Gorezilla And Pollution Of The Antarctic

I did not know until I read the Daily Mail slam dunk on Al "Gorezilla" Gore that one of the concerts planned was to be held in the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) base in Rothera on that continent. Let's see, this is a continent that is the least visited by man, one of the most pristine environments on the planet and almost mythical in it's vast expanse of untouched wilderness - yeah, it's pretty much ice, snow and wind. But I remember the excitement when I read about the scientific expeditions there. (I also am purportedly related to Roald Amundsen, at least according to my grandmother who had the same last name, but the name Amundsen in Norway is as common as "Smith" in the US. So who knows.)

But to participate in the concert - even though it is only a couple of songs by the station's "in-house" band - is going to take a number of kilowatts of electricity. Those kilowatts are likely produced by burning a special grade of jet fuel known as AN8. (That's what the US and New Zealand use at any rate. One rather suspects the Brits use it, too.) AN8 is not the cleanest-burning of fuels because of the additives necessary to keep it viable as a fuel in Antarctic conditions. In fact, scientists have to file justifications for using it in the pristine conditions there.

So, if you are a believer in the "Butterfly Effect", what is this little move doing to the planet? If you're a bit more jaundiced, what does this really say about Gorezilla's commitment to the planet? (Oh, hell, Gorezilla is figuring out how to sell more indulgences carbon offsets to the bases down there, isn't he?)

(Incidentally, you can hear the band Nunatak - the one from the BAS - here.

Today’s Bwahahaha Moment

In an effort to save the planet, many people have begun using a composting technique for processing kitchen wastes. The leftovers are put into bins full of red worms. The worms digest the organic matter in an extremely efficient way, leaving behind valuable compost. Sounds peachy, right? Well, it seems that the worms also produce something else besides the fertilizer.

Enormous quantities of greenhouse gas - and not CO2. Oh, no. They produce nitrous oxide and methane, which are 296 and 23 times more efficient greenhouse gases than lowly carbon dioxide. How bad is it? Bad enough that landfills are actually better at taking care of wastes than the "green" solution.

Worms may not be as environmentally friendly as the growing number of gardeners who use them to help compost their kitchen scraps and grass clippings believe, say scientists.

In fact, the greenhouse gases emitted by a large commercial worm composting plant may be comparable to the global warming potential of a landfill site of the same scale, according to the Open University.

This is because worms used in composting emit nitrous oxide - a greenhouse gas 296 times more powerful, molecule for molecule, than carbon dioxide.

Landfill sites produce methane which is 23 times more powerful a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide.

Jim Frederickson, senior research fellow at the Open University's faculty of technology, said: "We know from research in Germany that a third of the nitrous oxide emissions coming from the soil are associated with worms.

"What we found from looking at large worm composting systems is that their emissions could be comparable in global warming potential to the methane from landfill sites."

The Government has said it wants to increase the amount of waste that is composted to 40 per cent by 2010 and 45 per cent by 2015 - which is likely to involve more commercial scale worm composting plants……

……Mr Frederickson told Materials Recycling Week said: "Everybody loves worms because they think they can do no harm but they contribute to global warming.

"The amount of worm composting is very, very small and the amount of landfill is huge. But landfill sites are quite well run these days and it is possible to extract about half the gas they generate and use it for electricity generation.

"So the amount of nitrous oxide emitted by large scale worm composting is something we should be looking at before we go further down that route."

Just as the rush to produce biofuels is eradicating orangutans (and people) and causing skyrocketing food prices, the "green" solution of red worm composting turns out to be not at all beneficial overall. The unintended consequences of this rush to "do something" is in fact, causing more harm than good. Bjorn Lomborg - who does believe that global warming is happening - also believes most of the quick-fix solutions touted by the likes of Al "Gorezilla" Gore and his sycophants are bogus. This little item tends to prove that point rather well. Then again, Gore is probably figuring out how to sell more carbon offsets to people using red worms at this very moment.

The Daily Mail Fires A Broadside

Target: Al Gore and his concert extravaganza. Using detailed numbers generated by climate scientists, they positively tear Gorezilla's head off with this blistering article denouncing the rank hypocrisy of the whole affair.

No doubt to rapturous applause, Madonna will call for mass global change to reduce carbon emissions and to tackle 'climate crisis'.

Watching the veteran star lap up the adoration, her entourage could, however, be forgiven for exchanging slightly jaded glances - having witnessed her jet in for the concert from New York. For her 2006 World Tour, she flew by private jet, transporting a team of up to 100 technicians and dancers around the globe. Waiting in the garage at home, she has a Mercedes Maybach, two Range Rovers, an Audi A8 and a Mini Cooper S.

Indeed, Madonna's carbon footprint is dwarfed only by her ego - she has vowed that she will 'speak to the planet' at Wembley. In fact, an apology might be in order - for the superstar's energy consumption is only the tip of the iceberg in this epic vanity-fest.

The Live Earth event is, in the words of one commentator: 'a massive, hypocritical fraud'.

For while the organisers' commitment to save the planet is genuine, the very process of putting on such a vast event, with more than 150 performers jetting around the world to appear in concerts from Tokyo to Hamburg, is surely an exercise in hypocrisy on a grand scale.

Matt Bellamy, front man of the rock band Muse, has dubbed it 'private jets for climate change'.

A Daily Mail investigation has revealed that far from saving the planet, the extravaganza will generate a huge fuel bill, acres of garbage, thousands of tonnes of carbon emissions, and a mileage total equal to the movement of an army.

The most conservative assessment of the flights being taken by its superstars is that they are flying an extraordinary 222,623.63 miles between them to get to the various concerts - nearly nine times the circumference of the world. The true environmental cost, as they transport their technicians, dancers and support staff, is likely to be far higher.

The total carbon footprint of the event, taking into account the artists' and spectators' travel to the concert, and the energy consumption on the day, is likely to be at least 31,500 tonnes of carbon emissions, according to John Buckley of Carbonfootprint.com, who specialises in such calculations.

Throw in the television audience and it comes to a staggering 74,500 tonnes. In comparison, the average Briton produces ten tonnes in a year.

The concert will also generate some 1,025 tonnes of waste at the concert stadiums - much of which will go directly into landfill sites.

Moreover, the pop stars headlining the concerts are the absolute antithesis of the message they promote - with Madonna leading the pack of the worst individual rock star polluters in the world.

Oh, there is a LOT more. This is a long, detailed, brutal denunciation of all things Gore. The Mail is not buying the "carbon offset" fraud, either. They lay that one out - hard.

So just how does Gore claim that Live Earth will be carbon neutral? He does so by convenient use of 'carbon offsetting' - a trendy new method of absolving yourself of guilt.

Carbon offsetting involves 'neutralising' the emissions you are responsible for by buying 'credits'. A spokesperson for Live Earth says: 'This might involve buying environmentally sound lightbulbs for a Third World school, planting trees, or installing solar panels in a developing country.'

A huge industry has sprung up to provide corporations with carbon credits. However, critics say that the practice is simply a way for consumerist industries and nations to export their responsibility to developing countries. Others say it simply does not work.

Carbon-offsetting is, it turns out, how celebrities square green issues with their extravagant lifestyles and use of private jets.

Jon Bon Jovi has said: 'We wrote a cheque, we took care of our footprint and raised awareness, blah blah blah.'

This one is well worth the read. Very detailed and very, very damning.

Annual Rite Wrong

Well, it's that time of year again. The annual drunken party that usually ends in a number of injuries and the occasional death known as the San Fermin bull-running festival in Pamplona, Spain. Also known as the "running of the bulls" or, as we prefer, the running of the idiots.

"Men and women of Pamplona, Viva San Fermin!" Pamplona mayor Yolanda Barcina shouted from the city hall balcony. Below, crowds packed the town-hall square, most dressed in white shirts and trousers and donning red handkerchiefs, the traditional garb of the festival.

The "chupinazo" firecracker at midday officially starts the nine-day fiesta which was popularized internationally by Ernest Hemingway's 1926 novel "The Sun Also Rises" and centers round the daily running of the bulls.

The first bull run takes place Saturday and the spectacle, repeated each day until July 14, is broadcast live on Spanish television.

Many of the revelers had spent the night out drinking and partying prior to the 'chupinazo.'

Thuy Trinh, 28, a nondrinker from London, might have been the only sober person among the throngs.

"It's a bit crazy, but I love seeing people enjoying themselves," she said.

"Los San Fermines," held since 1591, attracts tens of thousands of people from across Europe and as far away as Australia and the United States.

Sara Newey, 23, and Rene Armstrong, 25, from Perth, Australia, recounted everything they had to drink in the past twelve hours: a bottle of Jack Daniels, several bottles of sangria, six beers each. (Ed. Note: Liver transplant alert.)

I suppose one could argue that this gives the bulls, who are scheduled to die in bullfights, a chance to even the score. But it really is a terrible custom with a far too high human toll. Last year an American was paralyzed during the festivities. (He has actually made a lot more of a recovery than doctors thought he would according to his family.) 13 people have died since 1924 in Pamplona. They didn't keep records before then, though.

Leftovers

A women attending a dinner party in Belgium decided to be nice and help out the host. So she went to put away the leftovers in the freezer. Whereupon, she found that the freezer was already full of leftovers. It seems the man had stored his wife and his stepson in there.

The woman went to the police after discovering the 46-year-old woman and her 11-year-old son and officers arrested the man in the town of Verviers, near Liege in east Belgium, on Wednesday.

"She went to the freezer and that is what she saw. She then alerted the police," said Georges Lahaye of the local public prosecutors' office. Prosecutors want the suspect, aged 43, to be remanded in custody to allow more time for an investigation into the deaths.

Lahaye said the suspect had not made a confession. He added that the couple argued a lot.

We have no desire whatsoever to know what was on the menu at the party.

Murdoch Buys Dow Jones: Report

The Business is reporting that a deal has been reached selling Dow Jones (and therefore the Wall Street Journal) to Rupert Murdoch.

Rupert Murdoch has succeeded with his $5 billion bid for Dow Jones, owners of the Wall Street Journal, according to sources acting for the Dow Jones board. Negotiations have been completed and the board is confident the terms of the deal will be accepted by the Bancroft family, which controls a majority of voting shares in Dow Jones, over the next few days. A formal announcement is expected next week.

Murdoch’s News Corporation will take over America’s most prestigious financial publisher at the price he originally offered on April 17, when he proposed $60 a share when the stock was trading at $36, a 67% premium.

After lengthy talks involving many lawyers, the deal includes a legally-enforceable agreement with Murdoch which will supposedly guarantee the integrity and independence of the Wall Street Journal’s journalism.

No hint of this on the other wires yet, so this is subject to correction.

UPDATE: And Dow Jones is reporting that the story is false.

NEW YORK -(Dow Jones)- Dow Jones & Co. (DJ) denied a press report Friday that said Rupert Murdoch has agreed with the Dow Jones board to terms of a $5 billion bid for the company.

A spokeswoman for Dow Jones said the report from The Business was "false." She said there has been "no change" in ongoing negotiations on the takeover offer from News Corp. (NWS). "The only agreement is on editorial independence," said the spokeswoman, Andrea Grinbaum.

Kim Sick?

The Telegraph has picked up some speculation that is raging in the South Korean media about Kim Jong Il. Judging from a picture of Kim greeting a representative from China, the media is wondering if Kim really is ill.

Kim was photographed meeting the Chinese foreign minister in the North Korean capital Pyongyang earlier in the week.

Newspapers in the South commented on his physical condition. "Emaciated Kim Jong-il," said the Dong-a Ilbo. "The 66-year-old North Korean leader looked thinner, with serious hair loss and dry skin," said Chosun Ilbo, the nation's leading conservative daily.

Both papers suggested Kim's appearance confirmed reports that he had been seriously unwell. He is known to be diabetic and it is thought he may have had heart by-pass surgery this year.

It's a bit hard to judge from a single picture, of course, but the media loves speculating like this, don't they? Maybe Kim is really ill, but he also may have just been having a worse-than-usual bad hair day, so to speak. But looking at the picture leads us to ask one question: was Kim standing on a box or the Chinese foreign minister in a hole? Inquiring minds and all that.

Disunity

Simon Tisdall, writing in the Comment is Free section of the Guardian, spends rather a lot of his column today pointing out that the Republicans are having a number of difficulties right now - all of which is quite true. But he also spends a little bit of time toward the end of the piece pointing out that the Democrats are actually not in any better shape, really. They have some serious problems as well.

But the Democratic field does not lack similar difficulties to those the Republicans face. Mr Obama remains inescapably what he is - a young, inexperienced, and occasionally faltering prospect whose time has probably not yet come. Ms Clinton remains a nationally divisive figure with the highest unfavourable ratings of any candidate, averaging around 50%. If that stays unchanged, she could easily win the Democratic nomination - only to prove unelectable in the general election.

In another indication of the wide-open nature of the race for both party nominations, the Democrat candidate who is currently advancing fastest is, as yet, no candidate at all.

Support for Al Gore is up to 34% in the Pew survey, only 10 points behind Ms Clinton, even though the former vice-president continues to say he has no plans to stand. Other polls indicate a similar Gore surge.

The focus until now has been on an all-New York showdown, between Ms Clinton and Mr Giuliani. But perhaps more attention should be paid to Nashville. If Mr Thompson and Mr Gore have anything at all in common, it is Tennessee — the southern state both call home - and the advantages of the dark horse.

The ridiculously long campaign is eating up a lot of money in the preliminary stages already. I suspect that some candidates on both sides of the aisle will begin packing it in sometime in the early fall. The thing that Tisdall mentions that should worry both parties at this point is the poll numbers for independents. (This ties in directly with my previous post about the report card Kimberley Strassel wrote about the Democratic-led Congress.)

Worryingly for both main parties, 77% said they would "seriously consider" supporting an independent candidate like the New York mayor, Michael Bloomberg, should he decide to run.

That really should be a wake up call to both parties. But especially to the Democrats right now. That block of independents is what brought them to power in the 2006 elections. If they lose them, they are in real trouble.

Report Card

Kimberley Strassel issues a report card on the Democratic party's leadership in Congress in the past six months. It is not even remotely a pretty picture. Frankly, they haven't done much of anything.

Six months on, the country isn't much impressed. Congress's approval rating is drifting into the netherworld, having sunk to an average of 25%. One recent Gallup poll reported only 14% of Americans profess confidence in that institution, now run by Democrats. The numbers make even President Bush look good, an extraordinary achievement.

A half-year isn't usually a fair measure of a party's abilities, but then again, Dems have set themselves a high bar. Their goal, by the end of next year, is to have increased their majorities in both the House and Senate, as well as captured the White House. That's an uphill climb in any political climate, harder still given today's skeptical and unsettled electorate. Ms. Pelosi and Mr. Reid can't afford dawdling or division, not if they want to make a mark with voters.

Both leaders seemed to understand–at least in the beginning–that few things were more important than showing voters the party had a plan, and that it could get that plan passed. This philosophy was behind the "Six for '06," an agenda that was purposely small (minimum wage, college scholarships), so as to garner support from all party wings. Ms. Pelosi's first "100 hours" were then run with military precision, as she systematically passed items with unanimous support from her party, and Republican votes to boot. It was an impressive showing.

Then, with the first 100 hours done and gone, by mid-January the Democratic Party proceeded to fall apart. The crumbling has progressed along predictable lines.

For starters, the leaders have failed to keep the Bush-hating left under wraps. This crowd isn't nearly as interested in passing legislation as it is flooding the Beltway with subpoenas. By one count, the new Democratic Congress has held over 600 oversight hearings since assuming power. Given the Senate has only been in session 100 days (the House, 92 days), that works out to six hearings per day, or one every 1.5 hours. The bashing covers everything from wiretapping to President Bush's global warming science.

Do read it all. It discusses a number of bad moves the Democratic leadership have allowed to happen. It should be a real warning to the Democrats that the poll numbers are as bad as they are for Congress. As I have pointed out before, those poll numbers are a disaster for the presidential candidates - from either party - that happen to be serving in Congress right now.

The Democrats are still running against George Bush - but Bush is not going to be on the ballot in 2008. These antics may make the far left fringe happy, but they aren't accomplishing any good for the party with the general public. There is a point at which the public tires of political screeching and dung-flinging. According to the polls, the Democrats passed that point a while ago. But they'll just carry on. The only trick these ponies know is Bush hatred.