How often do you see Paul McCartney and Jack Welch in the same room? It's been a while since Jack Welch attended a McCartney concert, but tonight they were under one roof in front of one very large pipe organ.
Here in New York City , leaders from business, media and the environment came together to fete NRDC. Frances Beinecke, the president, looked great in a Stella McCartney outfit - appropriate since Stella was honored tonight for her longstanding adherence to environmental principles in her design work.
David Zaslav of Discovery Communications was also honored and the brass and talent from TV land came out including Alec Baldwin (the evening's host), Lorne Michaels, Matt Lauer, Seth Myers, David Faber, the Mythbuster guys and two of the captains from Deadliest Catch. Was looking for Tina Fey but did not see her.
Testimonial videos for NRDC's work from Mike Bloomberg, Gavin Newsom and others showed throughout the evening. Seth Myers brought the house down with a riff of jokes threatening that "for every joke that bombs, a polar bear will die."
There was a buzz in the room. DC is now pro-science. The awareness of the environment is riding high. The question is how can we channel all this talent, all this star power, into a force that makes a massive dent in the power structure of the country and the planet?
Solar and wind energy are still only 2% of the country's power. Even doubling or tripling this will still leave us with a very dirty, unhealthy power grid. What takes this to the kind of wave that the Beatles spread in this country and abroad all those years ago?