As 2007 winds down as the hottest year on record, it's time to rekindle why the conclusion that global warming is occurring and human activity clearly is playing a part in that well-documented phenomenon versus the unexpected (?) maelstrom of discontent that has been ignited ever since Democrat (gasp!) Al Gore was awarded both an Oscar and a Nobel Peace Prize for his documentary, An Inconvenient Truth. Dispassionate observers have concluded that Gore's breakdown of recent changes in weather patterns or, more cautiously, "climate change" (which somehow makes weather disasters associated with Global Warming more acceptable because they are not "our" (humans) fault) is a slam dunk, a no brainer, yesterday's news. But the scientific investigation into what we are seeing before our various eyes courtesy of television and widespread video documentation of current weather events, has been turned on its head as, fairly portrayed, reactionaries have been successfully turning scientific "fact" into a debate paralleling that of evolution "versus" intelligent design.
Why is this happening? Who stands "win" or somehow believe the status quo is a far better path to take than investing in new technologies that can begin to remove carbon from the air? Why did this "mom and apple pie" story of one year ago suddenly become a, well, a controversy?
Without a dissertation on what British Petroleum is or isn't doing in this arena, their logo is instructive. Rather than showing an oil rig, for example, instead the BP logo invokes images of a sun flower. This is a bit ironic considering that their business involves, in large part, polluting the air by providing the carbon-based fossil fuels that run our millions of motor vehicles, and more. Is this a reincarnation of George Orwell's 1984? Of course, inorganic farming might benefit from pesticides and herbicides derived by petroleum products refined by BP, but is growing sunflowers really that large a portion of BP's business?
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