Ted Turner is an Environmental Genius

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Tags | celebrities, funny celebrity quotes, global warming, ted turner, ted turner interview

Ted Turner is an Environmental Genius

Posted on 15 April 2008 by Lisa Pawlowski

Celebrities. God love ‘em.

How could we average schmoes live without the benefit of their wisdom and expertise on everything from global warming and environmental issues to the US policy on the war in Iraq?

And why is it the media is all too willing to keep giving these self-anointed experts air-time?

I pondered these questions on April 1st as I watched Charlie Rose, on PBS, interview the founder of CNN and founder and chairman of the UN Foundation, Ted Turner.

During the interview, Rose pelted Turner with softball questions such as, “Why are you the way you are?” And he was able to coax Turner into singing his acappella renditions of My Old Kentucky Home and Somewhere over the Rainbow. What a tough interview.

However, Ted didn’t need much coaxing to air his astonishing theories about global warming. But don’t despair, people. Clear your gloom-addled minds. Ted’s a celebrity and he has a solution for our problems.

During the interview, Turner said, “Only the people that don’t understand it [global warming] think it’s going to—not doing it [anything about global warming] will be catastrophic. We’ll have eight degrees – we’ll be eight degrees hotter in 10 – not 10, but in 30 or 40 years. And basically none of the crops will grow. Most of the people will have died, and the rest of us will be cannibals.

“Civilization will have broken down. The few people left will be living in a failed state like Somalia or Sudan, and living conditions will be intolerable. The droughts will be so bad, there will be no more corn growing. It will – not doing it is suicide. Just like dropping bombs on each other, nuclear weapons, is suicide.”

So Ted, whatever can we possibly do to save ourselves from resorting to cannibalism? What can we do to save the Earth? Ted’s answer: population control.

“We’re too many people. That’s why we have global warming. We have global warming because too many people are using too much stuff. If there were less people, they’d be using less stuff.”

I guess it’s just that simple.

Anyone with an ounce of intelligence would be able to spot the dubiousness of Ted’s cannibalism theory. And even a middle schooler would know that his solution to global warming is simplistic. But he spouted all of this as if he were stating a fact. Rose didn’t even challenge him for making such outlandish assertions.

It’s the hypocrisy that makes me mad. Turner is saying everyone should have just one or two kids and he himself has more than that. Imaging how much energy his mansions consume. I know I don’t have a private jet whisking me all around the world, but I’m sure Ted does. How many pounds of carbon does that jet emit? And he is now in the restaurant business. If you’re ever in New York City on 51st street you can stop by his “Ted’s Montana Steakhouse”. Just don’t think about the waste the restaurant is generating and the methane gas the cows have spewed into the air before they were butchered.

Isn’t it great that all these celebrities can point to us average people and tell us that WE have to do something?

I don’t know who to believe on all of this global warming thing. Yeah, I think it’s a good idea for everyone to recycle as much as they can because we only have a limited amount of room in landfills. And I think it would be great if we all could afford to drive, and did drive, hybrid cars because oil is a finite resource and the place from where we get it now is unstable and always will be.

But I know I don’t need, and I resent, any celebrity telling me what I should do.

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1 Comments For This Post

Gary Karbon Says:
April 16th, 2008 at 8:55 am
Good post, Lisa. Thanks. The interesting thing is, some of the measures taken to “help” the environment sometimes turn around and bite us in ways that cannot be predicted beforehand. This morning I was listening to a radio show about how the new interest in “clean and efficient” biofuels is now creating skyrocketing food prices and even food shortages in some parts of the world. Go figure. The law of “unintended consequences” is at work everywhere and I don’t think even Ted Turner can help that.