Oh fantastic. Bin Laden's on the climate wagon.
I've been wondering where he's been, actually. Or even where he's bin, harhar. In terms of the climate change 'debate' (it's not a debate, it's a large body of scientific evidence pointing towards a conclusion), Osama bin Laden is so late to the party he may as well have just gone straight to the pharmacy the next day. Perhaps he's a little cut off wherever he may be, but still: in terms of a stick to wave at the West he only has to look at the front page of, well, pretty much any newspaper for the last several years. Carbon dioxide is the greenhouse gas making the largest contribution to the changing climate. Historically, the US has emitted the most carbon dioxide of any nation in the world. Not the whole story by any means, but both facts hardly secret, and hardly new. His latest tape must have been quite a disappointment when it landed in the Al-Jazeera office; I'm surprised they even bothered to air it.
So, Osama's on the climate wagon. Fox News must be thrilled. The story was immediately seized upon by their website - which, interestingly, lists 'The World's Strongest Beers' and 'Criminals In Haiti 'Raping Quake Survivors'' as its two most read articles - and it's probably only a matter of time before Republicans of the world discover that the climate change hoax was actually created by Al Quaeda in the first place. Idiots! How did we not spot it before? I always suspected eating red meat was patriotic. As food groups go, it's practically a metaphor for free speech!
It reminds me, for some reason, of a time a few years ago when some boy leant over to my friend in the pub and politely pointed out that, although she was a nice girl and everything, it wouldn't work out between them. She agreed wholeheartedly, but mainly because he was shorter than her, looked like a hobbit, voted for the BNP and the idea of even going near him had never even crossed her mind. The facts remain the same, but the conversation was a bit of an unnecessary poke in the eye. Similarly, climatic changes are taking place and the US has done a lot to contribute to it, but I'd prefer to think I didn't have anything in common with this psychotic mass-murderer. It could almost be one of my favourite things about my gender.
But does it actually matter in the slightest? An translation by the Al-Jazeera website quotes the audio tape - which has not yet been confirmed to be the voice of bin Laden - as saying "speaking about climate change is not a matter of intellectual luxury - the phenomenon is an actual fact," and, as much as typing the next three words reminds me of vomiting in my own mouth, he's kinda right. Who cares? Just because we can both read a scientific report, or even, ooh, listen to the radio, it doesn't mean we have anything else in common. It doesn't mean I want young people to feel so alienated from their society that they will strap explosives to their own legs in an attempt to blast apart the lives of hundreds of innocent families. Hooray! In fact, the best thing to do is just to not pay it any attention, in which case I should stop writing this right now.
So, Osama's on the climate wagon. Fox News must be thrilled. The story was immediately seized upon by their website - which, interestingly, lists 'The World's Strongest Beers' and 'Criminals In Haiti 'Raping Quake Survivors'' as its two most read articles - and it's probably only a matter of time before Republicans of the world discover that the climate change hoax was actually created by Al Quaeda in the first place. Idiots! How did we not spot it before? I always suspected eating red meat was patriotic. As food groups go, it's practically a metaphor for free speech!
It reminds me, for some reason, of a time a few years ago when some boy leant over to my friend in the pub and politely pointed out that, although she was a nice girl and everything, it wouldn't work out between them. She agreed wholeheartedly, but mainly because he was shorter than her, looked like a hobbit, voted for the BNP and the idea of even going near him had never even crossed her mind. The facts remain the same, but the conversation was a bit of an unnecessary poke in the eye. Similarly, climatic changes are taking place and the US has done a lot to contribute to it, but I'd prefer to think I didn't have anything in common with this psychotic mass-murderer. It could almost be one of my favourite things about my gender.
But does it actually matter in the slightest? An translation by the Al-Jazeera website quotes the audio tape - which has not yet been confirmed to be the voice of bin Laden - as saying "speaking about climate change is not a matter of intellectual luxury - the phenomenon is an actual fact," and, as much as typing the next three words reminds me of vomiting in my own mouth, he's kinda right. Who cares? Just because we can both read a scientific report, or even, ooh, listen to the radio, it doesn't mean we have anything else in common. It doesn't mean I want young people to feel so alienated from their society that they will strap explosives to their own legs in an attempt to blast apart the lives of hundreds of innocent families. Hooray! In fact, the best thing to do is just to not pay it any attention, in which case I should stop writing this right now.