Wave Maker

I've been reflecting on the story linked in the previous post -- that every one of the Dem candidates took their own private jet to South Carolina. I recall all of the indignation of the left against the criticism of John Edwards for his enormous energy-gobbling house. And Al Gore's enormous energy-gobbling house. And Cheryl Crow's silly embarrassment about toilet paper. And her escapade with Laurie David harassing Karl Rove at the Washington correspondents dinner. (by the way, the Rove link is an excellent eye witness account which, when viewed next to the Crow-David account serves to make them look even more fatuous.)

And then Rhod reminded me with his comment about Laurie David's infamous barbecue pit brouhaha in Edgartown, which I tried to chase down. It was a link from Instapundit to this piece from something called HealthNewsDigest.com:

Even worse is David's chic but hypocritical environmentalism at her summer home in Martha's Vineyard. She was issued a "notice of apparent violations" for building a 26-foot-long barbecue station, stone-and-concrete bonfire pit, and outdoor theater on an environmentally sensitive patch of their 14-acre North Road property without the proper permits. They were also cited for tearing up protected vegetation to make way for a lush, sodded lawn, among other crimes against nature.

The commission has since ordered her to remove the offending structures and restore the area to its previous state. All these violations were allegedly done to prepare for a political fundraiser hosted by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. (another faux Green). Alas, there's no such thing as cheap environmentalism on the Vineyard.

Laurie David has been labeled a "Gulfstream liberal" by Eric Alterman, himself a proud member of the Left and a regular columnist for the Nation. He recognizes that Ms. David's brand of environmentalism is nothing more than a facade, a distraction from the financially secure yet intellectually boring life of the fabulously wealthy. But this hobby has dire consequences for the rest of us. By transforming her politics into a religion, and by demonizing all who question her positions, including the author Michael Crichton, who actually is a Harvard trained scientist and physician, Laurie David makes the environmental movement seem bizarre and more than a bit ridiculous.

It seems terribly obvious to me that any person on the liberal side of the spectrum with a whisper of intellectual honesty would have to concede that these people are devoid of any moral authority to be lecturing anyone on global warming, or environmentalism generally, where they display such arrogant disregard for their own words.

Who the heck needs a 26 foot long barbecue pit, anyway? How many rib parties can you have in Edgartown during the course of a season anyway? I'd think those Beautiful People have their own code of social grace that limits each of them to only one Gaudily Extravagant Function per season.