Would it be better if he were rich and didn't bother to use his wealth to be as environmentally sound as he possibly can? Or are you arguing that he doesn't deserve to have more money than you?

Your post drips with resentment of the rich. When you say you're to the left of most people here, do you mean you want a complete and total redistribution of wealth, so that no one is rich or poor?

And of the hundreds of millions of houses in the US, Gore's is the second-highest rated!? Oookay. Call me crazy, but I'm betting my little hovel uses less energy than his.

Did you understand the article I linked to? The US Green Building Council doesn't rank every home in the US in numerical order, how the hell could they have the time or the manpower to do that? It has four levels of environmental soundness, like A through D on a report card, and anyone who wants them to rate a building can ask them to do so.

The Green Building Council's certification program has four levels, with platinum being the highest followed by gold. Gore's home was one of 14 to earn gold status and the only Tennessee home to earn any certification.

We all have to do what we can. Gore doesn't pretend that everyone is financially able to make the kinds of expensive technological improvements he has to cut his environmental impact. But he does point out that there are things everyone can do about this.

Do you bike, walk, or take the bus rather than drive? Use cloth bags at the grocery instead of plastic? Use compact fluorescents? Those too are stopgaps, until we restructure our entire political and economic system to build environmental sustainability into them; but they are stopgaps that anyone can use.

You seem to be more interested in slagging Gore and being angry that he has more money than you than anything else. Being poor is not an excuse for not trying to be environmentally sound. And attacking a man who spent thirty years bringing the environment to the world's attention does nothing to help matters.