Want to visit the South Pole?

I’ve got a great idea! Let’s climb into a private airplane, just the ten of us, with our wives or husbands. The uniformed staff will carry our bags and serve drinks, dinner, and breakfast. We'll jet off to Australia, where we’ll dive and snorkel on the Great Barrier Reef. Then we’ll ride a cable car through the rain forest, visit a penguin rookery, and to cap it all fly to the South Pole.

Yes! And the best part? This will all be paid for by the American taxpayer. Again, yes! The only catch is that you must first be elected to Congress (it helps if you’re a Democrat, but it’s not an absolute requirement) and you must have the gall to pass this off as a fact-finding trip with respect to the media obsession of the day, to wit: global warming.

Well, come on. Wouldn’t you want to do something about global warming, if it gave you the opportunity to have the mother of all vacations and to leave a carbon footprint the size of the moon?

Brody Mullins and T.W. Farnam tell the story in the Wall Street Journal. Since you weren't invited, and since you picked up the estimated $500,000 tab, you really ought to read it. Blue skies! – Dan Ford