Green Footprints?

[TW]

I got this in an email:

A Tale of Two Houses

Probably won't hear the environmentalists or the national media talking about this.


House #1 A 20 room mansion ( not including 8 bathrooms ) heated by natural gas. Add on a pool (and a pool house) and a separate guest house, all heated by gas. In one month this residence consumes more energy than the average American household does in a year. The average bill for electricity and natural gas runs over $2400. In natural gas alone, this property consumes more than 20 times the national average for an American home. This house is not situated in a Northern or Midwestern 'snow belt' area. It's in the South.


House #2
Designed by an architecture professor at a leading national university. This house incorporates every 'green' feature current home construction can provide. The house is 4,000 square feet (4 bedrooms ) and is nestled on a high prairie in the American southwest. A central closet in the house holds geothermal heat-pumps drawing ground water through pipes sunk 300 feet into the ground.

The water (usually 67 degrees F.) heats the house in the winter and cools it in the summer. The system uses no fossil fuels such as oil or natural gas and it consumes one-quarter electricity required for a conventional heating/cooling system. Rainwater from the roof is collected and funneled into a 25,000 gallon underground cistern. Wastewater from showers, sinks and toilets goes into underground purifying tanks and then into the cistern. The collected water then irrigates the land surrounding the house. Surrounding flowers and shrubs native to the area enable the property to blend into the surrounding rural landscape.

HOUSE #1 is outside of Nashville, Tennessee; it is the abode of the 'environmentalist ' Al Gore.

HOUSE #2 is on a ranch near Crawford, Texas; it is the residence the of the President of the United States,
George W. Bush.

An 'inconvenient truth.'


You can verify it at: http://www.snopes.com/politics/bush/house.asp

[Full Quiver]

Though the facts may be right the pics are not. Al's 20 room mansion is in Belle Meade, a very wealthy area of Nashville, and the house shown is not the one described. In fact the one shown is only one story (maybe a basement). You don't find wore out, gravel driveways in Belle Meade.

The Bush house pictured is the guest home on his ranch from what I understand. The link to snopes shows a different Bush home, the one described. The one pictured is not 4,000 sq. ft.

[stevenson]

Haha! I should send that to my parents who are die-hard democrats!

[JanB]

"Full Quiver"

The Bush house pictured is the guest home on his ranch from what I understand. The one pictured is not 4,000 sq. ft.

I agree with Full Quiver, this is probably where one of the workers live. I am sure the President does not have to stay in that house. We have been as close to the President's Crawford Ranch as one is allowed to get. What we could view was nothing like this picture. No, I am not a democrat. I am a property owner in Texas. We are a prideful bunch and would only want our native son to have the best Texas White House ever. After 9/11, you are not allowed to go as close to the ranch, as you once could.

[pastorables]

This is the real Gore home and the Gore's have supposedly spent several thousand dollars to make the home more GREEN.

[Full Quiver]

Though I don't agree with Al on global warming I will say he has installed a serious solar energy system at his Belle Meade home.

[TW]

FQ,
You are correct about the pictures (but they are the ones that came with the email). The descriptions are accurate in the amount of energy used at each locale, the Belle Meade mansion and the Crawford ranch. You are however not quite as accurate in describing Bell Meade as "a very wealthy area of Nashville." The fact is that Belle Meade is an independent city, a political entity unto itself. It has it's own Mayor, Board of Commissioners, Police Department, City Court, and Public Works department. It is one of the few cities in Davidson county that did not relinquish their legal status as a city when Nashville and Davidson County merged to form Metropolitan Nashville Davidson County. To be more accurate, Belle Meade is a city located within Metropolitan Nashville Davidson County.


TW
*I know that it's nit pickin, but I'm so good at it. *

[Full Quiver]

You are correct about that and they are completely surrounded by Metro Nashville. Some folks stuff don't stink if you can agree with that. Just another sign that they don't have gravel driveways.

What I find interesting is that snopes said it was real. Snopes is wrong here and quite possibly could be wrong much more of the time.

[forestwalker]

What I find interesting is that snopes said it was real. Snopes is wrong here and quite possibly could be wrong much more of the time.

The Snopes entry doesn't include the photos. The facts are correct.

[forestwalker]

A Tale of Two Families

Family 1
In 1981, he dumped his first wife for wife number 2, while wife 1 was in the hospital undergoing cancer treatment. He famously visited wife 1 in the hospital where she was recovering from surgery for uterine cancer to discuss details of the divorce. He later resisted paying alimony and child support for his two daughters, causing a church to take up a collection. He and wife 2 divorced in December, 1999 after she found out about his long-running affair with his congressional aide. He asked wife 2 for the divorce by phoning her on Mother's Day, 1999. He married wife 3 in August, 2000, and left his congregation over the pastor's criticism of his divorces.

Family 2
The youngest of six (and only daughter) in a conservative Catholic Italian-American family, she attended the Institute of Notre Dame high school and Trinity (Women's) College. She married in 1963 and has enjoyed a happy and successful 45-year marriage. She and her husband have five children and seven grandchildren.

Family #1 is the decimated remains of the family headed by the archon of Republican family values, Newt Gingrich.

Family #2 is the happy and healthy family of Speaker Pelosi.



Pointing to the hypocrisies of the elites who push various agendas feels good but it doesn't say much about the agendas themselves.

[sweetpea]

And what does that have to do with George Bush and Al Gore.

[one love]

all i know is that would be the smallest 20 room mansion i have ever seen and the other house dont look 400 ft either

[JanB]

What I find interesting is that snopes said it was real. Snopes is wrong here and quite possibly could be wrong much more of the time.

I am beginning to wonder...

[TW]

In one of my rare efforts to be fair to Al Gore I offer the following:

The first reports of Gores energy consumption were made by the Tennessee Center For Policy Research, a conservative think tank. They reported that in 2006 Gore used 221,000 kilowatt hours. The AP (Associated Press) investigated and found that number to be inflated, Gore used 191,000 kilowatt hours. This was compared to the 15,600 kilowatt hours the average house in Nashville used. Although his house is about 4 times larger than the average new home (2400 sq, ft.), his energy usage was twelve times the normal. That's just for the electricity.

Now as far as the picture of house #1 is concerned, I did some research. That is Al Gore's farm located just outside of Carthage, TN.. Full Quiver commented on the gravel drive. Actually if you are serious about protecting the environment a gravel drive would be one of the best driveways to install. There would be no oils from the asphalt, or lime from the concrete leaching into the ground.


TW

[RamboPreacher]

What I find interesting is that snopes said it was real. Snopes is wrong here and quite possibly could be wrong much more of the time.

I am beginning to wonder...

not me.
they are not wrong here, as noted. the added pictures were the only part that was incorrect. remember that snopes information didn't have the pictures; if it did, it probably would have noted that as well.

With that said, do I completely rely on snopes? not really. I usually just assume that ALL (unsolicited,) forwarded emails are wrong/bad/evil/junk, and go to the trash can.