Al Gore, Movie Star

Did you see the Academy Awards last night? We've been TV-less for weeks after pulling the plug on satellite, but M and I went to Best Buy yesterday for rabbit ears so that I could watch the stars come out. So many questions: Will Martin finally nab a golden statue after decades of snubs? Will anyone do one-handed push-ups on stage? Will Beyonce go with the tacky diva look or something tasteful? I just love the Oscars.

I think I'd seen only three films in the entire round up: Cars, Little Miss Sunshine, and An Inconvenient Truth. My friends Kim, Katie, and I saw An Inconvenient Truth last summer when Katie spontaneously called us and said, I know it's a longshot, but could you guys go see a movie after work tonight? Our husbands obliged us, and we skipped to the theatre for a crazy girls' night out to see... a Powerpoint by Al Gore about global warming. And you know, it was riveting. If you haven't seen it, you should. Previously, I had a Tarzan-like understanding of global warming ("depleted ozone bad!"), but didn't really understand or think I could understand what was happening, why it was happening, and what the results could be if it wasn't stopped. But this film explained it at a level I understood, and did it without putting me to sleep.

This morning I read several reviews on Amazon about the film and accompanying book, and while most were complimentary, there were a few reviewers claiming that global warming is a crock, that this graph or that graph is wrong, that Mr. Gore's whole presentation is nothing but propoganda.

So let's say it's fake. Even if it is, would it kill us to act like it's not? Would it *really* be so bad to eat bulk-purchased or even homemade yogurt vs. a single-serving bright blue Gogurt with packaging that's destined to clog a landfill? Do people in Indiana, the seemingly flattest state in the nation, really need to drive Hummers, or could something more modest suffice? Is it so awful to grow tomatoes in the summer rather than eat ones that are shipped across the country or internationally?

I feel like we're on the verge of a true mind shift about using the Earth's resources, and that the shift isn't a red-state or blue-state issue, but the natural reaction to the way we've been living for the past several decades. And I do believe that Al Gore, who has been repeating the same cautionary message for 30 years about global warming and what we have to do to stop it, deserves credit for making that message understandable, accessible, and even hip. So regardless of whether you voted for him in 2000, and regardless of whether you agree with all of his politics, I hope you'll join me in congratulating Mr. Gore on last-night's red carpet victory.

And in congratulating Beyonce on what ended up being a really pretty, tasteful ensemble.