 PM

Do as I say, not as I do dammit!!!11!

2/26/2007 9:08:27 PM

OMG JOHN EDWARDS NEEDS TO LIVE IN A BOX IF HE IS GOING TO TRY AND WIN THE WORKING CLASS VOTE

2/26/2007 9:08:38 PM

I will deny my that my lord and savior is a fraud like everyone else and instead make a sarcastic remark!

2/26/2007 9:15:02 PM

link?

Quote :

"The Tennessee Center for Policy Research, an independent, nonprofit and nonpartisan research organization"

here the commentaries on the front page

Quote :

"Minimum Wage Hike Means Maximum Harm for Working Poor"

Quote :

"Friedman’s Fight for Liberty Lives On"

Quote :

"Will a Democratic Congress End the Federal Spending Spree?"

[Edited on February 26, 2007 at 9:40 PM. Reason : ]

2/26/2007 9:37:49 PM

We have the numbers from his bill. I'm not saying global warming is false or not. I'm saying he sure isn't acting like it's the end of the world like he preaches.

2/26/2007 9:59:28 PM

News?

Is your surprise in the revelation that Gore lives in a mansion, or that mansions use more energy than the average home?

2/26/2007 10:00:41 PM

surprise that he preaches energy conservation and, if we don't conserve, then florida will be gone and Nashville will be waterfront.... property.... hmmmm

No, seriously, would you listen to Arthur Anderson if he decided to hold a lecture about Ethical Corporate Accounting?

2/26/2007 10:02:30 PM

and? i don't really think that gore is some awesome individual. i do think that some of his ideas on stemming carbon emissions are positive.

the whole reason people who oppose gore have gone this route is that they can't oppose his ideas because they know that many of them have merit. instead they talk about him as an individual.

and to what end? it doesn't seem he's going to run for office in the near future. it seems to me that this is one way of subtely discrediting conservation measures by discrediting the face that we put with them.

[Edited on February 26, 2007 at 10:08 PM. Reason : .]

2/26/2007 10:07:05 PM

I tried for 2 pages in the Inconvenient Truth to convince you that he was a hypocrite. At least you're finally coming around.

2/26/2007 10:13:00 PM

mostly i just don't care what he does specifically.

[Edited on February 26, 2007 at 10:14 PM. Reason : i don't think he's much of a hypocrite. not any more than most of us are.]

2/26/2007 10:14:01 PM

What I'm saying is that would we listen to Ted Haggard about Child Protection? Would we listen to Osama bin Laden about how to curb violence from muslims?


How does Gore have any right to say anything? He quite adamantly preaches Hell and Damnation if we don't do what he says... but the consequences must not be that bad if he is willing to live as he does.

2/26/2007 10:17:22 PM

i'd say that al gore has done far more good for the environment than he has done bad. between passing legislation and getting america talking and caring about carbon emissions, i'd say he's done a lot of good. guess what? most rich people have big houses that use lots of electricity.

2/26/2007 10:23:06 PM

This is just like Rosie O'Donnell, who gave Tom Seleck hell because he is a pro-gun advocate but thinks it's perfectly fine if her bodyguard is armed to protect her fat ass.

2/26/2007 10:28:49 PM

hey can we get back to why thats not the same, i guess some people didnt get it when it was talked about with kennedy

2/26/2007 10:30:08 PM

so. let's hypothetically say that all of this is true. what difference does it make? what of the things that he has said are any less valid? this is just a smokescreen to indirectly discredit ideas without a good argument against them.

2/26/2007 10:30:43 PM

Quote :

"this is just a smokescreen to indirectly discredit ideas without a good argument against them. "

ding

2/26/2007 10:31:34 PM

Gore has always taken the do as I say, not as I do approach.

http://www.counterpunch.org/frank05312006.html

2/26/2007 10:39:44 PM

Quote :

"i'd say that al gore has done far more good for the environment than he has done bad. between passing legislation and getting america talking and caring about carbon emissions, i'd say he's done a lot of good"

what if carbon emissions arent going to cause any more serious damage to the planet than they already have? well then i'd say his scaremongering wouldnt be too good

2/26/2007 10:42:11 PM

oh my god less pollution!!!!

[Edited on February 26, 2007 at 10:43 PM. Reason : the horror]

2/26/2007 10:42:45 PM

2/26/2007 10:46:46 PM

The moral flaws of Gore's An Inconvenient Truth...

http://www.slate.com/id/2142319/

2/26/2007 10:51:47 PM

There are companies that sell credits that offset your own CO2 usage.

Gore talks about them all the time.

There is no way that he uses them.

There is also no way that he has convinced anybody to lessen his or her usage, thereby meaning that there is no way he is a net gain for the environment.

2/26/2007 11:18:23 PM

Quote :

"There are companies that sell credits that offset your own CO2 usage"

left wing oil companies

2/26/2007 11:29:57 PM

It's not just Gore's house that he's being hypocritical about:



Airplane Contrails Boost Global Warming, Study Suggests

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/06/060614-contrails.html

And he's not the only one:

Quote :

"Writing in The Atlantic Monthly in 2004, liberal writer [emphasis added] Eric Alterman criticized producer Laurie David for her use of private Gulfstream jets. David, he wrote 'reviles the owners of SUVs as terrorist enablers, yet gives herself a pass when it comes to chartering one of the most wasteful uses of fossil-based fuels imaginable.' New Republic writer Gregg Easterbrook followed up, computing that 'one cross-country flight in a Gulfstream is the same, in terms of Persian-Gulf dependence and greenhouse-gas emissions, as if she drove a Hummer for an entire year.' In an interview in 2006, David told ABC News that she was limiting [emphasis added] her use of private planes and was flying commercial far more frequently."

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/GlobalWarming/story?id=2906888&page=1



[Edited on February 26, 2007 at 11:48 PM. Reason : .]

2/26/2007 11:31:34 PM

sarijoul has won this thread three times over.

2/26/2007 11:51:38 PM

This in itself doesn't show much -- as everyone said, obviously a bigger house is going to use more electricity, and I don't think it's reasonable to say that all global warming worriers should live in hovels. What would mean something to me would be a demonstration that his house is not equipped in any special way to save energy -- things like solar panels and special windows might not make a huge difference in energy costs, but they would say a fair amount about his dedication to this cause.

I suspect, however, that he's at least done the basic stuff to make his house efficient, and until I see otherwise I will call Al Gore many things, but not a hypocrite.

2/26/2007 11:56:54 PM

^ If you had bothered to read the link I posted, you would have seen some of that.

Quote :

"These efforts did little to impress [Drew] Johnson. 'I appreciate the solar panels,' he said, 'but he also has natural gas lanterns in his yard, a heated pool, and an electric gate. While I appreciate that he's switching out some light bulbs, he is not living the lifestyle that he advocates.' The Center claims that Nashville Electric Services records show the Gores in 2006 averaged a monthly electricity bill of $1,359 for using 18,414 kilowatt-hours, and $1,461 per month for using 16,200 kilowatt-hours in 2005. During that time, Nashville Gas Company billed the family an average of $536 a month for the main house and $544 for the pool house in 2006, and $640 for the main house and $525 for the pool house in 2005. That averages out to be $29,268 in gas and electric bills for the Gores in 2006, $31,512 in 2005."

Maybe Gore could cut power to the pool house? You know, since the glaciers are melting and all--he's seems really worried about it.

2/27/2007 12:21:43 AM

Quote :

""Paramount Classics, Participant Productions, and NativeEnergy have joined forces to offset 100% of the carbon dioxide emissions from air and ground transportation and hotels for production and promotional activities associated with the documentary." Al Gore has also mentioned in numerous interviews that he has made his life carbon-neutral, and now he's announcing that "100 percent of the profits from the book and the movie [will go] to a new bipartisan educational campaign to further spread the message about global warming.""

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2006/06/ait_carbon_neutral.php

Quote :

"Al Gore and the producers behind "An Inconvenient Truth" are making sure the former veep's press tour to promote the film doesn't contradict its eco-positive message. They've hired a firm to calculate the cost of the film's carbon footprint, and are donating the equivalent funds towards renewable-energy farming products."

http://donoevil.netscape.com/story/2006/06/11/gore-doc-is-hollywoods-first-carbon-neutral-release/

Quote :

"For his part, Al Gore says his "carbon neutral life" is made possible by reducing his emissions — he uses green energy and owns hybrid cars — and by offsetting the impact of his jet-setting lifestyle and electricity use by paying to have trees planted to soak up the carbon dioxide his energy use creates."

for those not familiar with carbon offsets:

Quote :

"A carbon offset is a service that tries to reduce the net carbon emissions of individuals or organizations indirectly, through proxies who reduce their emissions and/or increase their absorption of greenhouse gases.[1] A wide variety of offset actions are available; tree planting is the most common. Renewable energy and energy conservation offsets are also popular, including emissions trading credits."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_offset

I offset my driving with http://www.drivinggreen.com and my home is carbon neutral thanks to http://www.ncgreenpower.org/

[Edited on February 27, 2007 at 12:24 AM. Reason : .]

2/27/2007 12:23:44 AM

How many sq. ft is his house? I would bet his energy/sq. ft. isn't more than the average house.

2/27/2007 12:25:56 AM

^It's still wasteful but I like your thinking

2/27/2007 12:31:36 AM

Again, as much as I know you'd all like to paint Gore as some commie who suggests that rich people should live in poor peoples' houses, that isn't the case. He isn't completely wasteful and appears to be taking steps to compensate for his impact, which means he is at the very least not some raging hypocrite (that is, not appreciably moreso than the average person).

2/27/2007 12:37:07 AM

^^^^ So, if you're a liberal, a VIP, and you can afford ~ $30,000 per year in gas-electric utilities and you can afford to purchase offsets, then everything's cool, right?

2/27/2007 12:43:07 AM

Rich people do have more advantages.

I personally disagree with his excess, but I applaud his apparent commitment to the environment.

2/27/2007 12:49:01 AM

Quote :

"I personally disagree with his excess, but I applaud his apparent commitment to the environment."

Wow.

2/27/2007 12:57:55 AM

^^^ You don't really have enough information to determine if his energy use is excessive.

First, how much SHOULD his energy bills be? How big of a house should he have?

He probably has to entertain donors and other rich people in his house, that a normal person wouldn't have to worry about, which would require fancy lights and other luxury amenities. It would basically be like a hotel in this situation. It's a business as much as a home.

If he just sits around with 20 empty rooms and 8 bathrooms all powered up, with no one else around, that would definitely be wrong. But I would bet that a lot more stuff goes on in his house, business wise, that most people wouldn't or couldn't do with their own house.

If he has solar panels on his house, that alone is a huge step that most people, rich or otherwise, wouldn't even take.

Impugning Gore for his electricity bill is pretty idiotic. There probably other stuff (like in his actual message) that could be attacked, and actually be meaningful. It would be like comparing Bush to Bin Laden as far as the amount of people they've killed with their minions. I bet Bush wins that battle handily, but it's not an ingenuous comparison.

[Edited on February 27, 2007 at 1:00 AM. Reason : q]

2/27/2007 1:00:36 AM

Quote :

"So, if you're a liberal, a VIP, and you can afford ~ $30,000 per year in gas-electric utilities and you can afford to purchase offsets, then everything's cool, right?"

No. That's not what anybody is saying (especially the "liberal" part). We're just saying, if you can and do offset or at least limit your impact, that's cool. If you can't do those things, we can't blame you. It's only if you can and don't that you're kind of an ass.

2/27/2007 1:05:03 AM

Quote :

"He probably has to entertain donors and other rich people in his house, that a normal person wouldn't have to worry about, which would require fancy lights and other luxury amenities. It would basically be like a hotel in this situation. It's a business as much as a home."

I thought about this as well.

But, let's face it, he's loaded. He has a large house, first, because he's loaed, and second, because he has entertaining/business to worry about. If he was a hermit who never had people over, I suspect he'd probably be a hermit in a big ass house.

^Exactly.

2/27/2007 1:11:23 AM

^^^ Clearly, I have continually challenged many of Gore's unproven assertions. But please, feel free to attack my positions as "idiotic"--it's so enlightening. Bottom line: Gore does not practice what he preaches.



Gore fundraiser

PS: Why does Gore need all that power for his house? He can just jet over to some temples--while leaving contrails in the sky that probably contribute to global warming--and get tens of thousands of dollars from monks that have taken a vow of poverty.

[Edited on February 27, 2007 at 1:26 AM. Reason : .]

2/27/2007 1:18:47 AM

He preaches about offsets. And he uses those. He's setting a good example for other rich folks.

2/27/2007 1:23:58 AM

Quote :

""Today, under George W. Bush, there are two Americas, not one: One America that does the work, another that reaps the reward. One America that is struggling to get by, another America that can buy anything it wants, even a Congress and a president." "

I guess it's clear which of Edward's two Americas, Gore inhabits.

Gore's interests in the Occidental Oil Co. and the personal benefit he got from selling off U.S. oil reserves to Occidental, as well as kicking native tribes off their land to permit Occidental to explore for more oil tarred him with the moniker of hypocrite long before this situation.

That he is a hypocrite, though, shouldn't deflate our interest in reducing pollution. He is simply a political opportunist.

Living Green is fine if that is what you want to do. Just don't sic the gov't on me if I want to live life a different color.

2/27/2007 1:24:05 AM

Quote :

"Clearly, I have continually challenged many of Gore's unproven assertions."

um, where

2/27/2007 1:24:44 AM

Does an "offset" remove the contrails from the sky?

^ One has but to look.

^^ Yeah, Cokie Roberts (a liberal) said this weekend on This Week, and I'm paraphrasing, that Edwards' house is so big he lives in a third America--he and Gore are neighbors in that abstraction. Ha!


[Edited on February 27, 2007 at 1:48 AM. Reason : .]

2/27/2007 1:28:07 AM

Quote :

"Living Green is fine if that is what you want to do. Just don't sic the gov't on me if I want to live life a different color."

To an extent this doesn't make any sense. Really, the only argument is over whether or not there is any merit to global climate change and all that.

If there isn't, well, yeah, do whatever you want. But you still have to at least say you think there isn't before you go on to say what you did.

But if there is, even a Libertarian, I should think, would have to concede to some government involvement, as a person's contribution to the continuation of the problem is a concrete affront to the liberty of others.

2/27/2007 1:35:20 AM

Okay, no more arguing with hooksaw tonight. Way too much focus on individuals than on the actual issues, as usual.

^Yeah, that's what I was thinking. Most Americans don't want to change the way they do things, even if they say they want to be more friendly to the environment. So it could come to an eventual head where a minority + the government are going to have to impose upon the majority to get them to act right.

[Edited on February 27, 2007 at 1:41 AM. Reason : Pretty common theme, I guess. I dunno.]

2/27/2007 1:41:08 AM

^^ I disagree. A person could take the position that he or she does not agree with Gore and the so-called consensus, but will adopt a "green" lifestyle just in case. It's the better-safe-than-sorry approach--and I think a lot of people actually fall into this category.

[Edited on February 27, 2007 at 1:42 AM. Reason : .]

2/27/2007 1:42:08 AM

^Of course.

I just don't see most folks adopting shit without the government stepping in and forcing certain changes onto us, via more regulation of business and development or direct regulation of individual citizens.

[Edited on February 27, 2007 at 1:50 AM. Reason : LOL]

2/27/2007 1:46:41 AM

Quote :

"A person could take the position that he or she does not agree with Gore and the so-called consensus, but will adopt a "green" lifestyle just in case."

Right -- which is exactly why I say, "do whatever you want" if you don't think Gore is right or partially right or whatever. But if you think he is right, then I fail to see how it is anything short of your duty to try to get the government to act in accordance with that. Because it isn't just an issue between you and yourself or the gov't at that point -- it's an issue for all mankind.

2/27/2007 1:49:50 AM