HOT AIR AND GLOBAL WARMING

Yesterday's front page of the Independent (UK) featured an image of an island caused by global warming. P. 2 then devotes lots of space to Michael McCarthy's "Environment Alert". It seems that the easiest job in journalism today is that of environment editor, as there is always something happening which can be reported on from the comfort of an armchair in E14. They used to report from the comfort of an armchair in EC4, but rent was easier in E14...Fleet Street now has no newspapers, they've all moved out to some part of London you need a passport to get to.

The article by McCarthy is put to ridicule by the big ad for a big car on p. 3 of that august publication, a Renault Scenic to be exact. So between McCarthy's hot air, the exhaust fumes of this behemoth vehicle, and the energy used in cutting down trees to make the paper for this paper, we are helping the Earth to heat up.

Granted, the Independent has some great writers working for it, Robert Fisk, Patrick Cockburn, Genevieve Roberts, but McCarthy does not hold a candle to any of them. They ought to get a proper environment editor who just might do some real research on hemp and natural fibres. BTW, if they want a story, they ought to have gotten out of bed this morning and taken notes outside Sainsburys in Camden, where real environmentalists protested the sale of the Anya Hindmarch cotton bags. Other journalists were there, and coverage will appear shortly on this site and schmoontherun.