John Kerry: We Must Unite on Global Warming

[beachmom]

This is an opinion piece he wrote for AOL's sphere.com. I am sure you have all followed the events in Copehagen closely. It was in total dissaray and a circus. Obama was double crossed and lied to by the Chinese, so he had to burst into a meeting of the Chinese, South African, Indian, and Brazilian delegations to iron out a deal. A lot of netroots types have been writing red state like screeds against Barack Obama. But you know what? FDR did a lot of awful compromises during his time as POTUS as well, and it is my view that he is the nation's greatest President. I wonder if there were key members of Congress assisting FDR the whole time. No doubt there were. Like John Kerry.

http://www.sphere.com/opinion/article/opinion-we-must-hang-together-on-global-warming/19287313

Opinion: We Must Unite on Global Warming

(Dec. 18) -- Ben Franklin famously remarked, "We must all hang together, or assuredly, we shall all hang separately." Delegates from 193 nations who gathered at Copenhagen to craft a response to global climate change would be wise to remember these words from an old American patriot.

Unless the world's nations come together in a truly global effort – and quickly – then we will steadily increase the odds that each country will be left to suffer the consequences of climate change alone.

Two years ago at climate talks in Bali, a delegate from Papua New Guinea chastised the United States by saying, "If you are not willing to lead, then please, leave it to the rest of us, please get out of the way." Today, President Barack Obama and six Cabinet officials have come to Copenhagen to lead again and put America on the right side of history.

This administration has grasped the urgency and answered the call. In Copenhagen, America put forward a groundbreaking offer of a new climate financing fund for developing nations that make significant commitments to lower emissions.

I have no illusions that the Copenhagen agreement wasn't a whole lot. It was non-binding, it lacked specifics, etc. OTOH, President Obama couldn't come there with a bill signed on account of the snail pace of the Senate. So given that and some bad faith moves by the likes of Sudan and on a higher level China, this was a save that kept us in the game.

Read the rest of the opinion at the link.

[beachmom]

1. This article is worth reading of what Pres. Obama went through in Copenhagen

It's not my image of how these high level meetings are supposed to be. I credit Obama for salvaging the conference:

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5ge2OqwkoIhobJajPjIvUmAToARJgD9CMLVD00

Obama raced clock, chaos, comedy for climate deal
By CHARLES BABINGTON and JENNIFER LOVEN (AP) – 17 hours ago

WASHINGTON — It was almost unthinkable. The president of the United States walked into a meeting of fellow world leaders and there wasn't a chair for him, a sure sign he was not expected, maybe not even wanted.

Barack Obama didn't pause, however. "I'm going to sit by my friend Lula," he said, moving toward Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.

A Brazilian aide gave the U.S. president his chair, and Obama spent the next 80 minutes helping craft new requirements for disclosing efforts to fight global warming. Along with India, South Africa and Brazil, the key member in the room was China, which recently surpassed the U.S. as the world's top emitter of heat-trapping gasses.

At the table this time for China was Premier Wen Jiabao, not an underling as before. Obama was bent on striking a deal before flying home to snowbound Washington.

He would later hail the achievement as a breakthrough. But even Obama said there was much more to do, and climate authorities called Copenhagen's results a modest step in the global bid to curb greenhouse gasses that threaten to melt glaciers and flood coastlines.

Obama's 15-hour, seat-of-the-pants dash through Copenhagen was marked by doggedness, confusion and semi-comedy. Constrained by partisan politics at home, and quarrels between rich and poor nations abroad, he was determined to come home with a victory, no matter how imperfect.

Check out the whole article. It has a play by play of what happened. Fascinating stuff.