Gore

#306 Gore

So, the Nobel Peace Prize goes to Al Gore. And the inconvenient truth is he has to share it with a bunch of panelists from the UN. The Nobel Peace Prize goes to a committee? Only fair, since it’s chosen by a committee and they finally decided to honor one of their own.

At least this one won’t send Alfred Nobel blowing up in his grave, like some of them have. Think Yasser Arafat

But this has been a prize winning year for Gore. First the Oscar, now this.

It’s a good thing he won the Nobel THIS year. In the nick of time. There’s talk about downsizing the prize or maybe combining it with another.

Dubai made a bid to buy 20 percent of the Nobel Committee. It was rejected, but members still may be looking for a white knight. Maybe the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. The Oscar Peace Prize. Has a nice ring to it.

Or, to keep things global, the Miss Universe Peace Prize.

But that’s another story for another day. For now, we have to salute President Gore (yeah, he really DID win, but he’s been very subtle about using the office,) because everyone knew he was going to win and therefore, no one expected him to.

So what’s he going to do with the money? Make another movie? “An Inconvenient Sequel.” “Son of Inconvenience?”

Could add another room or two to the Gore Mansion or maybe a Humvee or two to put in that big driveway.

Now, granted, all these prizes are still not as big as the Publishers’ Clearinghouse Sweepstakes. And you have to actually go to Europe to claim the prize. Ed McMahon doesn’t deliver the check to your door. But, still, it’s quite an honor.

And it’s going to get all the conservative talk show people a-twitter. They cheapen the thing just by talking about it. They mock it by nominating themselves. And they write it off as irrelevant.

But it ISN’T irrelevant. It does several things. It reminds us that we’re fighting an undeclared war. It reminds us that the present President of the United States won his first election by five black-robed votes. It reminds us that if this year’s winner hadn’t been barred from the White House door, we wouldn’t be in the Iraq-mire we’re in now.

It would have prevented the wholesale destruction of the social institutions that made America America.

The global warming problems that the Nobel Committee frets about are not the same as the global warming problems that the Save The Polar Bears crowd worries about. To the committee and to the UN winners there’s an economic component. Population shifts due to climate and a squeezing of resources that can result.

A serious concern whether climate change is caused by natural phenomena or by all the SUVs in America and all the lead paint factories in China belching toxins into the air in unison.

They should, however, to keep things balanced, add a Nobel War Prize. After all, what did Al Nobel do for a living? And there are plenty of good candidates. G.W. Putch and his legion of merry pirates, a bunch of theocratic crazies in the middle east, Mel Gibson, OPEC and the banking industry.

Again, back to Gore. If you’re going to be in the Miss Universe contest, please skip the swimsuit part.

I'm Wes Richards, my opinions are my own, but you're welcome to them.

(c) 2007 WJR