Al Gore's appearance on the Today show yesterday is good timing, as I was gonna blog about Vanity Fair's** May "Green" issue anyway.
I'm not the type to read Vanity Fair so you don't have to. But if you like fashion photos of environmentalists (and you consider Arnold Schwarzenegger and George Pataki environmentalists), VF coos right at ya: "Saving the earth isn't just for lefties anymore." [EPA alert: GOP approval numbers just hit critical endangered status.]
The best article of this issue: "The Rape of Appalachia" about just how bad the coal industry is. If you need one more reason to oppose/hate/impeach the Bush administration, surely their consistent appointments of industry lobbyists as "overseers" of the environment is reason enough by its own self.
An important lesson for polluters, btw: first, bust all the unions.
And if your liberal panties aren't in enough of a wad yet, find out just how mercury gets into our water from coal burning emissions and then think about the explosion in autism cases in the past fifteen years, and...
...yeah, yeah what happens when you can't turn on your laptop 'cause a buncha treehuggers closed the coal-burning power plant that powers it...
We are all responsible.
We need vision, hope, and a plan of action. Enter
Bush, you son of a mother fucking bitch craphead 29 percent mother earth rapist --memo to the NSA listen in on THIS you buttfuckers of the US Constitution oh I am SO just getting started when are we EVER gonna learn?
Oh sorry. Back to Al Gore's excellent article on how much danger the environment, OUR environment, my two-year-old's environment, my three-year-old's environment, my seven-year-old autistic son's...
GEORGE W. BUSH I COULD CUT YOUR DICK OFF RIGHT NOW AND WATCH YOU BLEED WITHOUT SO MUCH AS BLINKING. [LINK]
Oh, sorry again. This is what Blue Gal is like when her liberal panties are in a wad. No, this is not PMS. I would be crying if this were PMS. I don't fantasize about castrating the President when I have PMS. But thank you for your concern.
Where was I? Oh, Al Gore. Great article.
Gore brilliantly compares Bush, not to Hitler, Satan, Madonna, the usual suspects, but to Neville Chamberlain, the British PM who in the 1930's thought it best to try to get along and co-exist with the Third Reich, while Winston Churchill slapped his hand to his own forehead and prophetically slammed out the truth:
...The era of procrastination, of half measures, of soothing and baffling expedients, of delays, is coming to a close. In its place, we are entering a period of consequences.
This has apparently become the motto of the stop global warming movement. The second half of Gore's VF article reads like a campaign speech, but a good speech of hope and vision and a plan for the future. It might just excite enough voters to make a difference. Is Gore running? Is this the 2000 do-over we wish could be? And why are fashion magazines thinking he is so cool all of a sudden? Here's the latest W**:
Gore is everything you thought he wasn't: personable, passionate, brilliant, humble and funny. (Where did this guy come from? He'd be a great politician.)
Regardless, over the course of my week away I came to a certain conclusion. Whether our candidates turn out to be 'blue" enough to make us bloggers happy remains to be seen, but we Democrats better get ready because we're about to be handed the mantle of power again, and when (not if, I've concluded) this happens, it's gonna be a big mess of steaming, stinking elephant shit landing right in our lap. Iraq, the environment, energy, health care: we are gonna have the snark slapped right off of our faces and have real work to do. I'm grateful that at least with Al Gore and other Dems we have some real cred and some real abilities to fix things when it comes to the environment.
Blame Bush. Why, sure, it's fun, and it will be useful during the upcoming campaigns and maybe even during the transition period. But January 20, 2009 may be the end of a nightmare, yet not the beginning, of our American dream. It's gonna take prayer, solemnity, maturity, and back-aching work to set this country right again. Count me in.
**I know, I know. Vanity Fair and W in the same post. And it's that W with a 46 page spread of Madonna dressed up like a horse. I know. But I was on vacation, people. Cool down and look at some leaf panties, for crying out loud:
![[LINK]](http://static.flickr.com/62/153113578_0054c2707f_o.jpg){kind=link}
I wish I could be as optimistic about the Dems, but I have two large and not unreasonable fears:
ReplyDelete1) The Dems run timid, completely-missing-the-point campaigns like they did in '02.
2) While a bunch of Republican incumbents will likely go down as a result of the growing throw-the-bums-out restlessness, I have a suspicion that some go-along-to-get-along Democratic incumbents go down as well, as despairing Dem voters wail, "Where were you? Why didn't you even *try* to stop these bastards? Why should I vote for you or give money if you won't represent me?
This could potentially even damage some Dem challengers as well. Much as we all despise Santorum, I can't think of a single PA progressive who likes Casey even a little bit.
yes, but even the republicans are afraid that santorum's gone off the deep end.
ReplyDeleteme, i think i have a HUGE crush on al gore! i watched him on tv the other night, i could have kissed him! : )
Blue Gal, I really do like your blog! But I have to make a point here: there is no connection between mercury and autism. From what I have read, Kennedy is a crackpot when it comes to this topic. I refer you and your readers to Respectful Insolence, a blog from a surgeon/scientist who frequently talks about and debunks this topic.
ReplyDeletefor the record- i have always thought gore was personable, intelligent, thoughtful, etc- which is probably why he didn't win the presidency. apparently, it's a prerequisite to be a complete moron to become president- but i digress. there was no reason that people should have lost any environmental momentum- except that we all got lazy and pampered and selfish. there is no sense of sacrifice at all in today's culture- and if we don't start sacrificing some of our wants and desires- there won't be our needs in the near future- you know stuff like clean water, food, clean air, etc. last thing- why is julia the only one dressed like a fairy of the forest?
ReplyDeletePhil, I totally agree with the pile of research that says mercury in vaccines did not cause autism (as you know, vaccine manufacturers took it out anyway). Respectful Insolence seems to focus on debunking that, which is fine with me. But mercury in fish and our water supply continues to grow daily, apparently, and somewhere there is, I believe, both a genetic AND an environmental cause to the increase in autism cases we are seeing. It is not mere improved diagnosis, though that is catching some kids way earlier than they might have been.
ReplyDeleteThere are just a great many, mostly boys, with social deficits and language delays coming into the world these days. Maybe this is not autism, or maybe there are 20 varieties of autism. We're still finding all of this out. But as a parent of one affected, I am furious with our President for putting industry mice in charge of guarding the environmental cheese.
Thanks for visiting and thanks for the compliment, too. Much appreciated.
...and Betmo, you would hafta go and make me look that up. It's Bill Blass, dahlink. Vanity frickin' Fair has not completely gone off the deep end. If she had been wearing only hemp panties, believe me, Bush would have found a way to ruin them. See here.
ReplyDeleteWhomever was in charge of Al Gore's campaign for 2000 needs to be shot, NOT moved to the CNN Situation Room with Wolf Blizer.
ReplyDeleteWe never saw the warm, charismatic, intelligent, witty side of Al Gore. Instead, we were presented with Clinton-lite, a goofy, distant, overly verbose career politician.
While these may have been ideas put into our minds by Karl Rove, the fact remains that whomever was running his campaign made no successful attempt to counter this charicature.
Fifty pounds later, Al has nothing to lose and whole bunch of (justified) sour grapes. But he finally is showing his true colors. Pity it happened now.
And yes, whomever inherits this big pile of Elephant shit is going to have their work cut out for them. We can either rise to the occasion (Winston Churchill), blame the previous administration for its failings while not really changing the status quo (Richard Nixon), or prove our incompetence (Jimmy Carter).
Here's hoping for success.
Actually, it's been my experience that Vanity Fair is frequently ahead of the game on important stories. If you can ignore all the high fasion and gossip...
ReplyDeleteSorry, BG, but I can’t go for leaf panties because by the time seasonal changes cause them to be shed it’s too chilly to walk around “nekkid”.
ReplyDelete