House Beautiful

A new site on my radar is Snopes.com a rumor and urban legends collection helping shed some light on the many bogus and not-so bogus stories out there. A fellow lawyer sent me some domestic scoop on Al Gore and President George Bush regarding how much energy their respective homes consume on an annual basis.

I found it interesting, especially given Gore’s oft-touted pro-environmental stance and Bush’s less than environmentally-friendly administration (and no, calling for a meeting on Global Warming after denying its existence for the past six years does not make you pro-environment).

Gore’s house is a Hummer III …



… compared to Bush’s Toyota Prius.



Of course, Mr. Gore is a proponent of carbon trading, through which high energy consumers can offset particularly excessive uses by doing other things which decrease energy use. A simple analogy is to constantly leave lights on throughout your house while also installing compact florescent bulbs throughout; i.e. you get credit for the latter which theoretically, offsets your use.

Theoretically, mind you.

I’m sure Mr. Gore’s domestic servants sort his cans and bottles before putting them out on the curb so he’s probably covered re: his electricity costs.

Mr. Bush on the other hand, being a good Republican with a strong uh, conviction that social policy must be driven by a belief in God, Country and the Internal Revenue Code (in that order), no doubt received a significant tax credit for building such a green house.

Truly, a man’s home is his castle.