Al Gore's new slideshow

Al presented a shorter talk (about 30 minutes) at TED. Take a look. The stats from 2007 are amazing and horrific.

BTW, most of the environmental organizations I belong to (National Wildlife and WWF, to name a couple) are all saying the latest data shows that global warming is progressing at a faster rate than previously (like 2 years ago) thought.

100 Ways to Save the Environment

If you think it's difficult or expensive or hold the opinion that one person can't make a difference, check out list of ways you can help the global warming crisis.

What does Al Gore have to do with planetary peace?

I need to applaud Georgie Anne Geyer for her wonderful piece on the link between Al Gore and the Nobel Peace Prize.

Some key quotes:

But the funny thing is that the critics of the Gore award have it all wrong. In fact, the deeper one digs into the historic reasons for chaos and collapse of societies across the globe, the more one finds that the real reasons behind many of the endless wars were precisely environmental degradation and collapse. Ironically, the turmoil in Iraq has its roots in the environmental problems of ancient times.

...supposedly ingrained "ethnic" wars like those of Rwanda and Bosnia came about not from old hatreds so much as rivalry over the environment that alone can sustain those human populations.

In related news...

Well, Bush&Co. may not get the effects of the Internet, but I'm glad other people do. Read up on the 21 Cities Labelled 'Most Susceptible' To Danger Of Climate Change Effects. It's scary how many lives and businesses and industries could be completely changed by this. Anyone wanna move inland with me?

White House 'eviscerated' climate testimony

A rather unsettling article about how the White House scaled down a climate crisis report from 14 to 4 pages. Maybe Bush doesn't have that kind of attention span, I don't know. But something this important would warrant at least 14 pages. I could write 14 pages on it in my sleep and I'm nowhere NEAR an expert on the subject!

Moving Beyond Kyoto

Al Gore wrote a piece for the New York Times that was published in yesterday's paper. Take a read.

Most interesting pullquote:

Therefore, just as President Reagan renamed and modified the SALT agreement (calling it Start), after belatedly recognizing the need for it, our next president must immediately focus on quickly concluding a new and even tougher climate change pact. We should aim to complete this global treaty by the end of 2009 — and not wait until 2012 as currently planned.

The next president, wink, wink, nudge, nudge? I'm reading into this, I know. But I really see this as Gore's first "what I'll do as president" piece. He's not going to enter the race until he's pulled in by his ears. He's not going to enter while there's still a chance he could lose the nom to another Dem. He's 3rd in most polls. Maybe he'd jump to 1st if he declared, maybe the list is still too long. There's no reason for him to chuck his hat in now. He just needs to stay in the public discourse and he's doing a GREAT job of that.

Another interesting line from his OpEd piece: "Are we so scared of this challenge that we cannot lead?" Touche, Al. I have a feeling you're not so scared that you can't lead your country, as well.

His last graph bodes well for his future presidential speeches:

But there’s something even more precious to be gained if we do the right thing. The climate crisis offers us the chance to experience what few generations in history have had the privilege of experiencing: a generational mission; a compelling moral purpose; a shared cause; and the thrill of being forced by circumstances to put aside the pettiness and conflict of politics and to embrace a genuine moral and spiritual challenge.

This guy doesn't even NEED a speech-writing team. He will when he's president, but he clearly has the inspirational grasp of our language (how many best-sellers has he written over the years? 3?).