Gore Rips Media: "Don’t Give Equal Time To Someone Who Believes The Earth Is Flat"

Posted by Amanda Terkel, Think Progress at 3:00 PM on November 5, 2007.

This post, written by Amanda Terkel, originally appeared on Think Progress

This morning, former vice president Al Gore appeared on NBC's Today Show to talk about global warming. Host Meredith Vieira brought up a Nov. 1 Wall Street Journal op-ed by climate skeptic John Christy, a former member of the IPCC. In the op-ed, Christy wrote, "I see neither the developing catastrophe nor the smoking gun proving that human activity is to blame for most of the activity we see."

When Vieira asked about the op-ed, Gore noted that Christy "no longer belongs to the IPCC" and is "way outside the scientific consensus." He also sharply criticized the media for giving so much air time to such climate skeptics:

But, Meredith, part of the challenge the news media has had in covering this story is the old habit of taking the on the one hand, on the other hand approach. There are still people who believe that the Earth is flat, but when you're reporting on a story like the one you're covering today, where you have people all around the world, you don't take -- you don't search out for someone who still believes the Earth is flat and give them equal time.

The IPCC is an international body made up of thousands of scientists from 113 countries who have been studying global warming since 1988. Its February consensus assessment said that global warming is "unequivocal" and "very likely" the result of human activity.

As Gore noted, scientists such as Christy are outliers, yet the media continue to give them an overblown amount of airtime. Last month, for example, Colorado State University professor Dr. William Gray sharply criticized Gore, saying that he is "brainwashing our children" on global warming. His comments were covered by multiple major cable networks and newspapers (with no mention that he also once compared Gore to Hilter).

Additionally, Media Matters documented that the Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times, New York Times, Washington Post, Boston Globe, CNN, and Fox News all recently reported that a British judge pointed out nine "errors" in Gore's documentary An Inconvenient Truth, without "mentioning that he also stated in the ruling that the film is 'substantially founded upon scientific research and fact.'"

Tagged as: environment, global warming, gore, today show

Amanda Terkel is Deputy Research Director at the Center for American Progress and serves as Deputy Editor for The Progress Report and ThinkProgress.org at the Center for American Progress.