AL GORE is not used to being interrupted. When the Nobel prize- winning filmmaker and former US Presidential candidate was repeatedly challenged after a talk he gave before an environmental journalists' conference in America earlier this year, the Irishman who questioned him had his microphone abruptly cut.

The testy exchange instantly became a sensation, with many in the American media wondering just who was the owner of that Northern brogue.

His name, we now know, is Phelim McAleer -- a film-maker from Omagh, Co Tyrone, who has been compared to Michael Moore, among others. Unlike Moore, however, McAleer and his wife Ann McElhinney, from Bundoran, Co Donegal, have been embraced by the American Right, earning praise and exposure from media demagogues like Bill O'Reilly, Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity.

A poll in the US revealed them to be the most popular conservative speakers after Limbaugh and Ann Coulter. The reason is simple. The Irish couple's documentary, Not Evil Just Wrong, rebuts a central maxim of Gore and liberal America: that global warming is bad and that the end of the world is nigh if we don't do something about it.

The film goes on to claim that the damage that would be wrought by anti-global warming measures are unjustified by science and would especially impoverish Third World countries. McElhinney and McAleer point to huge exaggerations on the part of environmental organisations such as Greenpeace, and heavily criticise the "sky is falling" rhetoric of Gore and his "allies in environmental extremism".

The documentary did not have a conventional theatrical release but was instead available to buy online, with purchasers urged to have screenings in their homes, schools or wherever they saw fit.

"Be part of the resistance," the couple wrote in a message on their website. "With your help we can bypass the barriers that mainstream media and Hollywood put up to stop you from hearing the truth."

Reaction to the film, which was three years in the making, has been mixed. Certainly the mainstream media did not ignore their message -- the couple were featured on everything from CNN to Fox News -- but while McAleer and McElhinney were lauded for providing a much-needed counterpoint to Gore's brand of environmentalism, others have pointed out that they use many of the same slickly rhetorical "tactics" favoured by Michael Moore, including "old movies, cartoons and class- based arguments".

Joe Romm, a senior fellow at the Centre for American Progress, called McAleer "a disinformer, denier, a liar". He derided the film as riddled with errors and called it "anti-environmental junk science".

There have also been more sinister reactions. The couple have been compared to Nazis, targeted with death threats, and received a letter which said, "You're so fond of pollution; I hope your children are born handicapped." Their website was also briefly brought down by hackers.

"Environmentalism is like a religion," says McElhinney, "and people have been unable to poke holes in our arguments so they have to resort to getting very personal. The science is not settled, but everything that is put out by organisations like Greenpeace is accepted as fact. Al Gore has become a billionaire from his green investments, but nobody seems to point out the conflict of interests there. Environmentalists like him do a great job of portraying themselves as the underdogs."

They feel that people need to be aware of the economic cost of environmentalism. Says McAleer: "I think there is more discussion of the subject in America than in Ireland, but what you need to understand is that the official stance on the environment is going to have a real effect: electricity bills will rise and the poorest will pay. It will hit people in their pockets. Going green was a folly of affluent Ireland."

The couple have also done work in Romania on the plight of orphans for Irish media outlets, and broke the story of an Irish couple who returned their adopted child to an orphanage when they had a baby of their own.

They estimate that 500,000 people have now seen their film, which was financed on a shoestring budget. They're hoping the huge exposure they have received in the American media will bring the film to an even wider audience.

"An Inconvenient Truth is now shown in schools and accepted as scientific fact" says McAleer, "and we believe there is a hunger out there for the other side of the story."

www.noteviljustwrong.com

Sunday Independent