America A Rogue Nation At Buenos Aires Climate Talks

[hatrack]

The spectacle of the United States single-handedly destroying the mid-December meeting in Buenos Aires on global warming offered further proof, if such were needed, that the world needs to confront this rogue state. Representatives of 200 nations had gathered to develop a plan for further reducing greenhouse gases (GHG) after 2012, when the Kyoto Protocol expires.

According to press reports, the Bush Administration's recalcitrance shocked and dismayed even longtime friends and allies like Australia. U.S. obstructionism ranged from the sublime (insisting that the Conference change the phrase "climate change" to the more ambiguous "climate variability") to the ridiculous (strongly backing Saudi Arabia's request for compensation for lost revenue resulting from reduced global oil consumption). Our nation's antics so infuriated many participants that an exasperated Alden Meyer of the Union of Concerned Scientists told Reuters, "Frankly, it might be a lot easier to do it without the U.S. and the Saudis in the room."

U.S. antagonism is not going to change anytime soon. Keep in mind that only a few months after the Kyoto Protocol was sent to countries for ratification in early 1997, the U.S. Senate passed a resolution by the astonishing vote of 95-0 opposing ratification unless poor developing countries were required to achieve similar GHG reductions within the same time frame.

EDIT

If that should occur, one can easily imagine that frustration with this country, coupled with the already existing and growing hostility to our international actions, could lead nations to take punitive actions. What might these be? One would be to prohibit U.S. companies from participating in the rapidly growing global carbon credit trading system. A tiny private system already exists that allows a company in Canada, say, to buy carbon credits by paying farmers in Iowa to change their cultivation practices so they build up carbon in the soil. Kyoto promises a thriving international exchange. Kyoto signatories are allowed to meet their greenhouse gas reduction commitments by buying credits, that is, by buying greenhouse gas reductions that occur outside their countries. But the rules appear to allow this only with other Kyoto signatories or with developing nations."

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http://www.alternet.org/envirohealth/20833/

[rfkrfk]

1. the annual week at Bernie's, has become tiresome

ditch the US corpse
You have to start somewhere.
The beginning, IMO, should be with the 100 plus
that have ratified,
not one or two deadbeats.