Wonderful, Wonderful Copenhagen

Altogether now:

Wonderful, wonderful Copenhagen
Friendly old girl of a town
'Neath her tavern light
On this merry night
Let us clink and drink one down

Representatives of 193 concerned nations have been clinking and drinking in this friendly old girl of a town. They have also been pouring tons of carbon into the atmosphere getting there and being there. They still have to fly back home.

But just when it all appeared to be for naught, in flies the Nobel Peace Prize champion to seize a world climate deal from the frigid jaws of inaction. I say frigid, because a ton of snow was dumped on all those tavern lights by a Mother Earth who was apparently not amused.

The President explains what wonderful thing was achieved there. From the New York Times:

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

Note the article "to," repeated three times in this short quote. Each instance represents one remove from any real action.

The three-page accord that Mr. Obama negotiated with the leaders of China, India, Brazil and South Africa and then presented to the conference did not meet even the modest expectations that leaders set for this meeting, notably by failing to set a 2010 goal for reaching a binding international treaty to seal the provisions of the accord.

Nor does the plan firmly commit the industrialized nations or the developing nations to firm targets for midterm or long-term greenhouse gas emissions reductions. The accord is nonetheless significant in that it codifies the commitments of individual nations to act on their own to tackle global warming.

Not only did COP15 fail to produce a treaty, it failed to produce an agreement to get a treaty.

Dropped from earlier drafts was language calling for a binding accord "as soon as possible," and no later than at the next meeting of the parties, in Mexico City next November.

This is theater of the absurd. Nothing whatsoever was achieved at Copenhagen, unless you count "codifying" an historic coming together to take responsibility to take action to confront global warming, absent any actual taking responsibility, or action, or confrontation, as an achievement.

Precisely if you take global warming seriously, you have to be contemptuous of this. If not, perhaps you can afford to be amused. What is certain is that the international community is completely divorced from reality. Global climate change is a serious issue and needs to be seriously addressed, regardless of what you think about the global warming orthodoxy. It cannot be addressed by setting utterly unrealistic goals and then declaring that pious statements, washed clean of any substance, constitute progress towards those goals.

Comments

[Stan Gibilisco]

If I'm not mistaken, China actually refused to be bound by any agreement to limit their carbon emissions -- because it would undermine their national sovereignty.

Communist China is starting to sound like Glenn Beck. May the wonders of this universe never cease to unfold!

[KB]

Stan: No one agreed to be bound by anything. There is no wonder in that.

[hari kotadia]

The Climate Lovers – Copenhagen – leave worth to be loved - “The United World”.

The United World.

Solution all in one.
Solution all in built.

Knowledgeable new born.

Flying lovers Copenhagen.
Roaming climate romance.

Curiously lost the track.
Open battle game war.

Traps/tricks counter act.
Wisdom voice back track.

How to open the heart?
Where, the natural love.

What some would say?
Lost that your mind.

Found free and fresh.

Memory access upgrade.
No hang up No disk crash.
Sectors arranged all intact.

No pressure no sugar.
Smartly moving graphs.

Side Report short vision.

Simplicity too evident.
Complexity un-designed.

Sure insure yes we can.
Change the world even.

Climate lovers Copenhagen.
Climate lovers earth around.

Found the magic lamp.

Solution all in built.
Solution all in one.

The United World.

Best regards,
Hari Kotadia

[Jim Meidinger]

If the misguided souls in Hopenhagen want "deniers' to take AGW seriously, then perhaps they should curb their emission spewing, so as to show that they themselves take it seriously.

[George Mason]

Very descriptive KB. As with most things the UN does, this allowed the participants to indulge in fine food and drink, be transported like potentates and engage in a lot of self congratulatory puffery. As with most of these confabs the best we can hope for is that no harm will come from it. It was also nice to see that Mother Nature (the greatest global warming denier of all)had her say.
As for Obamas participation, he allowed himself to be insulted by the Chinese and Indians with no display of diplomatic indignation or demand that the United States be respected.

[Canada Guy]

Copenhagen has failed. The UN has failed to address the most important crisis in human history. This is now the time for sanctions, boycotts and embargoes. A new alliance is needed. An alliance of hope and peace and justice must be built to oppose the axis of pollution, extinction and self destruction.

http://www.selfdestructivebastards.com/2009/12/beyond-copenhagen.html

[KB]

Thanks George.

Canada Guy: is pollution really the counterpart of hope? I think if you look fairly at your rhetoric, you will see it for what it is: the modern counterpart of apocalyptic religion. As I say, I think global climate change is worth taking seriously. There is no reason to believe it represents the "most important crisis in human history". It is likewise very dangerous to believe that a position on one question is enough to distinguish the forces of light from the forces of darkness.

But thanks for the comment.