REAL AMERICA

DO AS I SAY, NOT AS I DO

Exclusive: Patrice Lewis challenges 'earth is goddess' progressives over 'climate change'

Last week I touched on a quasi-satirical phenomenon called the Dunning-Kruger effect, and quoted Wikipedia’s definition: “A cognitive bias wherein people of low ability suffer from illusory superiority, mistakenly assessing their cognitive ability as greater than it is. The cognitive bias of illusory superiority derives from the metacognitive inability of low-ability persons to recognize their own ineptitude.”

While this definition is used by everyone (left and right) to mock anyone they dislike, one particular example continuously draws attention by his daily actions:

Al Gore, the so-called “expert” on climate change, the Wonder Boy who travels all over the world (often by private jet) to tell people to shrink their carbon footprint, the guy who refused to take a “Personal Energy Ethics Pledge” to consume no more energy than the average American household, the man who – for a while – was poised to become the world’s “first carbon billionaire.”

Mr. Gore is famous for his blatant “Do as I say, not as I do” lifestyle. Indeed, documenting Gore’s carbon footprint hypocrisy has become something of a hobby for many. Consider these “inconvenient” headlines:

• Al Gore uses 7 times more energy to heat mansion pool than average American household uses in a year
• Al Gore’s home devours 34 times more electricity than average U.S. household
• How Al Gore fooled the world into paying for his giant carbon footprint
• Al Gore bails from green-energy investment
• Al Gore: Global warming fight like slavery, civil rights
• Gore defends mansion’s power consumption

In 2016 Gore used 230,889 kilowatt hours (kWh) at his Nashville residence, 21 times more times that of the average family (which uses 10,812 kWh) and 25 times more than the Lewis residence (last year we used 9,082 kWh – see our 2016/17 power use history below). 

In just September 2016, according to the Daily Caller, “Gore devoured 30,993 kWh of electricity. That’s enough to power 34 average American homes for a month. 

Over the last 12 months, Gore used more electricity just heating his outdoor swimming pool than six typical homes use in a year.” By contrast, in September of last year the Lewis household used 467 kWh, which meant Gore used 66 times more power than we did that month. (And we use this electricity to power a home, a farm, a woodcraft business and a writing career.)

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Gore has the audacity to claim his lifestyle is actually “carbon neutral” since he buys carbon offsets from Green Power Switch. His claim that his home “uses 100 percent renewable energy” is, according to the Daily Caller, an outright lie. Oh, and by the way, these figures are just for his Nashville home. They don’t include his penthouse in San Francisco or his farmhouse in Carthage, Tennessee.

“The only way to solve this crisis is for individuals to make changes in their own lives,” Gore sanctimoniously said in 2007 as he outfitted his mansion with $30,000 in solar panels which – oh shucky-darn – ended up supplying only 5.7 percent of the power he consumes. A year later he said, “In addition to changing the light bulbs, it is far more important to change the laws and to change the treaty obligations that nations have.”

So it’s fine to talk the talk, but not walk the walk if you’re a progressive politician. You don’t have to worry about your personal energy usage or your consumer habits; all you have to do is throw enough money at “green” organizations and you’re good. 

The prophet of environmentalism has no qualms about exploiting his followers for fame and money while refusing to conform to green standards he would like to impose on the entire rest of the planet. “While warning of the dire consequences if the rest of us don’t urgently dial back our energy consumption, Gore has not made those same sacrifices himself,” observes the Daily Signal. Right, Al. Great logic and great example.

OK, Gore is a flaming hypocrite. We get that. But what do his followers say about him? How can any environmentalist worth his salt support Gore’s massive insincerity? 

It’s very simple: “Al Gore’s carbon footprint doesn’t matter.” That is, literally, what they say. It’s not the actions, it’s the message.

“Gore is hardly the only climate advocate whose personal energy use has been attacked by the right,” snarked Emily Atkin in the New Republic. “It’s a familiar, longstanding tactic among conservatives who don’t accept the truth about climate change. … 

The claim that Gore and his ilk are hypocrites is a classic conservative attack strategy of redirection (because it ignores the core issue of climate change) and of poisoning the well (because it attempts to discredit the message by discrediting the messenger). This is much easier, and perhaps more rhetorically effective, than debunking climate science itself.”

Ms. Atkin goes on to state, “But the hypocrisy charge simply doesn’t hold up to scrutiny. An anti-abortion advocate who believes abortion is immoral and should be illegal, but gets one herself, is a hypocrite. But climate change advocates who don’t live a carbon-neutral lifestyle aren’t hypocrites because, for the most part, they’re not asking you to live a carbon-neutral lifestyle. 

They’re asking governments, utilities, energy companies, and large corporations to increase their use of renewable energy so that you can continue to live your life as you please, without contributing to global warming.”

Typical progressive. She can’t understand governments force people to comply with their agenda at the point of a gun.

But we all know the deep-down reason Gore and his followers continue pushing their agenda: to destroy evil capitalism, a goal confirmed by the U.N.

Let’s never forget one thing: to many progressives, the earth is a goddess. To challenge climate change or any other pseudo-scientific buzzword – in other words, to challenge the leftist orthodoxy – is akin to blasphemy.

Ironically, I’ve always taken an interest in green living. On our little farm, we live a low-impact, almost zero-waste, locovore, small-carbon-footprint lifestyle. 

Yet progressives wouldn’t call us “green” because we don’t support the draconian agenda they would impose by force on everyone (but themselves). These are the people who would far rather be “experts” in climate change and legislate our lives, but exempt themselves because, after all, they’re “experts.” It’s the Dunning-Kruger effect in living (green) color.

So here’s my challenge to Al Gore as well as to all the environmental activists out there: Shrink your carbon footprint. Make it smaller than ours. Go on, I dare you. 

Put your money where your mouth is. And if your footprint IS smaller than ours, I congratulate you. You’re no hypocrite … which is more than I can say for some people.

Learn how to achieve a simple lifestyle without “going green” or joining a monastery. Read Patrice Lewis’ helpful book, “The Simplicity Primer: 365 Ideas for Making Life more Livable”

http://www.wnd.com/2017/10/do-as-i-say-not-as-i-do/