You Can Call Him Al, Nobel Laureate

As you’ve probably heard by now, my main man, Al "I’m too sexy for this White House" Gore, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize last week for his Inconvenient Truth-spreading. With the prize, Gore joins a long and venerable list of shiny-happy olive branch-waving peaceniks, including Henry Kissinger (1973), Yasser Arafat (1994), the I.A.E.A. (2005), Bono (2012), and Angelina Jolie (2018).

In all seriousness, though, Homunculus was thrilled down to his Birkenstocks for Mr. God -- er, Gore -- and just as thrilled that the Nobel committee took this blog into consideration when it made its decision. I mean, I knew the committee members read it; I just didn’t realize they would rely on it to the extent that they’d rip it off nearly verbatim in their press release. Check it:

"(Mr. Gore is) probably the single individual who has done most to create greater worldwide understanding of the measures that need to be adopted."

Well put, gentlemen. So well put, in fact, that maybe you weren’t the first ones to put it in the first place? Does this ring a bell?…

"By far the loudest and most charismatic megaphone [for the issue] has been, and will continue to be, Al Gore."

Sound familiar? No? Hmm. Well then, how about this one?…

"Gore has seemingly single-handedly brought climate change to the front: the front pages of the newspapers, the forefront of the public’s conscience, the frontburner of policymakers’ policies that need making and remaking."

Coming back to you now, isn’t it? I thought so -- 'cause you read it here two months ago. That’s okay. I’m sure you have some original ideas of your own…

"If the profile of the issue had not been raised with An Inconvenient Truth, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s [the co-winners of the Peace prize] reports this year would not have had nearly as much impact, experts said." *

Who are these so-called "experts" the Times cited? I’ll give you a hint: "they" are one man, and he is an impossibly brilliant blogger whose first name is Homunculus. Also, his last name is Reilly. And his middle initial is J. (Okay, that was five hints.) Here is what those "experts" said in August:

Since the release of An Inconvenient Truth -- its subsequent box-office success, the media blitz that accompanied that success, and its important (if undeserved) victory at the Oscars -- global warming has finally gotten hot. It’s no longer "old news"; it’s now continually breaking news that, by virtue of its oldness, has suddenly reached its breaking point. … (Gore’s) multi-part thesis -- the climate crisis, as he calls it, is real; the scientific evidence is incontrovertible; we caused it; now we must fix it, and soon -- is nothing revolutionary. But the previously deaf ears on which those truths had fallen have finally seemed to perk up.

Well put, Homunculus. I can’t speak for my fellow media elite, but when I read the Nobel committee’s official announcement, four words immediately leaped to mind: Winter on the Equator.

No matter. In the spirit of, you know, peace and shit, Homunculus will let this one slide. So, bygones. (Also, my lawyer, Uncle Marty, told me I don’t really have a case. Apparently blogs are not copyrighted. What’s up with that? Furthermore, apparently records indicate that no one reads this blog. What’s up with that?)

Besides, it seems that the Nobel committee staffers aren’t the only ones shamelessly misappropriating my prized I.P. Here is Times columnist Bob Herbert, the day after the announcement:

"The first thing media types wanted to know was whether this would prompt Mr. Gore to elbow his way into the presidential campaign. That’s like asking someone who’s recovered from a heart attack if he plans to resume smoking."

And here is House Representative Rahm Emanuel, who was a top aide in the Clinton administration:

"Why would (Gore) run for president when he can be a demigod? He now towers over all of us because he’s pure."

I agree, Bob! I agree, Rahm! In fact, I agreed with you two months ago!…

I don’t want Gore to run [because] I think he can do more for the world as an environmental activist than as a perpetually-compromising politician with his hands tied by political adversaries and omnipotent corporate interests. Besides, how would he make headway with the environment if he were also dealing with terrorism, the economy, health-care reform, the Iraq War, and the myriad other high-priority problems presidents juggle on a daily basis? True, the President of the United States is the Most Powerful Man in the Free World. But consider this: Even if Gore were to win, would he really get that much more accomplished in office than any other similarly-minded Democrat? If Gore sticks to his role as Mr. Green, on the other hand, we could end up with the best of both worlds: a Democrat manning (or "womanning," as the case may be) the country and Gore himself manning the rest of the earth. Unfortunately, today’s bitterly partisan political climate -- to say nothing of our checks and balances, bureaucratic inefficiency, and ubiquitous corruption -- prevents our elected leaders from initiating ground-breaking, potentially unpopular legislation. Politicians fight the battles they can win; artists and advocates fight the battles worth fighting, whether they will be won or not.

You might say that "With [The] Prize, Gore Is Vindicated Without Having to Add President to [His) Resume." If you were the Times last Saturday, in fact, that is exactly what you would have said. You might also have said that Gore was vindicated long before he received the Nobel, that he was doing okay with the Emmy, the Oscar, the reported $175,000 he receives for speaking engagements, the scores of hot young ladies who hurl themselves, bewitched, onto his undeniably sexy rolls of flab -- and, most of all, with the online tribute he received from an anonymous expert two months before a bunch of Scandinavians knew which way was up.

* Were you as pleasantly surprised as I to see that Al’s old buddy Newt “See? Newts are green!” Gingrich even got in on the hosanna-fest? Well, sort of. In minimally-veiled backhanded fashion -- that is to say, in Republican fashion -- Gingrich half-praised Gore: "In a way Vice President Gore, by raising the intensity of the issue, by talking about it, raised the challenge for those of us who think there’s an alternative to say, 'O.K., right emotions, wrong answer.'"