US shows masterly timing in climate talks

[dgriffin]

From Times Online
December 17, 2009


Analysis: US shows masterly timing in climate talks





The Americans have timed their interventions in the climate change talks to perfection.

By waiting until today to pledge support for the $100billion fund, the US appeared to be rescuing the whole process. It also ensured that all eyes turned to China to look for a reciprocal concession on independent monitoring of emissions reductions.

Until this morning, the US was being widely portrayed as the biggest obstacle to progress at Copenhagen, because of its weak target of cutting emissions by only 4 per cent by 2020, and its lack of commitment to a long-term fund to help poor countries cope with climate change.

President Obama last month deflected attention from the lack of ambition in his emissions target by announcing at the same time that he would attend the Copenhagen summit.

Today, Hillary Clinton repeated the trick, avoiding questions about whether the US would raise its emissions target by appearing to make a generous cash offer. The conference was so desperate for any good news that no one seemed to notice that she did not actually say how much the US would be contributing, nor where the money would be coming from.

Yet the US pledge on long-term finance could indeed prove a turning point because this conference is more about money than emissions reductions.

Wow! What timing can do! Plus 100 Billions of our tax dollars. (For even though we're saying private and public funding, guess what'll happen?)

www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/copenhagen/article6960419.ece

[gski]

Hey, anyone see my wallet?

[rodwilson]

WOW. do any of these morons really have ANY concept about the dollars behind the words?

[Ralph]

Nawwwww.........Not like they're spending their own money.

Hey! Gski, you see your wallet somewhere let me know.

I think mine may have played follow the leader with it.

[clarencebunsen]

C'mon Ralph. Someone must have a visual of our wallets lined up like lemmings jumping off a cliff into a sea of... never mind.

To be politically correct you will have include a few purses.

I think I can get by with just a change purse.

[gski]

Wait...maybe it was that little tiny scream, wimper I heard. You know the kind you hear when there's not much left anymore....

[dgriffin]

Steady, boys. She's our next President. I'll lay money on it ... someone else's, in the spirit of the times.

[gski]

thanks Dave, it'll have to be someone else's money...ours will be gone by then.

[dgriffin]

Mr. O forgot to keep his enemies closer when he chose Biden as veep and sent Hillary down the road to the State Department.

[gski]

Maybe he was hoping something would happen when she went overseas or that he wouldn't see her much if she was out of the country.

She'd definately be able to say she has foreign policy experience...

[Clipper]

How many people could have healthcare for 100 billion? Uh how many AMERICANS that is.

Bring the damn polar bears to the US and if they get hungry, tell them that illegal aliens taste just like baby seals. Better yet, tell them that politicians make a hell of a dessert, LOL.

Something wrong with a president that doesn't even sneeze at such a donation to an international cause, but has to take a week or two to decide whether he wants to fund reinforcments for our troops in battle.

[gski]

Clipper, first, feeding the polar bars politicians would kill them and it'd be inhumane treatment of an animal. Eating all that poisonous meat.

Second, green is the president's cause so he'll give whatever he feels is necessary, afterall, it's not his money, at least the way he continues to spend it.

He'll have even more to spend once health care goes through.

[stoney]

Copenhagen, Denmark (CNN) -- President Obama announced what he called a "meaningful and unprecedented" climate change deal with China and other key nations that was expected to be sealed before the president headed home from the Copenhagen summit late Friday.

"For the first time in history, all major economies have come together to accept their responsibility to take action to confront the threat of climate change," Obama told reporters.

The president said he met with leaders from India, China, Brazil and South Africa, and "that's where we agreed ... to set a mitigation target to limit warming to no more than 2 degrees Celsius."

It's a nonbinding goal, and the emissions targets "will not be by themselves sufficient to get to where we need to get by 2050," Obama said. However, he added that it is a first step, and that for many countries "this is going to be the first time in which even voluntary they offered up mitigation targets."

"I think that it was important to essentially get that shift in orientation moving," Obama said.


The president said he believes it's necessary that the countries get to a legally binding treaty, but said, "If we just waited for that, we would not make any progress."

Earlier, a senior Obama administration official said, "No country is entirely satisfied with each element but this is a meaningful and historic step forward and a foundation from which to make further progress. We thank the emerging economies for their voluntary actions and especially appreciate the work and leadership of the Europeans in this effort."

Critics of the U.N. Climate Change Conference have said that without specific commitments from the leaders to actually cut carbon emissions it would be difficult to reach any target.

The deal calls on nations to submit their "concrete commitments" into an appendix attached to the agreement to specifically lay out each country's intentions for climate change, Obama said. Those commitments will be subjected to an international "consultation and analysis" that will help foster accountability among the nations.

"It will not be legally binding, but what it will do is allow for each country to show to the world what they're doing," Obama said, "and there will be a sense on the part of each country that we're in this together, and we'll know who is meeting and who is not meeting, the mutual obligations that have been set forth."

Another senior administration official had said the precise details of the agreement were still in some flux, so it was unclear whether the final version would include language that was in earlier drafts aimed at forcing nations to set legally binding targets for reducing emissions.

The president worked behind the scenes on getting a vote among key nations -- including China and India -- to approve the agreement before taking it to the wider group for a vote, according to the official.

The first official added Obama would leave Copenhagen shortly after addressing the media about the tentative deal in order to return to Washington before a major snowstorm hits.

[Ralph]

And all this means....................

[dgriffin]

Dec 20, 2009 2:32:59 GMT -5 Ralph said:

And all this means....................

]

It means Stoney has gone green on us. She plans to sit around in the dark, sitting close to the tiny heater that burns junk mail and anything arriving from the Republican National Committee.

Good thing she has the whip to drive those little squirrels running round and round to power the Internet connection.