Instead of catching Duran Duran at a local ribfest or bat mitzvah, I decided to flip on Al Gore’s “Live Earth” concert on Saturday for Simon LeBon and the other musical artists with a social conscience, as self-advertised.
About two hours after stapling my eyelids to my forehead to ensure that I didn’t miss single epiphanous second, I got bothered.
It was not the noise pollution from climatologists like Kanye West and the Pussycat Dolls. No, that didn’t bother me.
The fact that there was more reasoned reflection at Jonestown than there was on the NBC set manned by "Today Show" host Ann Curry, that didn’t bother me.
Enduring the sanctimony of Alicia Keys calling out the “hate skeptics” for their intolerance of non-peer reviewed scientific findings and spiteful distinctions between hypotheses and conclusions, that didn’t bother me.
The delicious irony of watching the Dave Matthews Band, the same eco-friendly Dave Matthews Band that dumped 800 pounds of human waste from their tour bus into the Chicago River during their stop through three years ago (well, maybe the irony wasn’t exactly delicious), that also didn’t bother me.
Reminiscing about a 1975 Newsweek cover story entitled “The Cooling World” in which the scientific community was then allegedly predicting the next Ice Age and suggesting that, among the options, we consider purposely melting the Artic ice cap, and now 30 years later we’re to believe that after 3.5 billion years of life (and 1 million years of human life) on this planet, we are collectively on the verge of going up like a Roman candle because of the amount of Aqua Net consumed by Bon Jovi groupies - no, the fickle nature of the global alarmists didn’t bother me either.
What bothered me, what truly bothered me was three words uttered by Al Gore, “Thank you, Leo.” “Leo” as in Leonardo DiCaprio who introduced Gore to the global audience.
I’ll sign Gore’s 7-point pledge. I’ll install CFL light bulbs in my home. I’ll buy a car that runs entirely on switchgrass. I’ll even stop clubbing baby seals. I’ll do anything they want me to do as long as Al Gore stops his “hep cat” routine.
Watching Gore keep it real with his Hollywood friends is kind of like watching your dad shake his groove thing at a wedding.
Global cooling, global warming, sign me up for whatever. Just make him stop.
