It’s been cold lately, and when it’s cold, people pipe up against Al Gore as though he’d said "it will never be cold again."

But, to start from the beginning, it’s pretty well established those fumes pillowing out of coal stacks and tail pipes aren’t great for the environment. If you’re still not sold on this wild idea, take a look at Mexico City.

A serene look at one of the world's largest collections of vehicles.

So, it’s not a far stretch to consider if thousands of factories and millions of cars could turn the skylines of Mexico City, LA, or Shanghai into a brown haze, that the same pollutants could be bad for our climate. Doesn’t take a crack team of scientists to tell you noxious fumes are bad.

Which they did. The U.S. National Academy of Sciences and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) - both large groups of internationally recognized scientists – have both ruled human activities are causing surface temperatures to rise globally, and that an overall “global warming” is very likely.

So, if it strikes a chord with common sense, it’s backed by the scientific community, and it’s prevention helps keep our global home looking its greenest, who could possibly want to argue against the ill-effects of carbon pollution?

The Critics

There’s actually a strong crowd of folks who say it’s all a big hoax. Some are legitimate scientists with alternate theories, but most are American conservative taintledinks like Glenn Beck and fans of said taintledinks who haven’t been the same since Al Gore was awarded an Oscar and the Nobel Peace price. Their view goes like this: environmentalism is a hoax cooked up to create an artificial industry of green products and restrict progress for leading world corporations through emissions capping legislation. It’s part "you're just a bunch of Marxist, anti-corporation folks" paired with "you're creating an industry... for other corporations to cash in on!"

And of course, no stranger to denying widely accepted science (for example, the three Republican Presidential candidates in `08 that didn’t believe in Evolution), these same folks reject all popular reasoning on climate change. "The Earth changes naturally" they say. "It goes through ebbs and flows, and climate change is what leads carbon saturation, not the other way around" they say. The viewpoint espoused by the “Earth is 6,000 years old” crowd is playing science with the big boys. No, I’m not convinced.

On the more level-headed side, some call to question the drastic predictions of an Inconvenient Truth. The two biggest points of the global warming hypothesis are:

1. How much will the globe warm in the next 100 years?
2. Is it man made?

Clearly, no one (aside from the most fervent voices on global warming, such as Al Gore) has said outright what exactly will happen in 100 years, only what could happen. It’s reasonable to ask how serious are the future consequences are, and what exact cause do they derive from.

Really though, why does this matter? If sea levels only rise 24 inches versus 24 feet in the next century, is this just a bummer for Atlantic city? Do we shrug it off to some unknown global phenomena and toss another tire on the fire? If it’s indeed not man made, wouldn’t piss-poor air quality and choking landfills still be our handywork? Overall, if eating right and exercising won’t guarantee you’ll live to see 100, does that give you license to bury your face in a bucket of trans-fats until your aorta seals shut?

The sober debate that’s missing

You’d think this isn’t a political issue, and you’d be both right and wrong. The facts of it needs to be analyzed scientifically, but the call to action requires political will. Unfortunately, scientists are good at thinking and politicians are not. And then taintledinks like Glenn Beck just confuse the issue with poo-flinging.

So the reality is we face, globally, a potential danger. It’s not Polar bears are drowning and Kevin Costner’s Waterworld becomes a reality, but it’s not the Earth can magically recover from any unbalance either. Clearly, something could happen in the next 100 years.

Let’s face facts: recycling and car pooling will only get us so far. Each year America wastes more than it did the last. This has not changed. It’d take a tremendous movement of reusable bags, compost heaps and hybrid vehicles to even break even the rate of waste we expunge into our environment, let alone halt it altogether. I don’t care how many “Green” themed events or Network television awareness weeks are scheduled, you will not guilt Americans out of their SUVs, just as you will not guilt Chinese factories out of prospering on plastic injection molded crap and zero environmental impact oversight. The world moves forward regardless.

Plus, we suck (with a capital S) at preventing future turmoil. If CNN had broadcasted the oncoming doom of the housing crisis back in `05, nothing would have changed – it would have just made people tell themselves "OK, I'll just make heaping gobs of money a little longer..."

So, to get legislation and awareness on reducing carbon emissions and prevent the potential catastrophes of a drowned future, it’d seem we need two things. First, focus on the present more. Stop selling the future no one is certain of, and bring focus to what the coal burning plants are doing to the atmosphere today. Nostradamus was great and all, but Al Gore isn’t the same thing, and we’re not going to buy into Cap and Trade just because of future risks even supportive scientists argue over.

And second, a Plan B. I’m talking a mole wood arc, 40 cubits long. You don’t even have to plan for capacity. Just build it out, and dock it on the pond between the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial. It won’t serve much good, but it’ll freak people the hell out into considering rational thought.

Long story short, she had a few questionable firings in office, a few ethical complaints, and about half a million in legal debt. But, she showed courage and heart, and braved her way through the onslaught of evil politicians, changed the game, and now builds her fan base with regular spots on Fox News and $100,000 speaking engagements at Tea Party events.

She’s like Tina Turner, and the Liberal Media is Ike Turner. It’s exactly like that.

But, as much as I heart and admire Sarah, I have to say, Sarah, please don’t run for President in 2012. I care for you too much.

1. You’re frighteningly uninformed

You know how mean Fox News was to your opponents last election? Check out your coverage on your home turf.

You see? Some world Geography and knowledge of government is the kind of stuff that they expect from the person 4th graders have to memorize the name and title of. You can’t rely on Google in the White House.

2. You’re morbidly unprepared

Governor of Alaska is equivalent to Office of the Candyman. You run a state with the population of  Columbus, Ohio (4th smallest state in the Union) that gets 80% of it’s revenue from oil business. If a line of very fair questions for someone actively campaigning for the second highest office in the land can bring you to your knees, what makes you think you have the right stuff to be top dog?

You can’t answer every question with “freedom.” It’s not like ketchup – it isn’t always appropriate.

3. Most people remember #1 and #2

Even in clip 1 Shepard Smith has to recognize the Obama lead that resulted from clip 2, the Katie Couric interview. I know heartland Moms who get their news from chain emails and Nascar Dads who get their news from the Paladin Press are 100% behind you, but the rest of the curious country has some serious reservations about you. And you haven’t exactly quelled those concerns.

In a nutshell, you’re a frightening prospect given any amount of authority beyond, say, the Governorship of Alaska or perhaps a mayor of a town of 5,000.

And truly, running for President isn’t the “rogue” we all fell in love with. Stay Mavericky and away form those beltway politicians. Because we know you don’t have it in you to write another book to slam another failed campaign, or the constitution to survive quitting another elected office. You have too much good and comic relief to share with the “Real” America to see it all eviscerated during candidate debates in November, 2012 (where winking is frowned upon).

I heart you too much for that.

The experience is phenomenal. The 3D is crisp, colors remain unaltered – it’s just incredible. It’s the closest I’ve ever seen to being in the scene itself. Of course the CG of the film is top caliber as well. There’s tons of moments where you lose track of what’s real and what’s animated.  Facial expressions are so life like you often mistake the characters for actors in rubber suits.

In a nutshell, I can’t adequately describe how great the movie experience is. It’s two parts awesome to see a movie in that way, and awesome to see it with a movie like Avatar.

So what gets to me is the comment I’ve heard several times from various sources. “Avatar is just Dances with Wolves.”

There’s two elements I feel are at play with this comment.

1. “I yawn at what everyone else likes.”

The appall of anything “mainstream” is one element I think that drives criticism for any artistic creation that receives too wide of an appeal. Music, art, movie and even food fans pride themselves on having a finer taste in their passion than most. When the most start liking something too quickly, the quickest way to distinguish themselves from the majority is to dislike what everyone else likes.

The part I don’t like about this sentiment is it’s not honest. It’s the notion that no good music plays on the radio, no good food is served at common restaurants, and no good movies make #1 at the Box Office.  It’s why some folks will always swear Greenday used to be good, why only the first set in the Star Wars series is worth watching, and why a meal is served in a rural strip mall can’t be top notch.

Specifically the notion that Avatar is tantamount to Dances with Wolves in space is kinda like summing up the Bible as the Torah with Jesus.  For one, it over simplifies a massive body of work. It’d be a meaningful statement if there were any other tie-ins from this work to it’s comparison apart from “this story is similar to that other story”, but in fact the two are in distinct genres by unique directors over two decades apart. Avatar is no different than any other movie  in sharing similar story elements with preceding works; the same can be said for any work of fiction in the last two centuries.

So the heart of the sentiment is basically another way of saying “the movie was alright, but the book was better.” Or, another way of saying “sure people liked this work, but I’m well informed and know of it’s influences.” Ta da! The “book was better” crowd is generally the “my tastes are refined and are ahead of popular trends” crowd. It’s the verbal equivalent of giving yourself a big shiny gold star for being special. It’s why teenagers go Goth. Kudos, you are special.

In short, Avatar is Dances with Wolves in space? So what?! They’re two distinct movies, and this one is very good – in spite of having been released at a film festival on a $2,000 budget.

2. “I interpret a political message in this movie that I don’t like.”

This stems from the crowd that hates to see American’s – or any familiar government groups or institutions – in any way being portrayed as a ill-intentioned bad guy. If Americans are shown as, say, corrupt, greedy, or in any sort of colonizing or occupying force, certain folks read the directors message that Americans are bad, and are instantly insulted.

I personally can’t understand people with such a fragile world view that can be usurped by a premise that their country is anything other than a force of unquestionable good. These are people that love cowboy and Indian films that don’t examine anything beneath the surface of polar myths. Cowboys in white = good, native Indians = bad. Can’t everything be this presumptuous and simple?

So if a movie challenges your world view and leaves an itchy rash, complain about the concept, but leave the work itself alone. Frankly I wouldn’t be deterred if the Colonel of the movie was victorious and raped Pandora of every last mineral. It was beautifully scripted and well done. So parse what irks your preconceptions from what James Cameron crafted over 3+ years. I’m sure there’s a few good Christian family websites that can advise you on the right and wrong films to watch, ones devoid of any influence from reality.

After a nice breakfast with my parents, Anna and I proceeded to do nothing at all. The kids ran around with their new toys, and we simply did next to nothing. I’m continuing to do nothing. And it’s wonderful. It’s like all my childless friends like now – a blissfully free schedule with few commitments.

And this is what Christmas apparently means for parents. Two hours of kiddy madness followed by a wonderful day of nothing.

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One of Anna's extra-credit assignments during a cake decorating course.

The problem I have with this sad story is that it’s all too logical.

Tiger Woods is the best golfer in the world. Out of 6 Billion people, his name stands at the top. He makes ungodly amounts of money in endorsements, is in incredible physical shape, travels the world year round, and has superstar fame and fandom wherever he goes. This is his life: he leaves home, travels somewhere for 5 or 6 days, stays at the finest of hotels, has an outpouring of cheer and adoration, wins oodles of money, and travels back home.

I don’t think the story here is that he’s been cheating. I think a more surprising story would be that he hasn’t been fooling around while on his routine luxury tour of the world.

This is in no way to excuse the behavior. Marriage is an uncompromising bond, and a person is committing to full fidelity when they enter it. “Transgressions” can’t be watered down or excused because of circumstances when love and family are on the line.

My point is how can you ever expect to be a normal husband and father when you’re Tiger Woods? I understand the instincts to settle down and raise a family, but it’s a huge gamble if it’s your job to be at a different city and golf course 4 days a week, 40 weeks a year. And some point you got to recognize where your life and your plans fit together. It’s why celebrities treat their marriages like car leases. If you see one last more than 5 years, it’s a phenomenon.

In perspective, it’s not that fascinating of a story really, just a typical tale with fascinating people.

Oh that’s right. You just got served.

The homes around us started right after Halloween. Following quick math, that’s two months of potential Christmas cheer. Two months of inflated Santa Clauses, the before and after nativity scenes, reindeer parts and other Chinese-crafted, LED illuminated, plastic holiday cheer.

I know, Christmas is awesome. I’m sure Chanukah and the other end of year festivals are great too, but in America, it’s mostly Christmas. I’m will not dignify the crap that follows this topic. The folks that spaz out over the greeting “Merry Christmas” need to ease up a few notches, and the folks that spaz out over “Happy Holidays” need a percocet and a copy of the Bill of Rights.

So under the premise that Christmas is awesome, I understand why people would be anxious to celebrate it. I like my Birthday (or at least used to before I turned 30), but I don’t go prodding for Birthday wishes a month before it comes up. Why don’t you see this sort of hysteria over any other holidays?

Frankly for me, Christmas is egg nog, a (realistic) pine tree and Nat King Cole. A glowing altar on my home’s exterior never really attached itself to my fondness of the season. It almost feels like a competition in suburbia – who can really show it up for Christ’s birthday. Maybe it’s part American competitiveness, part kissing up to the king of kings. Not sure. Either way, it’s quite gaudy and in my mind, is close to warranting federal regulation (clearly since that did a great deal of good on Wall Street).

All I’m saying is, let me enjoy Thanksgiving for what it’s worth without stepping outside and momentary loss of bearing. Give the leaves a chance to fall before you start stringing up the garland and fire-hazard lights, mm-kay?

Apparently most of the world wasn’t doing so hot before our economy tanked either. Half the world’s population lives on less than the cost of your morning mint mocha latte. Picture one of those rickshaws being dragged through the streets of Bangalore. Now picture someone sitting in that rickshaw. That dude is pretty damn good by most country standards.

Point is, we all need money. We’ve been living on borrowed money for too long, and now we’re unclear on where it all came from in the first place. So we can wait for some solid plan and long, arduous efforts to pay off, and I’m pretty sure the Germans’ invading days are over. So where to we turn?

Tax church!

Say whaaaat?! Damn skippy, you heard me. Temples, mosques, churches, cathedrals, monoliths, sanctuaries… if you’re preaching to folks and getting their money, and you use that money to pay staff and grow your property, you sound like a business to me. Start paying.

The last church we were a part of (until every sermon turned into an NPR-esque pledge-a-thon) once sent everyone a “campaign slip” asking what we were willing to pledge each week. We usually dropped $5-$10 each week, so we rounded up and said $10. Toward the end of that year, we got a letter in the mail stating how much we had pledged, how much we actually gave, and the difference. It might as well have said “Balance due“. That moment crystallized it for me. This church was collecting membership dues for it’s faith services. It was paying off the expenses of its recent expansion, rallying support for its future plans, and collecting dues from satisfied customers.

OK, sure, you can’t equate God or spiritual enlightenment with, say, used tires or designer shoes.  You may not agree with even remotely considering the treatment of a church as a business because of it’s sacred foundation. But let’s be honest – there’s a lot of churches out there. And even if you feel yours is beyond reproach or any such consideration, you probably wouldn’t mind thumbing your nose down on some of the others out there. Episcopalians probably feel Protestant churches are the bees knees for example, but they don’t have the same motivation to protect Mormon temples. They’re like Division rivals. And then when you bring Shintoism, Sunnis and the Torah into the mix, well you probably tune the Episcopalian out altogether. Probably lose the Baptists, Catholics and Methodists as well.

So not all churches are sacred. Because if they were, then they’d all have equal worth in helping individuals seek inner-spirituality and harmony in life, and all would be equal paths to God. But clearly when you ask around, followers aren’t so broadly accepting. There’s a few right folks and a whole lot of wrong folks. And frankly it’s hard to tell as an innocent bystander.

Clearly churches have lots to say, and clearly they have a lot of frustration with that darned separation of church and state. When the various Catholic organizations rally against abortion, for example, they skate the line of church and lobby group. In fact, places of worship risk losing their 503c tax exemption if they tread public policy too much at the pulpit. I say, let’s alleviate this burden. Let every cleric, rabbi, imam and bishop speak clearly on anything they want. Let them condemn public restrooms. Let them rally against the month of February. Let them wage war against escalators. My point is, there’s a crazy train waiting to happen, and we’re missing a lot of good material. Can you really trust your spiritual leader until you know his or her stance on gay chipmunks?

Here’s another point: the Church… of… Scientology. That in itself is probably the best case for taxing churches. I can hardly say that phrase with a straight face. It’s like my tongue starts to form the “ch” sound at the beginning, and then a pale sickness washes through me and my brain wants to argue why it exists. Buddha, Abraham, Jesus, Mohamed – these folks have cred. But if you’re able to look past the fact that your religion was founded by a hack science fiction writer, a man paid to weave tales of fiction, then I’ve got a great timeshare opportunity for you in Boca Raton, Florida.

Exhale.

But I digress. These are fun notions to entertain. Of course nothing’s absolute, and there’s a lot of charitable activities that organizations of worship provide. Lord knows this isn’t a call to start taxing the United Way or the Red Cross, and clearly there’s a line to draw between organizations that do good, ones that do targeted good (here’s some bread, and look, a Bible!), and ones that simply grow (like the Ch… *choke*).

So, in this semi-facetious fashion, I gotta’ include a clip from Sarah Silverman. Certainly not what I’m proposing here, but hell if I can argue with the logic. You think Jesus ever envisioned a golden city in his name?

To put the notion in perspective, a quick look at what could show up on eBay.

Part of the confusion for me was seeing people opt for a cell phone’s more obscure features over it’s primary function, and the other part was seeing communication reduced to emoticons and terrible new acronyms. LOL! How R U IRL? It all just feels like a major step backward for human communication. In 1806 we’d be hand writing eloquent letters to one another using proper cursive, grammar and punctuation. Two hundred years later, we’re butchering fragmented phrases and incomplete thoughts into tiny devices. It just feels like we’re a century away from grunting and howling at each other.

Call me a cynic, but the structure of English language serves a purpose. If we’re given years of instruction to learn it and maturity produces articulate adults, moving away from this feels like regression.

Shoe on the other foot

Maybe I didn’t hang out in the right circles. Maybe I don’t have “friends”. Whatever you want to nitpick, I’ve never really traded text with someone until recently. Our friend / nanny has had to let us know on a few occasions “Hey, I’ve gotta run to the store with the kids really quickly” or “traffic’s bad – we’ll be there soon.” So, she sent it to our phones, and it finally made sense.

I was so wrapped up with the vapid conversations I saw conducted over text that I’d missed just how convenient it was. No small talk, no filler converation, as direct as humanly possible. “I require X- do you have it available?” “What time will you be ready?” Sharp, pointed communications that cut right to the message or question. I like it.

Of course, if I wasn’t using my work Blackberry, there’d be no way I’d be willing to thumb it out on an 10 digit pad. That’s nuts in my mind.

Of course, I write this as my own 1 year old is planted in front of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. That’s the immediate benefit for parents – it’s a distractor. They want to watch, you want to fix coffee and breakfast. Win win, right?

Deal is, there’s a ton of programming out there, from the moment they’re out of the womb all the way up through their segway to college. Specifically children’s programming has exploded over the last several years. It used to be a handful of public television shows that we relied on – Sesame Street probably the king of them all. Every kid growing up in the last 20 years should know Sesame Street well, and with good reason. It was creative, and it worked.

That’s the surprising part – it was fiercely researched and scientifically engineered to have to biggest impact on the youth audience. Reading Malcom Gladwell’s book The Tipping Point, he explains the painstaking research that went into making the show what it was. Sesame Street is probably the most researched show of all time, because it broke all conventional wisdom about kids and tv. It proved children can learn from a television show, and that everything about a show’s effectiveness centered on how much a child could grasp. That’s where the puppets came in. They made adult concepts relatable to young children.

These days, the new cadre of shows has come in such large numbers that one can only imagine how few get the Sesame Street detailed approach. A great example of that in my mind is the Baby Einsteins series. It was targeted at new moms who thought it’d give their babies a leg up on vocabulary, early concepts and new languages. If you never saw a Baby Einsteins video, it’s pretty much a montage of 30 second clips that show various colorful demonstrations with narrations in different languages doing a voice over for each. After about 15 minutes, it cuts to about 25 more minutes of advertising for the rest of the Baby Einsteins series.

I’m not going to say it’s total garbage, but there’s no proof it adds anything to early child development (article). You can tell by the way they’re marketed, and the premise they’re built on: any arrangement of distracting pictures set to Beethoven will make your kid smart.

Clearly, there’s no substitute for one-on-one interaction with a child, but at the same time, not all TV shows are a complete hindrance to a child’s development. Of course there’s also the factor of parental tolerance: I will not sit through Dora the Explorer. It could teach kids Calculus, I’m avoiding that show like the plague. Her insipid voice just grates my nerves.

There’s a ton of children’s TV shows out there. I’d say there’s nothing wrong with a little TV, as long as it’s in moderation and you’re selective about the materials.