How many Cambridge WARMmongers does it take to change a lightbulb?

"No, no! You can't! That would be just too mean! And you know what the bumper sticker says: 'mean people suck!.' "

The preceding was a direct quote from my conscience( conservatives do have consciences, you know). Let me explain what occasioned these rare qualms. In line at the supermarket, browsing Cambridge's august paper of record, The Cambridge Comical, my eyes were caught by this intriguing headline:

Group fights global warming on the neighborhood level

Well that's good news, I mused, now that Cambridge has joined the fray, GLOBAL WARMING hasn't got a chance. Especially with such fearsome foes as "Greenport, Cambridge’s first neighborhood environmental group," leading the charge.

And how does this stalwart group propose to save Cambridge? Light bulbs, yup, light bulbs - who woulda thought it. According to the Cambridge Crockical:

Greenport’s most recent initiative is encouraging Cambridgeport residents to switch to compact fluorescent light bulbs that last longer and use up to 75 percent less energy than a regular light bulb. This month, they received a donation of 1,000 CFLs from NSTAR, the dominant electric company in the state.

And, get this:

The changing of 1,000 bulbs in Cambridgeport will save enough energy to light almost 20 homes for a year, according to those statistics.

Wow, this is really big league stuff. Everybody knows that if GLOBAL WARMING isn't stopped, and soon, Cambridgeport will be the first to go under when the water level of the Charles River rises.

"Now there you go again"(that pesky conscience!) "you start kinda straightfaced, but then you lapse into facile mockery. Don't be so darn mean."

But you must understand, I pleaded. It's unfair. It's facile because it's just so easy. There are just too many tempting targets here in Cambridgeland.