In case you’ve been living under a rock, you likely didn’t miss the media orgy that accompanied Al Gore’s Live Earth festivities this past weekend. With Live Earth’s seven concerts on all seven continents on 7.07.07 available on dozens of TV stations, both satellite radio networks, terrestrial radio, and streaming live on the web, the world rocked for global warming.
Well, maybe not so much. To be fair, it was more like cleaning out the Augean stables of pop music in the service of some nebulous speculation about weather patterns. Originally,
National Review Online thought that I might want to attend the North American concert and report directly, but I’m trying to keep my carbon footprint to a minimum. Besides, the irony of traveling to New Jersey to support an environmental cause is a tad dispiriting.
So I took advantage of the media torrent and stayed home to witness the cultural event of a generation, that way the only harm done by my personal emissions was to the couch. Nine hours passed. I have been to the mountaintop and seen its glaciers melting. I have willingly listened to more bad music than anyone the CIA isn’t trying to extract information from. I saw the best minds of a generation destroyed by madness, starving, hysterical… This is my story.
9:44: I meant to watch the start of Live Earth coverage on the Bravo network at 9 A.M. sharp, but my personal carbon footprint is at its smallest while I’m sleeping. When I finally turn on the Live Earth broadcast they’re touring Ed Begley’s environmentally friendly house. We’re told it costs only $1.20 to fill up his car — apparently that’s the going rate for ten gallons of self-satisfaction.
10:26: The first iPhone ad, of what had to be hundreds more to come.
10:48: Because Al Gore promised concerts on all seven continents, a bunch of British climate researchers living in Antarctica formed an indie/garage band Nunatak, named after the word for a peak on a glacier. They are fortunately disposing of their performance before too many people are watching, because they’re terrible. Earnest, but awful.
Not that I’m surprised. If you don’t have a subscription to
Modern Drunkard, you’re a) missing out and b) you probably didn’t read their cover story a few years back “
Soused at the South Pole.” Supposedly, being a researcher stationed in Antarctica is “like Jack Nicholson in
The Shining, but with more geopolitical significance and fewer axe murders.” All that’s left to do is drink yourself silly.
Some highlights of how scientists while away the time Antarctica:
A few weeks ago we had a party where someone took a big block of ice and carved little “ski trails” in it down which kamikazes were poured into the eager mouths of those wearing ski goggles and holding ski poles. This was called Liquor Mountain. Women gave prizes to any man who showed up in a dress, so there was much cross-dressing. Myself, I wore a nasty leopard-print number with the nipples cut out, drank one too many kamikazes and barfed up corn dogs in the snow … this one guy came up with the idea to have a bunch of Depends adult diapers sent down so that everyone could stand around drinking beer and pissing themselves. I didn’t make it to that party, but a friend of mine did. He hooked up with this amazing woman after the party. He picked up a chick while wearing a diaper!
Even skipping the part about “Boozy the Clown,” I believe this article does more to explain climate researchers than the results of every global-warming study thus far.
11:43: Karen Duffy: “Coming up… Chad Lowe.” Excuse me? They’re going to interview noted environmentalist, ex-husband, and sibling extraordinaire and star of CBS Schoolbreak Special: No Means No? Are Live Earth producers contractually obligated to shoehorn in every willing person with an Internet Movie Database listing? This is going to be a long day.
12:06: We’re taken on a tour of another environmentally friendly “bungalow” in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. The highlights are the hemp-upholstered sofa (naturally mildew free!), and a demonstration of how to wrap gifts with old potato-chip bags. Which is good, because after you’re done smoking enough weed to upholster the couch you should have hundreds of potato-chip bags left over.
12:16: Duran Duran begins performing in London. Over 3,000 miles away in New York, NRO editor and devoted DD head Kathryn Lopez’s ears perk up and she’s suddenly overwhelmed with the urge to buy a Prius even though she takes the subway everywhere. It soon passes.
12:29: Supermodel Naomi Campbell does a public-service ad about planting trees. Campbell is perhaps best known for being dragged into court multiple times for having physically assaulted two former assistants and three former housekeepers. As a result, Campbell is no stranger to environmental work, having been sentenced by a judge last year to spend five days doing community service at the New York sanitation department for assault. Returning from break Live Earth host Dave Holmes slyly notes that “She will not hesitate to throw that tree at you.”
12:34: Live Earth is encouraging audience participation by scrolling the names of viewers who send text message on a large screen behind the stage. My cell phone sits impishly on the corner of my desk, patiently waiting for Heywood Jablome and Amanda Hugginkiss of Washington, D.C., to register their support in letters eight-feet high and luminous.
12:39: Holly Hunter does a PSA about how buying digital music is more environmentally friendly because there is no oil wasted in making plastic CDs and energy is saved by not physically transporting discs around. While this is true, I doubt the music industry is thrilled by this message. Also, isn’t Al Gore on the board of Apple, which just happens to be the largest digital-music retailer?
12:59: Another PSA, this time horrendously exploited children prattling on about global warming. One very young girl bemoans that her children may never see a blue sky or green grass. It’s a full-frame closeup with tears streaming down her face. Naturally, this causes my wife to laugh uproariously. I knew there was a reason I married her.
1:01: Daryl Hannah, who speaks in a voice so childish I wonder if Jackson Browne isn’t threatening her off camera, is explaining to a befuddled Karen Duffy how she’s been “living off the grid for sometime.” It takes me a second to realize she’s not talking about her acting career.
2:49: Kevin Bacon introduces KT Tunstall in New Jersey saying Live Earth is the “biggest global event ever.” Really? Everyone in the house that remembers World War II wave your hands in the air like you just don’t care…
KT Tunstall declares that on the heels of the industrial revolution we need an “emotional awareness revolution.” I’m very conscious of my feeling this is an inane thought.
3:10: After her performance, KT Tunstall tells Dave Holmes and Karen Duffy that there’s a forest of 6,000 trees in her native Scotland that is offsetting her carbon emissions. Wait? What? What is it with these offsetting schemes? According to this website, “KT Tunstall has supported enough forestry to ‘neutralise’ the CO2 emissions that were given off as a result of producing her new album ‘Eye to the Telescope.’” It doesn’t say if these trees were newly planted or anything that might actually offset her carbon emissions — never mind that planting 6,000 new trees for every energy-intensive occupation isn’t exactly a practical plan for addressing the problem. It does say on that website, however, if you send in ten dollars you get a certificate saying you have a tree in Tunstall’s forest dedicated to you personally. Looks like a pretty bad deal, especially considering I can buy an acre of land on the moon for $30.
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