Al Gore's video

I have to admit it...I had not watched Al Gore's video, An Inconvenient Truth, until this week. At the time it was released, I was still disgusted with the political turmoil that had occurred six years prior (the Florida vote debacle and the way the candidates had handled themselves). There is no question that global warming is a fact. There is also no arguing that humans have contributed (and will continue) to that process. The earth has cyclical heating/cooling and it is accelerating. Whether we like it or not, we have to try to mitigate the problem because doing nothing cannot be an option.

I wish that Gore had been able to let go of the past political disappointments and leave them out of the film. References to the Florida incident detracted from his message. The constant references to himself were also distracting. If he had been able to leave that part behind and focus solely on climate change and its ramifications, he would have persuaded a larger audience. Despite those idiosyncrasies, he raised awareness of global warming and deserved the Nobel Prize he received.

Education will play a critical role in all of the strategies proposed by the City of Albuquerque Climate Action Plan. In order for any of these goals to be realized, it will be critical to educate the children of New Mexico. If you look at the state profile at http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/states/profile.asp, you will see that nearly 61% of children in the schools of New Mexico qualify for free/reduced lunches. And while the testing scores are improving, they are still below the national average in nearly every category. I wish the policy makers in New Mexico were as interested in trying to address climate and education issues as they are in attracting the movie industry to this state. This would be an investment for the future social and economic health of New Mexico But until then, I will continue to recycle, to combine my necessary car trips, to use my bicycle whenever I am able and to shop locally whenever I can. And I will talk about it to the children in my sphere of influence.