No, I haven’t read the book, and I haven’t seen the movie. A lot of people have, though.

News reports say folks are flocking to bookstores and theaters to buy Al Gore’s newest book and see the movie, An Inconvenient Truth. The movie features a slide presentation on global warming that Gore has been showing for years. One account even calls it a documentary.

I understand the film also contains snippets about Al’s life and career. That’s the part I’d like to see.

I know some folks might think the story of Al’s life would be kind of dull, but I remember some of the funny stories he told during his presidential campaign.

There was the one about his dad teaching him how to clean out hog pens with a shovel and a hose, for example. And the yarn about clearing land with a double-bladed ax and plowing with a team of mules. Those would make a great movie.

We could open with Al and his mules trudging across the slopes on the Tennessee farm. “Doggone it, Al,” his dad would say. “If you don’t quit plowing across those sidehills the mules will just keep rolling to the bottom!”

Then there was that story about his mother-in-law paying more for her medications than his Labrador retriever paid for his. That was a good one. Anytime someone compares his mother-in-law to a Labrador retriever, we know he has a keen sense of humor.

Back to the global warming, though. Al suggests everyone should strive to become “carbon neutral.” He claims everyone in his family is carbon neutral.

I’m not sure what that means, but I suspect he keeps track of the fuel burned in his car and then tries to produce an equal amount of gas with his next speech.

Al explains he’s been preaching about global warming for 30 years. The main difference now is, “The debate is over. No more debate among serious people.”

This reminded me of a friend’s comment about environmental activists he dealt with years ago. “Their base of information seems to be ‘everybody knows,’” he said.

It also reminded me of a recent column by Indiana broadcaster and columnist Gary Truitt. Truitt points out that much of what everybody knows just happens to be incorrect.

He says, for example, that several reputable scientific groups now believe the infamous hole in the ozone over Antarctica is shrinking rather than expanding - and may disappear by the year 2050.

He also says, “Data from the National Climate Data Center indicates that, instead of global warming, the earth is actually getting cooler.” This data shows the earth got warmer from 1970 to 1998, but has gotten cooler since then.

So, maybe we should all buy Al’s book and go see the movie? I suppose everybody knows I’m not going to do that.

This farm news was published in the July 5, 2006 issue of Farm World, serving Indiana, Ohio, Illinois, Kentucky, Michigan and Tennessee.