Pledge to see "An Inconvenient Truth" this weekend!

An Inconvenient Truth, the critically acclaimed movie based on Al Gore's book on Global Warming, opens this weekend in Philadelphia. I strongly urge you see the movie on opening weekend because the movie distributor, Paramount Classics, will donate 5% of ticket sales from opening weekend to the Alliance for Climate Protection. You can pledge to see the movie by going Here. Not only do I plan on seeing the movie, but I have Gore's book by the same name, and I plan on reading it just as soon as I get through 31 Days.

So far, the film is getting fantastic reviews. "...Intellectually exhilarating. An Inconvenient Truth is a necessary film," writes A.O. Scott of The New York Times. I'm not saying that should be a reason to see the movie, though. I encourage all of you to see it because this is perhaps the biggest threat to humankind that we have ever known. I'd listen to an argument that atomic weapons holds that distinction, but we can disarm. It's going to take a superhuman effort times a million to reverse or stop the onslaught of global warming consequences. It may be too late, but that certainly isn't an excuse to not try and combat this problem, on a global scale. But, it all starts with you.

Al Gore has been thrust back into the national spotlight with his relentlessness and dedication to this cause. "What changed in the U.S. with Hurricane Katrina was a feeling that we have entered a period of consequences," said Gore recently about climate change. Who can argue that point? Before Katrina, people sounding the global warming alarm were portrayed as fanatics and heretics. As Gore and many scientists now rightly contend, the debate is over. It's now time to begin coming up with solutions, remedies, and strategies to deal with this problem.

I've blogged several times about my strong feelings on global warming, and those feelings are only growing stronger. In April, Time ran a well written and eye opening article on global warming; if you missed it, go to that series Here. Another magazine, U.S. News and World Report, ran a piece on global warming in its June 5, 2006 issue. In it, several mind-numbing statistics really grabbed me by the throat:

In the Pacific Northwest, temperatures have increased by 1.5 degrees since 1900, resulting in a 50% loss of snowpack. This could have a devastating impact on water reserves; in one of the wettest areas of the continental United States. The snowpack in the mountains traditionally serves as a "natural banking system" that allows rainwater to slowly seep into the ground and streams, filling up reservoirs for the summer dry season. Now, more precipitation is falling as rain, which quickly runs off and is lost. Think about that for a second, because it dramatically illustrates just how enormous this problem is - one of the wettest areas of the country, precipitation wise, may go through a drought because of climate change.

Want more proof we are swimming in the deep end with no life jacket? The article continues: "Even if people everywhere unplugged their applicances, left their cars home, and shuttered their factories today, enough fossil fuel emissions are already in the atmosphere to heat up the planet an additional 1 degree Fahrenheit this century, experts say." However, emissions are increasing, not only in the United States (the king of greenhouse gases), but dramatically increasing in China and India. And this upward trend is certain to continue (and some say skyrocket). Some scenarios peg the temperature increase at 2.5 to 8 degrees. Even 2.5 will have sea levels rising three feet, by conservative estimates.

The only fools left who think global warming is a myth work for an oil company, a fossil fuel power plant, the Bush administration, or a lobbying group for one of these groups.

Scared yet? Or just confused? No matter your outlook, you are not alone.

Just like the universal health care misinformation campaign in the early 1990s, and the bullshit campaigns by big tobacco before it, there is a well-financed campaign to misinform and confuse the public.

Step to the mike, Mr. Gore...

"We are dumping tens of millions of tons [of carbon dioxide] into the atmosphere every day, and it has literally changed the relationship between the Earth and the sun. It's a challenge to our moral imagination to understand we are now like a bull in a china shop. [And] there has been a very well-organized and lavishly funded effort by a few irresponsible polluters to intentionally confuse the American people by spending millions of dollars a year on pseudo-science reports - the same way the tobacco industry used that technique to stave off action to save the lives of smokers."

I'll leave it right there, since I can do those comments no justice.

Be proactive, get informed, be afraid. Throughout history, Americans have shone brightest when we were scared and worked our hardest: The Manhattan Project, World War I, World War II, the Space Race, arms control, civil rights, etc. With education, public will and dedication, we can hopefully stem the tide or even begin to reverse the devastating consequences of climate change. There are many Web sites you can visit to find out ways to lessen your environmental impact. The Inconvenient Truth site is a good place to start.