I’ve been predicting this for a year now, and the moment is upon us.  I note that the article makes a lot of the same predictions I have been making.

Al Gore tipped to win Nobel

THE environmental campaigner Al Gore is being tipped as a favourite to win the Nobel peace prize in Oslo this Friday in a controversial move that could place saving the planet above saving people from war and conflict.

Gore, a former American vice-president and failed presidential candidate, has reinvented himself as the “Goracle” with a rock star following after presenting last year’s Oscar-winning documentary An Inconvenient Truth, about the dangers of climate change.

“A prerequisite for winning the Nobel peace prize is making a difference and Al Gore has made a difference,” said Boerge Brende, a former Norwegian environment minister who nominated Gore and Watt-Cloutier.

Gore spent last year assessing whether he ought to run for the White House in 2008, teasing his supporters by saying, “I haven’t completely ruled it out”, and prompting observers to keep a close eye on his girth for signs that he was slimming for a presidential bid.

Some commentators in America, including the British writer Christopher Hitchens, believe he could use a Nobel win to challenge Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination.

“Can he stand to watch another Clinton walk away with a nomination that could have been, or could still be, his?” Hitchens asked.

His supporters think he will sit it out, but with his ego so inflated with his Million Dollar award, it may be that he cannot pass it up.

And he would be hard to beat, drawing on his faux leadership via the GW issue, but also stimulating the left with the thought of a “do over” of the 2000 election.

We will see.

What is it with Chris Matthews, and why do they keep letting him moderate?  Ever debate for the right wingers he hosts he has to waste our time taking shots at the candidates and trying to attack their answers instead of just letting them live or die on the weight of their own words.

Moderators should steer the questions, but they are supposed to be theoretically neutral.

As for Fred!, I was not disappointed really.  He made some solid sensible answers and handled the surprises very well.

He was not flashy, he was solid, which I think will win out in the long run.  Captain Ed has more analysis:

Fred Wins, Chris Loses (Update: My Prediction Comes True)

The first debate with Fred Thompson was expected to reveal whether the lanky actor had what it takes to make a national run for the office. Instead, it revealed Chris Matthews as a hack of the first order, one who tried his best to torpedo Thompson — and failed utterly. He got so desperate that he demanded to know whether Thompson knew who the Canadian Prime Minister was — and he did. Matthews grew so frustrated that he openly critiqued one of Thompson’s answer for being too detailed, which prompted a scolding from Thompson.

That was the game behind the debate, and Thompson stomped Matthews into a laughingstock. In the rest of the debate, Thompson showed that he was comfortable and prepared, even for the silly attacks from other candidates. Mitt Romney went into a long, telegraphed, and obviously gag-written punch about how the debates resemble “Law and Order” and how Fred shows up last, which Fred neatly returned by feigning surprise that he wasn’t the best actor on the stage — jabbing at Romney’s perceived plasticness.

Fred’s in now, and he will find new momentum after this performance. Matthews will become more of a joke, if such a thing is possible at a network that employs Keith Olbermann.

The UK is starting to show more sense than the US where Al Gore and his movie are concerned.  Nothing symbolizes the holy writ of Global Warming better then An Inconvenient Truth.

Schools must warn of Gore climate film bias

Schools will have to issue a warning before they show pupils Al Gore’s controversial film about global warming, a judge indicated yesterday.

The move follows a High Court action by a father who accused the Government of ‘brainwashing’ children with propaganda by showing it in the classroom.

Stewart Dimmock said the former U.S. Vice-President’s documentary, An Inconvenient Truth, is unfit for schools because it is politically biased and contains serious scientific inaccuracies and ’sentimental mush’.

Finally!

Mr Justice Burton is due to deliver a ruling on the case next week, but yesterday he said he would be saying that Gore’s Oscar-winning film does promote ‘partisan political views’.

This means that teachers will have to warn pupils that there are other opinions on global warming and they should not necessarily accept the views of the film.

Since the movie is not steeped in science, that is only fair.

The case arises from a decision in February by the then Education Secretary Alan Johnson that DVDs of the film would be sent to all secondary schools in England, along with a multimedia CD produced by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs containing two short films about climate change and an animation about the carbon cycle.

David Miliband, who was Environment-Secretary when the school packs were announced, said at the time: ‘The debate over the science of climate change is well and truly over.’

But during the three-day hearing, the court heard that the critically-acclaimed film contains a number of inaccuracies, exaggerations and statements about global warming for which there is currently insufficient scientific evidence.

Newsbusters gets the details (emphasis original):