O.K. - so the documentary "Planet Earth" didn't have a polar bear specifically named "Petey." Nevertheless, I'm hooked on animal documentaries and I like to anthropomorphize animals. So, for purposes of this column, we are talking about "Petey."
Also, to give a little background to this column, I'm going to start with a digressive kick in the pants to the Reverend Al Gore. I'm doing this because it appears that the Reverend Al's documentary is part of what led to the "Planet Earth" fiasco I describe below.
The Rev. Al Gore's slide show and the movie based thereon, like "Planet Earth," also feature pictures of a Petey Polar Bear. He is stranded on a baby iceberg. He stares down into the water.
Oh what will Petey do? He's stranded!
Uh - not exactly. Well, all right...he's not even close to stranded. Then what's he doing standing on this little block of ice? Hasn't he been washed out to sea due to Universal Pandemic Global Warming?
Uh - again, not exactly. In that picture - which has gotten some worldwide fame thanks to Al - Petey Polar Bear is - most likely - waiting for Stupid Sammy Seal to come a' swimmin' on by.
If Sammy does show up - it'll be Sammy's last swim. Petey will jump on his back - whack him a few good ones between those dewey seal eyes - and then it'll be time to break open some mustard.
Anyway - the Reverend Al's documentary has managed to scare more than a few school children. [Yeah, it's palmed off as science and shown in public school classrooms. In a recent article it was reported that in one high school alone, a student had been shown the entire movie on four separate occasions for four separate classes. It was not reported whether or not it was featured in Sophomore American Fiction where it belongs.]
In another news item, it was reported that an eight year old girl started crying when she got home from school because all the 'polar bears are dying." Hooo boy....it never ends. [Thanks, Al.]
Anyway - now on to "Planet Earth" polar bear show - parts of which, as you will see, are loosely based on a true story - or rather - loosely based on a version of the truth.
As mentioned, I love watching animal documentaries. So, it was easy for me to get on board for the newest installments of 'Planet Earth.'The episode that precipitated this column was, in large part, about our friend Petey Polar Bear. I happened to tune in mid-way through the show.
Bingo! - I was hooked. There was Petey, and he was a swimmin' away, king of all he surveyed.
We were shown a Pelican's-Eye View of Petey from helicopters. Scuba divers gave us some film of the bear from below the surface. This is the same view seals get just before they 'go to the light.'
So, I popped open a Diet Coke and settled back to enjoy the adventures of Petey.
It was just then that I became aware of exactly what the narrator was saying.
And what she was saying was deceptive, misleading and just short of outright lies.
Why, you may ask, would the narrator have anything to say about polar bears that was misleading almost to the point of being fraudulent?
She said it to scare us about the Global Warming Epidemic which we now know can be spread by a handshake.
I wished I had taped her words so I could type it here verbatim. However, you'll just have to trust me that my paraphrasing is fairly accurate. It went like this:
"Petey the Polar Bear is a good swimmer. He uses his paws as paddles. [she begins to speak with an ominous tone.] But, Petey has not yet been able to find any land.....he is some sixty miles [direct quote of distance] from the nearest shore.....the ice sheets are gone......small bergs of ice, too small to support his weight are all that he can see......if he cannot find land soon...[and the following words are verbatim]...he will drown." [my emphasis added, although the narrator, as well, sounded pretty worried.]
Before cutting to an advertisement, the helicopter's camera went wide angle and then panned the horizon. Oh-mi-god----No land in sight!!!!
Now I cannot be sure of this - but I suspect that in any home in which an eight year old parishioner of Rev. Al Gore's religion was watching the same show, there were probably some tears welling up in the parishioner's eyes.
"Mom! Dad! Petey Polar Bear is gonna drownnnn!!!! Whaaaa!!!!
Husband: "What in the hell is she watching?"
Wife: "I dunnoh, you're in charge of the 'V' chip."
Husband: "Cripes, don't tell me Disney's killing polar bears now....she just got over the 'hit' on Bambi's mother..."
Meanwhile, back at my casa, I was not in tears. I was furious. More on that in a moment. [There better be, or I don't have a column here.]
The commercial ended. The next scene unfolded.
The camera panned a shoreline that was chock-a-block full of yummy Wally Walruses. For Petey Polar Bear - finding this collection of tusked lard buckets would be like having 'take-out' delivered. But?! But?! Where's Petey? Last we knew, we had drawn the desired inference: Petey was lost at sea!!!
Oh, but look, over there, near the Wally 'take-out' counter, Petey has pulled his bedraggled bear's ass up onto the shoreline.
The narrator's voice then, somehow, combined a tone of dread and grim foreboding [the world's ending] with a touch of: 'wow, it's a miracle Petey made it.'
Again - I wish I had taped the show. Her words and tone implied that it was somewhat miraculous that Petey had not drowned. Further, her tone implied that that Petey was one lucky carnivore. We were led to believe that this was pure coincidence that Petey happened to wash up next to dinner.
Her words went something like this: [camera pans to bedraggled-arse-bear] "Our bear has somehow made it to this shore. He is exhausted. He must sleep before he can order his meal. [o.k., she didn't exactly say he would 'order' a Walrus, but we got the idea that some Walrus in the pile would soon be recycled.]
So, let's re-cap: We've been led to believe: a. the bear was lost at sea; b. the bear got lost sixty miles from shore because the ice sheet he expected to find had gone to Global Warming Heaven; c. if the bear survives and finds land, it will be a miracle; d. the scene after the commercial was a miracle; e. the bear's arrival at a Walrus smorgasbord is a fantastic stroke of luck and coincidence; f. global warming can be spread by toilet seats.
Well, your loyal writer got right onto the internet. I wanted to confirm a few facts before I wrote this column. So - I went to a couple of 'Pro-Petey' websites, including that of Sea World and one sponsored by Alaska.
Yep, my memory of the many, many documentaries I've seen on 'Petey' and his 'homeys' was pretty accurate. A summary will suffice:
a. Polar Bears have been spotted on quite a few occasions swimming as far as sixty [yep, exactly sixty] miles from shore.
b. Polar Bears do not get lost at sea.
c. Polar Bears can always find land. No scientist knows how they do it, but they always do. A Polar Bear's perfect sense of direction is two things: a mystery and an established fact.
d. Polar Bears can smell dinner up to twenty miles away. [Believe me, ol' Petey didn't park his butt next to all those Walruses by pure chance. He got a whiff of 'em - probably twenty miles out to sea where he was patrolling the shoreline - and honed in on the buggars like a laser beam.]
e. Polar Bears have such a terrific sense of smell that they can smell a live seal, hiding under three feet of ice, from over a mile away.
But, the Global Warming Fundamentalists of the Rev. Gore are religious dogmatists.
I thought it was bad enough that they named scientists who opposed them as 'Global Warming Deniers.' Not only were they bent on ignoring science that disputed their faith, they were bent on smearing the opposing scientists with a term associated with hateful anti-semites who are known as 'Holocaust Deniers.'
But now I've seen how far the members of this faith will go -- and about this, I am quite serious.
They are willing to twist, distort and lie about facts in other fields of science [i.e. the study of Polar Bears] to scare us into joining their church.
We are led to believe the damned polar bears are now getting 'lost' because ice melted. If they are sixty miles out to sea, they are in grave 'danger.' They may 'drown,' because they cannot find familiar land marks. They are very 'fortunate' to find a meal and do so by luck.
This is all unmitigated crap. And it is a sign of the Global Warming Church's desperation.
As more and more serious climatologists study old and new data, the members of Al's church are being asked to 'debate' the topic.
Those parishioner's - and the Reverend Al - are petrified at the thought of such debate. The good Reverend himself absolutely refuses to engage in a public debate with anyone - no matter what their credentials. After all, Al's a genuine lawyer just like me. What could an MIT meterologist have to contribute to a debate?
Also, Al and his followers know what happened to the Christian fundamentalist William Jennings Bryan in the infamous Scope's Monkey Trial.
Science buried him alive.
And, the Rev. Al's parishioners know - and Reverend Al knows - that despite the fact William Jennings Bryan was fat as a house - there's always more room in his coffin for those who denounce fact in favor of faith.
The parishioner's also know about the debate a few months ago at Cooper Union in New York. Scientists debated the topic of Global Warming.
A poll of the audience found the majority were true believers in Rev. Al's religion prior to the debate. At the end of the debate, the audience was again polled and it turned out that the majority had now become Global Warming Deniers!!! [Uh-oh....Hmmm....Debate's not a good thing now, is it boys and girls?]
One Deacon of the Warming Church - formerly a real scientist - decided that the public at Cooper Union was just too dumb to understand the problem and said so after the second poll was taken. [Y'uh know, in their only appearance in the northeastern United States, Abe Lincoln and Mr. Douglas had the same problem when they debated at Cooper Union....it's just the kind of forum that attracts dumbbells and the homeless. And, of course, when you advertise a debate among scientists - well - for sure you are going to attract every drunken illiterate in crawling distance.]
Thus, belief in Global Warming is reduced to an article of faith. It is not subject to discussion or debate. As Rev. Al knows: you lose parishioners, baby, then you lose donations.
So, dear readers, keep an eye and ear out the next time you watch, if you happen to watch, animal documentaries.
The Global Warming Fundamentalists are everywhere and they are desperate.
There's an old saying: "Truth is the first casualty of war."
Petey Polar Bear doesn't know that saying and never will. But if the scientists who have spent their lives studying Petey and his buddies saw the same documentary the other night, they saw their lifetimes of work and hard-earned knowledge flushed down the toilet by a bunch of religious nuts.
And, disappearing down the crapper with their science was something called 'the truth.'
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