US Considers Scaled-Back Climate Deal - Congressional Inaction Holds Up Global Commitment
by Matthew McDermott, New York, NY 
on 11.13.09
photo: blakeimeson via flickr.
I have to admit there are some days when I have trouble holding back my frustration following the painful progress of the climate change negotiations, and this is one of those times. The Washington Post reports that the Obama administration is looking at endorsing a short-term climate pact and pushing off stronger action until next year. Essentially because Congress can't get off its delaying, half-measured haunches, pull its head out of the the political sand, and do what science says is required to, well, not destroy the climate for us and future generations:
Todd Stern, US special envoy on climate change, was quoted as saying,
An interim operational deal is not meant to be seen as a substitute for a real agreement. It's meant to be seen as substantive building blocks to a full, legal agreement, and perhaps the best chance of getting such an agreement.
Well, at least it's not a substitute for a real agreement...
US Exceptionalism Rears Its Ugly Head
The Washington Post also points out the part that really gets me fired up. This isn't Stern, rather the original article author: "Any global pact would be postponed until next year when it would be constrained by whatever domestic climate legislation Congress enacts."
Let's remember that the legislation being pondered in Congress falls so far short of the science that it'd be belly-laughable if the situation weren't so dire and ultimately tragic.
And constrained by Congressional legislation?!? We're talking about the future of the planet and the US falls back on its historical position of US exceptionalism when it comes to international law.
Not wanting to be bound in any way -- and ignoring the climate rope around its neck and the tipping-point hangman waiting to open the trapdoor -- we fall back on painfully myopic ways of thinking... to the ultimate detriment of us all, starting with those people in the world who did little or nothing to create the situation.
A collective psychological defect on the part of US lawmakers is going to doom us. Shameful.
Read a more measured account of it all: Washington Post
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