PARSHALL: I think I saw this movie. I think it was called Chicken Little. Right? Oh no, no, no, no -- this is a different film. I think it's called An Inconvenient Truth. It was a hit at the Sundance Film Festival, and if you know anything about that film festival, I'm not surprised it was a hit. Now, I can't figure out, is Al Gore trying to be a movie star, the next American idol, or is he still running for the office of president of the United States? One thing's for certain though: Based on this movie, he's not a scientist. How do I know? Because there's more fiction than fact in this film.
And to back up my position, we have Doctor Sterling Burnett with us, who's a senior fellow at the National Center for Policy Analysis. And Sterling, I've seen you take him to task all over the place on this, because you and your organization have been speaking out, saying “Hey, wait a minute. I know they don't want to be bothered by the facts, but we are not on a ticking time-bomb, which is what Al Gore would like us to think.” First of all, back up for a little bit. He wrote Earth in the Balance [Plume, 1993]. Obviously, he's concerned about the environment.
BURNETT: Sure.
PARSHALL: But why is this such a hot-button issue for him? He says it's the biggest problem.
BURNETT: I guess I can't explain his motives or, you know, why Mr. Gore's taking this too hard. One thing I will say is, on many issues, I consider Mr. Gore to be an elitist, I consider him to be a liar, and I consider him to be a hypocrite. But on global warming, I don't consider him to be a hypocrite. I believe him to be a true believer. So, for whatever reason, he does think global warming is the greatest threat ever posed to civilization. And I think that demeans the millions of people killed in various wars, pestilences, plagues, you know, in horrific human and natural catastrophes and disasters throughout history. But that's his belief, and, you know, I don't question his belief. I think he's that honest in that. I just think that he's misguided, and I think that based on the evidence I've seen, it's not Apocalypse Now, it's “Apocalypse Not.”
PARSHALL: Very good. Very sharp, Sterling.
[...]
PARSHALL: All right, so let's go to some of the issues that Al Gore wanted to address in his film. And he did, he talked about creating these holes these in the ozone. The theory is that the cloud layer is removed, you get this hole, you get more solar activity -- that's what's causing the global warming, because the layer of protection has been eroded away, because man is not a producer, he's a polluter. Right?
BURNETT: Well, you know, I don't exactly understand. I haven't had the opportunity to see the film. I don't, to be honest, it's not released in Dallas. I think it's only in L.A. and New York right now.
