When Ted Turner told his wife of his plan to give $1 billion to the United Nations--in 10 annual payments of $100 million or less--her response was Biblical: Jane wept.
Presumably, Ms. Fonda's emotions welled up because of a sudden realization of what a terrific guy she had married, and not because of distress at all that money going out of the house. Shucks, it's only nine months' earnings, Mr. Turner modestly said later. If the value of the Time Warner stock falls in value during the 10 years, it could be even less than $1 billion, since the offer specifies that annual payments will be the lesser of stock or cash.
Nonetheless, it was a generous gesture, and particularly so since the object of Mr. Turner's generosity has become such a forlorn institution. Expensive "peacekeeping" has yielded little peace. World health projects are floundering while resurgent malaria and other potentially controllable diseases wipe out millions of people in Africa. A swelling multitude of refugees from war and hunger haunts the world. Looking on the U.N.'s dismal record, the U.S. Congress, unlike Mr. Turner, is reluctant to offer it either love or money, although the legislators may soon relent and pay up back dues.
Mr. Turner's soft spot for the U.N. seems to be related to another of his enthusiasms, global warming. The U.N. has pledged to fight this scourge no matter what it costs, and taxpayers already have paid quite a lot. "Have you been outside lately?" Mr. Turner asked an interviewer.
"It's hot as hell out there."
Some might regard that as a rather unscientific way of proving that the entire planet is getting hotter, a little like saying that a thundershower in Hollywood presages floods in the Sahara. But the entertainment world Mr. Turner inhabits has little to do with such fusty old concepts as scientific method, where truth is pursued methodically and one's research results are not regarded as valid by one's peers until reproduced by other researchers using the same methodology. TV is not science.
Using environmental scares for political purposes can backfire.
Among Mr. Turner's fellow admirers of the U.N. global warming campaign are Bill Clinton and Al Gore. The landscape they too see, and helped to create, might be called a world of virtual reality, where what appears to be transcends what actually is. Newt Gingrich once described Mr. Clinton as a "virtual President," who on any given day can represent anything that suits his political convenience. Mr. Turner and Time Warner make a good business out of supplying film and TV viewers worldwide with virtual realities created in Hollywood's dream factory. But men and women who have wide-ranging police and military powers play a far different role and can be dangerous to the public weal when they choose to act out their fantasies.
Global warming is a fantasy. John R. Christy, an Alabama atmospheric scientist who was one of the contributors to the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) did his best to defend the IPCC findings--the basis for proposed draconian measures--when he faced an onslaught of challenges by knowledgeable questioners at a George C. Marshall Institute roundtable in Washington last February. But even he finally expressed skepticism about how the report is being used. In response to one criticism, he said: "I don't do policy, okay?"
He should consider himself lucky, because those who "do" policy, Mr. Gore for example, may soon be learning that using environmental scares for political purposes can backfire. More about that later.
The "science" behind claims that industrial emissions are warming the atmosphere has always been ephemeral. Only a tiny portion of the "greenhouse" gases are manmade; most are created by nature. And even the most apocalyptic guesses of "warming," all based on selective use of time periods that support the case, show only slight temperature change over the last century.
But in today's world of virtual reality, virtual science can gain wide credibility, especially when promoted by government itself. The U.S. has never had a President more capable of promoting virtual reality than Bill Clinton, whether it be in attributing gross misuse of the FBI to staff confusions or in using his own sales of government favors as an argument for "reforming" the already extensive campaign finance laws that forbid that practice.
Mr. Gore's problem goes beyond his own reinterpretations of the campaign finance laws, although he will soon be joining Mr. Clinton in spending large sums on personal legal fees. The vice president also had a major role in promoting the virtual reality of global warming and he may soon be paying the price.
Reality is beginning to intrude into this dream world and its politics don't look nearly as seductive as they did when Mr. Gore helped fashion it and began promoting it as a vehicle to win "environmentalist" votes.
It seems the likes of Maurice Strong, the U.N.'s environmental strongman, didn't know this was all just a game. The U.N. will convene representatives from 150 nations in Kyoto, Japan, in December to sign another one of Mr. Strong's infamous binding "save-the-world" treaties. It will call for all signatories to roll back industrial activities, if need be, to cut emissions of "greenhouse gases" to 1990 levels.
Mr. Clinton and the candidate he wants to succeed him, Mr. Gore, are on the spot. If they sign, a few tons of brick will come down on Mr. Gore's neck, adding to the ones already flying in his direction. The AFL-CIO will disown him for costing jobs. The automobile industry already has forgotten the Japan-bashing Mr. Clinton did for them and will scream if the U.S. commits itself to more mindless spending to cure fictional problems. The fossil fuel vendors, painted as villains by enviroradicals, will ask: "what has Gore wrought?"
If Mr. Clinton and Mr. Gore don't sign, a more likely possibility, they will have to face the constituency they created with their enviroscare politics. Ted Turner and wife Jane might be among the critics, who knows? The press hasn't been aroused by the campaign finance illegalities of these two highest law enforcement officers, but don't bet they will get off easy if they turn their backs on the envirozealots.
Mr. Clinton promises to make his decision known next month in advance of the final conference leading up to Kyoto. His skills at creating virtual reality may well be equal to dealing with this dilemma, probably by making demands that he knows the U.N. won't fulfill. But it will be a tough call, far harder than Ted Turner's decision to donate $1 billion for the U.N.'s good works.
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