Sunday, June 4, 2006 | 7:30 a.m.
I always like to talk about the truth in this column. Today I have to talk about an inconvenient one.
"An Inconvenient Truth" is a documentary film that opened in the big cities last week. It is centered on a slide presentation that Al Gore, the former vice president and presidential candidate, has been giving around the country. It is about global warming.
It is inconvenient, I suppose, because it addresses head-on the scientific certainty that is global warming and shows incontrovertible proof that man is doing far more than his share of contributing to what could and most likely will be an Earth-changing event.
Another inconvenience, of course, revolves around a certain group of movers and shakers in this country who want to ignore the science and writing on the wall in favor of business as usual for the usual suspects. In case I have been a bit obtuse, think the Bush administration and all of its friends in the power and automobile industries.
It is also inconvenient because the people in this country aren't as stupid as the oil companies want to believe, and they are finally waking up to the fact that we are responsible for all that comes next.
In "An Inconvenient Truth" we learn that what is coming next is a change in the way the world's maps will be drawn over the next 30 years or so. Simply put, if the present trend continues, the world's great oceans will rise about 20 feet. Now that doesn't mean much to us in Las Vegas, where we are more than 2,000 feet above sea level. But think about the entire Eastern and Western seaboards of the United States for starters.
The bottom part of Florida disappears. California's beautiful coastline doesn't disappear - that is, if you consider a new coastline a few miles eastward a good substitute. Hawaii? Oops! Work yourself around the globe and figure that all those beautiful Pacific islands, Caribbean islands and the thousands of others that currently exist will be just so much more water. Look what 10 feet did to New Orleans!
At the very least, I would say that kind of outcome is inconvenient.
When I walked out of the theater the other day I made a commitment to do something about this global warming thing. One of the easy steps for me to take is to inform Sun readers about this documentary and urge everyone - especially the young people who will be most directly affected - to go see it.
When you watch the plight of the polar bears that are slowly drowning because their natural environment - ice masses from which they swim to-and-fro- is melting, you realize that those beautiful creatures, no matter how far from our lives they may be, will soon be gone, and it will be our fault.
Everyone my age knows about the snows of Kilimanjaro, frozen ice pack atop the highest mountain in Africa - 19,340 feet - but the next generation will never see a flake of the snow because it is almost all gone. The same is true for the majestic glaciers on almost every continent that have receded to almost nothing and the once-impenetrable ice packs of the Arctic and Antarctic that are melting at an almost unstoppable speed.
Put simply, it is not a pretty picture. But, rather than tell you about this documentary, you must see it for yourself. Grandparents owe it to their grandchildren and children owe it to themselves because they will have to deal with the consequences.
That brings me to another inconvenient truth. The movie is not scheduled to play in Las Vegas until later this month - and only at one theater.
Science has accepted and professes that global warming is here and that it is the enemy. Only when the people get concerned enough about this truth, to make the politicians accept what is inconvenient to their financial backers, will the United States get off the dime and do something about it.
Start by seeing this documentary. Your next action will be obvious.
As long as I am on the subject of truth and inconvenience, what is most disturbing about the Sen. Harry Reid boxing match flap is the dearth of voices heard in defense of the good senator's actions. I understand that the world has changed and some people have lost their minds and good common sense with which they should have been born, but where are the leaders in our society who speak to the issue of knowledge?
We can't really be serious that we would prefer ill-educated, unknowledgeable people making decisions for us. Whether it is a boxing match and the way they are conducted or a trip to Iraq or some other country, it seems to me that the more our leaders know the better decisions they will make.
We should now know the folly of any potential leader of this country boasting about his or her lack of foreign travel and even lacking a desire to do so. Likewise, how do people make decisions about anything in this country without experiencing them firsthand and with some regularity? You couldn't ask Congress to make decisions about New Orleans unless responsible authorities went there to see firsthand what was needed, could you?
Much of what happened to Reid was politically motivated. That's fine because that's the name of today's game. But, we the people make the rules, so if we want to drive more of our leaders into blissful ignorance, keep allowing this silly game of gotcha to continue. Pretty soon, no one will know anything about anything.
We are almost there now. How dumb are we?
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