Al Gore's Place - The Old Switcheroo!

Just a little addendum to this Al Gore's energy usage post from yesterday. In the comments someone posted a link to a spreadsheet entitled 100,000 Chernobyl-type Nuclear Reactors Required to Sustain Gore Lifestyle! At first I thought it was Onion-style satire; then looking again I realized the premise wasn't that Al Gore himself was using that much energy; it's how much energy we'd need if we all lived like Al Gore.

It's a little insight into the right-wing mind. You know how Bill Bennett was the arbiter of morality until it was discovered that he has a huge gambling addiction? And you know how those couple of senators were on committees to make things harder for gay folk even though it turns out they themselves were secretly gay? Well dig - obviously, Republicans resent Al Gore because he owns too much property! 

Obviously we're not going to make every man, woman and child in the world as rich as Al Gore, so the only way they'll be satisfied is if we seize his land and turn it over to, I don't know, the workers. After all, the workers control the means of production! And all this "tax breaks for the rich" nonsense - they know it isn't sustainable! They're making sure the middle class bears the burden, because once the revolution comes we'll ALL be middle class!  And don't tell me they're against Soviet-style surveillance techniques! 

I'm just kidding. The kind of people who are in favor of stuff like this would also want some kind of Berlin-style wall along our border.

And Cheney Has Shot More People While Under The Influence of Alcohol Than the Average American

Maybe I'm too easily distracted. But get a load of this!

Energy Guzzled by Al Gore’s Home in Past Year Could Power 232 U.S. Homes for a Month 
Gore’s personal electricity consumption up 10%, despite “energy-efficient” home renovations 

Look, it's our good friends at The Tennessee Center for Policy Research! They're back again. You may recall last year they put out a similar press release that I took issue with. I questioned the numbers they were publishing, but in fact those were accurate numbers. It's the analysis which was slanted and stuffed with lies like a falsehood burrito. 

This biggest lie, of course, is the comparison. An average US home may consume X amount of electricity, but the average US citizen is neither a former vice president, board member of Apple, Nobel Prize Winner nor millionaire. Gore's house is A LOT BIGGER than the average American home. 

Furthermore, the average home in TENNESSEE uses 1.5 times the national average, so they're not even comparing Gore's house to others in the same climate. And their source, this table by the EIA, appears to calculate energy consumption by PERSON, not household. So let's do the math based on average people per average home, versus people in Gore's mansion. This includes live-in domestics and aides, if he uses some rooms as offices.

Now they say he's using 10% more energy than before the renovations. 17,768 khw a month, to be precise. The press release from last year? 22,619 kwh. I'm kinda having a problem with that math. See, I'm almost certain 17 is LESS than 22. I think 12%, but like I say math and I aren't best friends. My guess is they're comparing the numbers now to the months before the renovations were complete, which would make sense because things would be shut down for rewiring.

I know, if you're conservative you already stopped reading, because you like the simple cheap shot rather than the fair comparison. "Press 1 For English, 2 For Deportation" is all you need to know. Tell you what though - Clinton was a detail guy and he balanced the budget. Bush legendarily "doesn't do nuance" and he calls anything he doesn't understand Fuzzy Math. This math is so fuzzy, you might as well stick a couple of ping pong balls in it and call it a Muppet.

I'd Like To Say The Whig Party was a Mistake

Al Gore has publicly endorsed Obama, at long last. I'm predicting zero impact from this, though it's kind of comforting. And good for completists, the kind of people who collect all of the things in a set. "Wait! I also need the Han Solo frozen in Carbonite figure!"

But really, the subset of Democrats who preferred Hillary, but were on the fence between Obama and McCain, was pretty small. Hillary's own endorsement presumably took care of them. All that Gore can add is helpful spreadsheets and a PowerPoint show which explains why Obama is the right guy for the job.

Meanwhile, David Frum suggests that McCains VP should be Rudy Giuliani. Oh please, please, please let it happen. McCain has to secure that all important "war with Iran until the end of time" vote. It's what Americans want!