Has the Bush administration denied reality on so many subjects — including global warming — that the American public is hungry for some old-fashioned facts? Here’s Washington Post columnist Sebastian Mallaby’s take on how the GOP may unintentionally be helping Al Gore and his global-warming documentary, “An Inconvenient Truth.”:
“Ordinarily this film would never have been made, let alone scheduled for release in hundreds of theaters. But President Bush and the congressional Republicans have created a Ross Perot moment: a hunger for a leader with diagrams and charts, for a nerd who lays out basic facts ignored by blinkered government. By their contempt for expert opinion on everything from Iraqi reconstruction to the cost of their tax cuts, Republicans have turned Diagram Gore into a hero.”
Meanwhile, Bush said Monday that he doubted that he would see Gore’s film.
Posted by Melissa Cooley
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36 Comments
I agree Heartlander. So many years of being in the public eye, being groomed for the presidency nomination – he had to make sure he didn’t do anything wrong and always said the right thing. Having a few years to chill out and relax he’s able to make his point naturally and without seeming like a stiff board.
Mixing trust with Bush would be like oil and water.
You gotta show us the proof! We don’t care about words – they can be twisted and retracted. Show us studies w/ graphs and hard facts. We can beleive that.The words we take w/ a grain (or many grains) of salt and in one ear out the other.
I (heart) nerds!
Ben, It oil, water and “Marvin.”
Al Gore is a much more attractive candidate than he was in 2000. He’s showing a great sense of humor. He’s really loosened up.
You mean Americans might finally be (GASP) actually caring about things they have to think about! One CAN hope!
I wonder if this movie will screen in Wichita? I intend to see it and take my son.
What you didn’t tell us Melissa, but is included in the “bush said” link is the fact that Gore has volunteered to bring the film to the White house any time at the convenience of p(resident) bush. bush is already a chickenhawk. If bush does take Gore up on this, I call chickensh..!
What say you “Mr. p(resident)? Can Al Gore come over to the house the American people voted for him to live in and show you a movie?
I meant doesn’t take him up on this. And he won’t
If Bush could read anything besides his “Goat Book” you’d have started something.
now JR. I’m sure that Bush is a very, very busy man right now. I’m sure he’ll try to catch it when it comes on HBO or Cinemax. (heck, he might even tivo it!)uh, yeah.
Ed– “Read?”- I thought he got left behind.
No gster – he got a ‘courtesy promotion’
Ben– How many of those has he had?
LOTS!
Part of an early review I found for the movie.
In this eye-opening and poignant portrait of Gore and his “traveling global warming show,” Gore also proves himself to be one of the most misunderstood characters in modern American public life. Here he is seen as never before in the media – funny, engaging, open and downright on fire about getting the surprisingly stirring truth about what he calls our “planetary emergency” out to ordinary citizens before it’s too late.
I actually e-mailed the Warren to find out if they would be screening An Inconvenient Truth, I got an e-mail reply saying it will be at the Premier Palace location starting June 30th..
Nicki,
Way cool! Thanks for the heads-up.
As for Bush’s response, proof positive that a petulant boy inhabits the White House. But not forever.
Al in ‘08!
Well….I guess Gore would be a better candidate than Kerry. He might be a little more electable than Hillary. Still, it would be nice if Democrats could find someone interesting to run for president.
I look forward to seeing the film.
I guess we should feel lucky to see the movie at all given Warrens control of movies in town.
They did this with Fahrenheit 911 too. Stuck it in the little theatre. But at least it got released around the same time as the rest of the country. Looks like we will be among the last to see “An Inconvenient Truth”
Ok, I have never been to the Premiere Palace because frankly I’m worried that it’s filled with the scourge of cheap moviehouses: teens with cell phones.
The problem is that it seems to be one of the main places in Wichita that shows anything remotely artsy-fartsy, which I like (it’s a weakness).
Anybody care to submit a review of the theater itself? Is the Premiere a good venue for film in Wichita?
It’s an ok theater I guess. It is not heavily attended. Warren was trying to get rid of it.
It’s comfortable and the sound is good. It is not significantly cheaper than the other Warren theaters.
Definitely not “center ring” though.
An Eagle editorial during the mayoral campaign called Mr. Warren “a brilliant businessman” [sic].At the time, I didn’t agree, because I thought, if you are truly brilliant businessman, you create a net-dollar PROFIT to a community, not a net-dollar loss. But, given the constraints of Wichita, maybe Mr. Warren IS brilliant.
In any case, he does show movies that would otherwise not be aired. I put-down a friend who said the adults-only balcony at Warren-East was great. Then I tried it. For movie-going it IS really nice. I went to a movie at an AMC theater, and realized, “Bill Warren provides much more comfortable seating.”I want to see him give us IMAX.
Heartlander – a number of businesses are “net-dollar losses” by your reckonong – most retail outlets for example. They bring goods in and sell them here. However, they indirectly support our economy by providing revenues in other communities that then is used to buy OUR products.
Domestic trade, like international trade, can benefit both parties.
The fundamental distinction between failing economies and thriving economies is net-dollar outflow, versus net-dollar inflow. The more net-dollar inflows you have, the better your future economy is going to be. The economy for your children.
PS. In high school, my classmates gave me the nickname “Mr. Spock”. Maybe it was true.
Very true heartlander; however trade can increase both sides’ accounts.
Heartlander,It was the ears, bro.
No doubt.
;-)
I don’t mean to be subersive and change subjects, but the May 19 Open Thread is the #1 blog this week. People are still posting. WE, give the people a semi-weekly Open Thread!
I don’t mean to be subersive and change subjects, but the May 19 Open Thread is the #1 blog this week. People are still posting. WE, give the people a semi-weekly Open Thread!
Hear hear, heartlander. Thanks for beating the drum.
Al, who?
Dear Ben,Businesses that sell goods and services within the community distribute and recirculate dollars, exerting a dollar-multiplier effect.
The hitch is that the community first has to bring these dollars in, through trade with the outside world. To wit, if you don’t sell something to the outside world, you have no dollars to work with.
“Outside world” may mean surrounding and some farther-away Kansas counties, but I’m really thinking more of other states. For example, it strongly appears that aviation is the most important dollar-inflow-channel we have. It employs thousands of people, who are paid high wages and salaries.
In this transaction, Wichita is not actually the seller of aircraft, i.e. it does not accrue community profits as it once did, but rather it sells labor to the aerospace corporations that are headquartered in Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Ontario.
Oklahoma City is trying to achieve a balance between offering workers to outside-owned corporations, and bringing in their payroll dollars, while also trying to grow home-based businesses that will bring profits to OKC. For example, they have a small, but growing biotech cluster, based on the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation, which is a private research institute that gets millions of federal research dollars. The new Stowers Institute in KC is trying to do the same thing.
If Oklahomans don’t get lazy by the resurgent oil economy, but if they use growing petro revenues to invest in their economic diversification agenda, that state may become quite prosperous for a LONG time.
In 1986 they built a residential math and science school for high school juniors and seniors, modeled after Texas’s 1979 Texas Academy of Mathematics and Science. Missouri built one too. One may be built here, but even if it opens in 2007 or 2008, look at the huge time lag here.
Oklahoma City and Tulsa have 20+ AP-course programs in magnet high schools schools, just like Shawnee Mission/Overland Park. If you look at Census data, OKC and Tulsa’s household income profiles and college-degree-holder states aren’t even close to JoCo’s, they’revery close to Wichita’s.
Of course OKC and Tulsa are more populous than Wichita, but I think that the real difference is leadership there that has vision, and a goal to achieve long-term, oil-independent prosperity.
I don’t think Wichita’s leaders, nor Kansas’s in general, have vision, or the pluckiness of our southern neighbor’s to conduct thoughtful, and I would judge, smart, experiments.
Oklahoma recruited David Boren, former governor and U.S. senator to lead OU. Boren is a Yale graduate (on Yale’s Board of Directors) and a former Rhodes Scholar.
Oklahoma has what it calls a “Brain Gain” campaign. That’s what is called for in this era. There’s a cost: it’s going to bring to Oklahoma smart and energetic outsiders, and change the political and business landscape. But, you know, Wichita was once run by newcomers. They wanted to build a modern city, even though the location was in the hinterland. “Fresh blood” is invaluable. Outsiders bring useful experiences and perspectives–if a community can “handle” this. Dallas, Denver, and Albuquerque are welcoming smart and energetic outsiders. JoCo obviously is doing this as well.
There is no model for successful isolationism. If there were, it would be great, but there just isn’t. Cities must either proactively connect with the outside world, or they decay. With the resurgence in aircraft sales, Wichita’s going to seem healthy for the next several years. But if it doesn’t come up with an economy-diversification plan during these good years, the longterm outlook here does not look good.
I agree Heartlander. We need to be selling goods and services outside of Kansas as well as buying from outside. I also agree with you that Wichita lags in this area. It’s too bad that my proposal way back in 1994 to integrate the 4 area CC’s, VoTech, and WSU was ignored as I still believe that such training would be very useful in diversifying our economy.
We should be using our ‘metal-bending’ and composites technology to build things other than aircraft. We should be providing more computer help desk services nationwide. There are many things we should be doing. Unfortunately our ‘leaders’ (sic) have tunnel-vision and remain still too wedded to a narrow view of ‘appropriate’ industries upon which to focus. This will not lead to the diversification we need.
I saw an interesting CNBC interview with Bill Gates. The interviewer, Don Deutsch said, “I was talking with Tom Brokaw, and he said ‘Bill Gates could sell cookies and corner the market. He’s a genius businessman.” Gates responded, to loosely paraphrase, “I’m not interested in business for business’s sake. Selling cookies may interest other people, and if that’s what they want to do, great. I’m interested in science. Business is easy. Science is HARD.”
What Brokaw didn’t understand is that Gates loves to do really hard things that others cannot do.