In his opinion piece “Paul Ehrlich was wrong about everything” (March 19, TribLive), Jonah Goldberg refers to Ehrlich as “the most influential Chicken Little of the past century.” I’d give Ehrlich second place. I nominate Al Gore for first place.
Like Ehrlich, Gore inspired global efforts to respond to what I believe is an imaginary crisis. Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth” made him a leader in the climate change movement. Certainly, Earth’s climate is changing; it’s been in constant change for billions of years, ho-hum. But if you call climate change a crisis, you get attention.
Gore convinced his followers that atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations must be immediately reduced, at any cost, to save the planet. Ehrlich’s followers believed birth control and abortion were necessary to save the planet. Gather a big enough audience, put on a good show (Gore won an Oscar for “An Inconvenient Truth” — check Netflix under science fiction genre), scare enough people, and they will demand government intervention to solve a nonexistent problem.
If you don’t have grandchildren, thank Paul Ehrlich. If you can’t pay your utility bills, thank Al Gore.
Bob Horger
Penn Township, Westmoreland County
