Written By : John Hawkins

What better way could there be to mock Al Gore than to create an ice sculpture of him, shivering away the winter months as once again, for the 11th year in a row, global warming fails to materialize.

Al Gore can thank the Nobel Committee for honoring him with last winter’s Nobel Peace Prize.

He can also thank Fairbanks businessman Craig Compeau for what could be the farthest-north likeness of the former vice president: A 5-ton ice sculpture of a “shivering” Gore, created during a recent spell of bitterly cold weather in Alaska and aimed at confronting global-warming theories.

Compeau described himself as a “moderate” critic of those who “rabidly” believe that man-made emissions are contributing to a rise in global temperatures. Gore won his Nobel for raising awareness of global warming as one of the greatest challenges facing mankind.

“Be skeptical. Or not. But research it yourself,” Compeau told the roughly three dozen onlookers and reporters gathered at the corner at 10 a.m. Monday under gray skies. “There’s a lot on both sides.

Compeau unveiled the sculpture — created by a local artist Steve Dean — near the downtown Thrifty liquor store, where he said it will stay through March or “until it melts.

I do have one complaint about the ice sculpture: it doesn’t quite capture Gore somehow. Maybe if they had a speaker nearby that droned on in a dull monotone voice about polar bears and carbon credits while passers-by were forced by a government ordinance to give it money in order to insure that Alaska didn’t warm up in the summer, then I think it would really make people think “Al Gore.”

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