Gore discusses Live Earth on CNN

This video clip is from CNN's Larry King Live, where former Vice President Al Gore appeared last night to talk about his effort to fight global warming and save the environment through the Live Earth event.

During the interview, Gore discussed how the idea of having this 24-hour worldwide event originated. He also talked about how he personally contacted each one of the performing artists so they would become part of this global spectacle.

Gore also announced that in addition to the cities already announced, there will be a special performance in Antarctica, while also hinting at a surprise location (which was today discovered to be the U.S. capital).

Here are a few excerpts of the interview in case you missed it:

Larry King: How did this massive thing come about?
Al Gore: ... It's the launch of a three-year campaign to get the message of the climate crisis and the solutions to the climate crisis to every person on Earth so that we can move across the political tipping point beyond which everybody in every country puts pressure on their leaders to make this the top priority and solve the climate crisis.

We’re asking all of the 2 billion people estimated to be in the audience Saturday, to sign the Seven-Point Pledge that embodies the solution to the climate crisis, including putting pressure on your country no matter where you live in the world, to sign and join an international treaty within two years that cuts global warming pollution by 90% in the developing countries and by more than half worldwide in time for the next generation to inherit a healthier Earth.

…The Earth's climate really is in great jeopardy. Some of the leading scientists in the world have announced that we may have as little as 10 years in which to make major changes lest we lose the chance to have and retrieve the favorable climate balance on which human civilization depends.

Larry King: What do you want to see accomplished?
Al Gore: I'd like to see all 2 billion people in the audience sign the Seven-Point Pledge and become part of the solution to the climate crisis. I hope it gets the attention of the world in a way that we've never been able to do in the past and deliver the facts about the climate crisis and the solution to the crisis.

Larry King: Shanghai, China is considered one of the world's major polluters. Why go there?
Al Gore: Because they need to be part of the solution. China and the United States are the two biggest sources of global warming pollution.(But we also) both have the opportunity to invest in the new, cleaner, more efficient technologies that will allow continued improvements in our quality of life.

The future for every generation after ours is at risk. Incidentally, temperatures in many parts of the country have reached all-time records. Almost half of the US is in drought or near-drought conditions, so some of the problems that scientists have said we should watch out for because they are associated with global warming are beginning to happen- the stronger storms, the sea levels rise, diseases from the tropics moving into the areas where more people live, the melting of the ice...

A new study says that the North Polar Ice Cap is now melting three times faster than the most pessimistic projections were just a few years ago and could be completely gone in as little as 35 years. But we can still save it if we act quickly, and that's what the Live Earth concerts are all about- to get past the naysayers and the cynics and the carbon polluters and instead, lay the truth before the people of this country and the world and define it properly as a moral issue. A lot of it depends on doing the right thing now, while we still have the chance.