Journal: Live Earth shows us with what the road to hell is paved

Check your tire pressure. Replace your incandescent bulbs with florescent bulbs. Recycle. Use Biodiesel. These were some of the messages of Live Earth. 150 artists on 7 continents coming together, apparently to tell us "Do as I say, not as I do." How many of those artists own palatial mansions? How many of them own mansions that they staff and maintain but rarely visit? How many own or lease private jets? Limousines? Pool-sized jacuzzis?

I have three words for those who organized the Live Earth event; shame on you. An event to raise awareness of global warming should have been greener. Before they hold another, I'd like to offer a few suggestions on how to better keep with the theme.

• Instead of encouraging 2 billion people to sit for hours in front of many millions of television sets, encourage them to turn them off for the day.
• Instead of a small number of large concerts, organize a large number of small concerts and more evenly distribute them about the globe. Then fewer people and less equipment will need to be driven, flown and hauled hundreds or thousands of miles.
• Use local talent. Rock and pop stars tend to be the poster children for wretched excess. Messages like "Keep your tires properly inflated to save gasoline" carry more weight when delivered by people who carpooled to the event than they do when delivered by people who flew in on private jets. And yes, I read about your transporting artists to the venue in low-emission, alternative fuel vehicles but I know full well that you didn't drive to Madonna's mansion and pick her up.
• Lose the tires. I get that you were trying to show that you were recycling something, but moving truckloads of tires takes trucks. And the truckloads of steel holding up the tires? Yeah, more trucks.
• Lose a bunch of the lights. All those tires had lights that didn't serve any practical purpose. It rings hollow when you tell people that they can do with less power when they're trying to stay warm when you're wasting a bunch of power trying to look cool. And yes, I read that you were powering the stages with clean energy, but whatever that might be, using less is still greener.
• Lose the giant video displays and anything else that isn't absolutely necessary in order for people to enjoy music or hear your message. The less you have to move or power, the more fuel you'll save.
• Set up a web site on which people can discuss other ways to make the event greener. You talked a lot about what we could do to reduce carbon emissions but as far as I can tell you didn't solicit our input and it appears to me that you would have benefited from it.

Those are off the top of my head. How else might Live Earth have better kept with its theme?