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Andrew Revkin, Dot Earth blogger for the New York Times, seems to be despairing that his award-winning journalism still hasn’t made everybody stop driving cars and using microwave ovens and turning on lights at night. Things have gotten so bad that he’s resorted to the medium of… folk music.

Here’s Revkin performing his own composition, “Liberated Carbon”:

A sample of the lyrics:

It took a thousand generations for our species to rise.
But gathering and hunting was no way to get by.
We yearned to burn more than dung and sticks.
Then someone came along and said, “Hey, try lighting this.”
He opened up the ground and showed us coal and oil.
He said, “Come liberate some carbon. It’ll make your blood boil.”

Is that really what it does? Must be! And then the chorus:

Liberated carbon, it’ll spin your wheels.
Liberated carbon it’ll nuke your meals.
Liberated carbon, it’ll turn your night to day.
Come on and liberate some carbon, babe, it’s the American way.

Apparently, these are all supposed to be bad things.

Revkin is so proud of the tune, he recorded a new version and put it up on his blog. Along with a picture of him performing with noted scientist Pete Seeger. You know how some people have certain stereotypes about the New York Times? Isn’t that silly?

Here, I came up with some more words for the nice man to sing:

Ya know, they made a hockey stick where there was once a straight line
And when they started gettin’ questions, they yelled, “Hide the decline!”
The lack of evidence will never leave ‘em defenseless
As long as they remember: keep repeatin’ “consensus”

Liberated carbon makes our society possible
Liberated carbon, it’s eminently fossilible
Liberated carbon, lightin’ up the home of the brave
Come on and liberate some carbon, babe, or f*** off and live in a cave

(Hat tip: Tim Blair)

P.S. Revkin’s a good sport, gotta give him that.