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US Opposes G8 Climate Proposals
elrond writes "The US appears to have summarily rejected draft proposals for G8 members that would have agreed to tougher measures for controlling greenhouse gas emissions. The BBC reports that leaked documents have indicated the positions of the various world powers, from the timetable-setting of Germany to the US's intractable stance. Red ink comments on the documents hint at the US's irritation: 'The US still has serious, fundamental concerns about this draft statement. The treatment of climate change runs counter to our overall position and crosses 'multiple red lines' in terms of what we simply cannot agree to ... We have tried to tread lightly but there is only so far we can go given our fundamental opposition to the German position.'"
This world is fragile in our hands.
surely its only a matter of time before europe imposes trade tarrifs on US goods? Otherwise they are basically subsidising US industry, operating with far looser environmental standards. I'm sure the US will complain and 'retaliate', but I don't see any other option in the long term.
The overall position of the US at this time is that people and dinosaurs lived together in harmony and that soon George the idiot and all his money-grubbing pals will fly into the sky up to heaven. Global warming and the changing environment is a problem for those of us LEFT BEHIND to deal with. So as dubya says "What me worry?"
Hey, you think your house is cool?
this news is sadly unsurprising.
when will the US finally step up and take something other than short-term, economic driven decisions concerning the environment?
~~~ Paf. Le chien.
the world is more like a single civilization these days, any sanctions brought by europe would have far reaching consequences for the world economy. while I do think that the only way to get the top C02 producers' attention is to hit their wallet, I dont think sanctions are it. mainly because sanctions interrupt the global economy not just america's. but hey if there is a way, I hope they do it- I am sick of politicians and industry putting their own monetary goals ahead of life on Earth- something must be done.
Sigs are too short to say anything truly profound so read the above post instead.
The US still has serious, fundamental concerns about this draft statement.
Correction: The US Government.
Here's a related bit of news that may make you feel better.
An investigation at the Department of the Interior (Manages US wildlands) has resulted in numerous resignations and may result in real domestic reform.
Accusations from leading scientists include:
Elimination of data regarding imperiled species in resource rich areas
Rubber stamping of logging permits on public lands without due process
Improper contact between dept administrators and corporate interests including the allowance of corporate influence on impact assessments
All of the allegations center around administrators who were placed by the Bush administration. Several highly placed scientists have left for the private sector and there may be an expose published. The elimination of data was egregious. Apparently data was not only removed from official reports, but other data was *actually* changed and whistleblowers were railroaded out.
Bet you five bucks this becomes a campaign issue if Gore decides to run.
We don't suppose you can spare some rice and some oil, by any chance? Only the desert now stretches from the West Coast to Chicago and we have a bit of a food problem. And the Canadians have built a big fence along the border and won't let us in as none of us want to mow their lawns or harvest their oranges.
We can offer plenty of stuff in exchange. How about some strategic nuclear missiles? Or some fighter aircraft? We've got plenty of them. Unfortunately, turns out they don't work too well if you want to invade another country and make people grow food for you.
Pining for the fjords
That's exactly right. I read a Gore Vidal essay explaining how Regan was absolutely convinced that the biblical end of times would be within his lifetime. It's scary to think how such beliefs influence national policy. Vidal also proposed that no president should be elected who holds a literal view of the bible. I wonder how much the Christian Right influences Bush's environmental policy.
Why bother looking out for future generations if the leader of the free world believes we'll all be getting beamed up in a few years?
it is the usa, a republic, not a democracy
Democracy: government by the people; a form of government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised directly by them or by their elected agents under a free electoral system.
Republic: a state in which the supreme power rests in the body of citizens entitled to vote and is exercised by representatives chosen directly or indirectly by them.
(source for both defs, dictionary.com)
The difference is what, precisely? Other than that "republic" is a more precise term than "democracy" which is somewhat vague about the exact mechanism, nothing relevant.
The thing is not inly if "greenhouse gasses" affect the climate. It's also about outrageous and irresponsible use of resources. It's about pollution.
You don't pollute your own house, so stop polluting this world.
Although I don't live in your house and couldn't care less about what you do there, I and about 6 billion people live in this world so let's keep it clean.
Privacy is terrorism.
"... why should we wreck our economy over something that not everyone can agree on..."
Who says it would wreck the economy? Automakers cried wolf in the same fashion in the 70's and 80's when rasied MPG requirements and imposed the environmental standards that required catalytic converters and cleaner fuels. "Oh," said they, "it will cause the collapse of the industry as we know it and cause irreparable harm to the US economy."
Didn't happen.
At worst cleaning up our act and imposing higher CAFE standards "might" impact corporate profits for a quarter or two. But in return we get a cleaner environment, less polution, and less dependence on foreign oil imports. Not to mention spawning new industries to provide those solutions and technologies.
And that's a bad thing... how?
Any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so.
The implementation is everything. Democracy goes back to the Greek demokratia and takes as its model the 5th-century B.C. Athenian democracy, in which the people administered the government as directly as possible. It was marked by wild policy shifts, especially after the death of Pericles, and self-destructed under the pressure of the Peloponnesian war. A perusal of the Federalist papers and Madison's other writings will demonstrate how eager the American founders were to avoid pure democracy.
A republic is loosely modeled on the Roman republic, even though the Roman system, like the Spartan constitution to which the ancients compared it, was only superficially similar to modern republics like the U.S. The founders nonetheless saw in Rome (and Sparta) many ideas worthy of imitation: separation of powers; aspects of monarchy (president), aristocracy (legislature), and democracy (the voting public); term limits.
The key distinction in the modern sense is this: while Americans do elect their representatives, presidents, some judges, and local officials, they do not do so directly. The process is made indirect through the party system and the electoral college. And once the representatives, senators, and president are in power they are not immediately subject to the whims of those who elected them. The idea, for better or worse, is to introduce a measure of stability and keep the government out of the hands of the unwashed masses.
Those who argue that the people's representatives must obey the volatile wishes of their constituencies once in office would do well to read more about Athens and learn where that road leads.
I mean, why don't they listen to the USA. Our position is that since the earth is only 3000 years old, there isn't enough long term data to determine if climage change is even being caused by humans. Not only that, why would God let the planet get too hot? It just doesn't make any sense.
As the single biggest waster of energy in the world and a country where average miles per gallon figures are actually dropping, I would hope that a bigger stick would be applied to the US.
Do you hassle all your neighbours equally, or just the ones who are letting their dog shit on your lawn?
Even if we come up with a huge breakthrough on the energy production front,
How about just improving the efficency of your economy to the same level that other people have?
China and India will both be producing 5-10 times more emissions than they are today
Gothcha, two wrongs make a right.
They aren't covered by this agreement at all.
Oh, I thought you said you didn't know the specifics of the agreement.
global warming still just as much of a problem and the developed world has no economy left,
Hey, crazy thought, but couldn't you just not buy all that crap China is producing? I mean, if you're that worried about their economy overtaking yours maybe you should stop paying them to do it? Plus, since they're a totally corrupt and evil country, you'd even be acting ethically. Just a thought. We could all make a small start by not sending any teams to the Chinese Olympics.
TWW
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
The funny thing is, that Christianity has been perverted to a big degree, I dont know where those groups derive their believe from, it cannot be in the words written down.
Lets sum those words up, there was a guy 2000 years ago, he went into confrontation against people who had strict religious rules, he sided with hookers poor people etc, and called the rich ones being not his people. He went into opposition against things which would make the life miserable for ordinary people, and he was in his core message not really a very capitalistic guy (some people nowadays probably would call him communistic, I just would say he puts the people in the core of his message not the money)
He also was absolutely opposed to any war or violence whatsover even dismissing defense as valid form of violence.
Now lets face it, if a guy with such a message would go out into the crowds nowadays, how long do you think his life expectancy would be. Probably three years as well, the killer, probably some corporate sponsored guy, or a religious zealot, who wants to the defend the words of jesus (and does in fact do totally the opposite). Jesus probably would go in total confrontation with any right wing cristian groups like he did with the jewis zealots in the past, and probably would call them severe names out of anger, he also would go into opposition with lots of governments including our own, and generally our society of self righteousness while we bring lots of misery onto the rest of the planet.
I dont think the message he would bring us would be very comforting for us!
Further, if the G8 did reduce emissions by 50% by 2050 (below 1990 levels... um... ok, so we reduce our energy consumption by 50% and don't completely destroy our economy how?).
Hey, remember. Emissions!=energy production. I could easily drop our emmissions by 50% and increase energy production. Nuclear power is our friend.
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
Unfortunately, the political will to make real changes seem to be lacking, not only in the US.
Ultimately, everyone's in favor of doing something to help our environment, but there's nearly always something they care more about, and very few people vote on the basis of a politician's stand on the environment.
And, perhaps more importantly. With democracy the way it is, politicians profit (get reelected) by looking no more than 4 years into the future. Any good they do which doesn't show significant results before the next election simply doesn't matter to the professional politician. Politics is a job, and securing your job is one of the greatest motivations for most people.
Making the drastic changes required to slow global warming significantly has a very high political cost - more unemployment as polluting businesses go out of business, and a great deal of money taken from other posts that will be obvious much earlier, and influence the next election a great deal.
We're all environmentalists, but when the interest rates start increasing, when your house falls in value, and you're in danger of losing your job... You don't vote for environmentalism, you vote for your own short term best interests.
And I fear that by the time the global climate becomes the immidiate problem for a majority of the population, it will be far too late to do anything effective to change it.
I'm a dreamer, the world is my playpen. But hey, I'm a serious person, I can't dream all the time.
"North Americans plant billions of trees each year. There is no reason why the rest of the world can't do the same."
This somehow remembers me some cute Maire Antoinette saying on pre-revolution days: "if there's no bread, let them eat cake!"
Please, remember how Marie Antoinette ended.
Someone should come right out and call a shovel a shovel.
The U.S.A. is essentially an international criminal state on this issue,
and it's time that the rest of the world agreed to take some serious
punitive measures.
I think sanctions would be a good first step.
"No oil for you!"
('til you learn how to use it like a responsible adult.)
Where are we going and why are we in a handbasket?
"North Americans plant billions of trees each year. There is no reason why the rest of the world can't do the same."
This somehow remembers me some cute Maire Antoinette saying on pre-revolution days: "if there's no bread, let them eat cake!"
Please, remember how Marie Antoinette ended.
Clever, but a non-sequitir. I imagine your +4 rating has more to do with your historical reference and playing to the anti-american-they'll-get-theirs-someday crowd then you actually having a point.
Trees are a renewable resource that can be predictably grown and harvested- it's just that the season isn't months, it's decades. I see no good reason that we can't expect the rest of the world to act accordingly when it's something we do routinely in the US.
Unless, of course, your opinion is that the rest of the world is too stupid and impatient to treat wood like any other crop.
Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms should be the name of a store, not a government agency.
Did she get to eat cake?
- These characters were randomly selected.
Trees are the ultimate renewable resource because the more you harvest, the more area you have to replant them. It's not like, say, fish, where the more you harvest, the less there are to reproduce and replenish their stocks. The reason the world is losing forested area is because sustenance farmers are able to grow food and cash crops on cleared land, while harvesting trees is not as economically attractive. So they burn the trees down to clear land.
The U.S. only accounts for 24% of the world's carbon emissions. The U.S. also accounts for 28% of the world's economic production. In other words, the rest of the world is less efficient than the U.S. at producing value per ton of CO2 released. Europe is by far more efficient and the U.S. should try to learn from them, but these attempts to paint the U.S. as the sole bogeyman are horribly misguided. If the U.S. were to disappear overnight, by the time the world economy grew back to the level it's at today, there would be more CO2 emissions than before the U.S. disappeared!Also, trying to pin blame on a country by country basis makes no sense (aside from a policy perspective) because each nation has a different size and different population. On a per capita basis (CO2 emissions per person), the U.S. is not at the top, and there are several developed nations who are right up there with the U.S.
Finally, in terms of forest and protected forest, the U.S. has far more than all of Europe combined, nearly 1.7x as much in terms of area, and more than 3x as much per capita. In the above hypothetical scenario where the U.S. disappeared overnight, 7.6% of the world's forests and 9.6% of the world's protected forests would disappear as well.
What's needed to get us out of this mess is a systemic plan which address all aspects of the problem, not trying to single out sole nations for blame. If you do that, as we found out with Kyoto, the nation singled out will simply choose not to play ball. The developed nations need to set and meet energy efficiency goals (the U.S., Canada, and Australia especially). They also need to invest R&D money in non-carbon based energy sources. Environmentalists in these countries need to accept that nuclear is a much, much better option than spewing out millions of tons of carbon and other pollutants by burning fossil fuels. Developing nations need to restrict behaviors which are cheap in labor but expensive in carbon emissions (e.g. slash and burn). They will need economic and organizational aid from the developed world to help them establish economies which are not based on these behaviors.
Don't worry. I'm selling carbon credits. Just pay me and continue on what you were doing.
Selfishness seems to have become the core value of America right now. The measure of all actions is self interest. Individuals and corporations are encouraged to act solely in their own self interest, for that, we are told is the best way to ensure the common interest. While there is some truth to this, overall it is dangerous delusion. We are all part of a larger civilization, and the fate of that civilization effects all of us.
Climate change is an issue that will effect all of us. And no matter how many deluded denials there are, no matter how loud those deluded denials are shouted, no matter much we look away from the unpleasant truth, the laws of physics remain. No matter the slippery and reassuring words of oil industry funded public relations people, the landslide of data supporting the predictions of climate scientists will remain.
Reducing carbon emissions is highly likely to cause great harm to corporations whose main income comes from oil extraction. Thus we see many of these oil interests working hard to prevent any effective reduction in carbon emissions. After all, it's just self interest. If you were facing the loss of billions and billions of dollars, wouldn't you be fighting it? Except that the oil companies' profits are coming at the expense of the future of our civilization. I believe that unless we as a society overcome our obsession with pure self interest, our civilization will enter a period of profound decline. Is that really in our best interest?
This and no other is the root from which a tyrant springs; when first he appears as a protector - Plato (423 to 327 BC)
There is plenty of doubt out there about whether man-made CO2 is the cause of global warming...including well-known scientists in the National Academy of Sciences. Like this guy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Lindzen
It seems to me that the best way for the rest of the world to react would be to stop negotiating with the US as a country and move to negotiating with the states. Some of them are as large as a reasonably sized country and act as such. California, for example, seems very ready to move on climate change.
The other states, some of which seem to have "rogue governments" that look very much like "axis of evil", can easily be ostracized. Sanctions can be implemented such as travel restrictions for their elected officials or freezing of funds in foreign bank accounts.
Of course military action cannot be ruled out but liberating Texas may be difficult.
This common refrain ("we won't reduce ours until they do so, too") is like two school-children arguing: "You first!" "Nu-uh, you first!"
Oh come one, you know this is bullshit. Countries like that are still busy getting their economy up and running. You seriously think they should be held to the same standard as the US, who's carbon emission per capita is WAY higher than any of those countries ? (e.g. 6 times higher as China). Talk about the pot calling the kettle black.
The other G8 nations are coming to the table with proposals that are already very much watered down, due to the demands of big business, and of course political expediency. That the US isn't even prepared to entertain these weak and inadequate changes shows the lack of regard they truly have for the state of the planet on which we live. They should try to bear in mind that the rest of us also have to live with the consequences of their selfishness and shortsightedness.
Bzzzzzt..."AAAAaaaaarrrgh!!!" Thud.
You're joking, right??? The term this thread is searching for is 'non-rival' ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rivalry_(economics) ). Apples are rivalrous goods. If I eat an apple I reduce the amount of apple left for everyone else. Housing services (think 'house-months') are, too. If I live in a house for a month, I reduce the amount of housing left for everyone else for that month. A musical recording, or a piece of software, is non-rival. If I listen to (or copy) some country music it doesn't - regrettably - reduce the amount of country music left in the world for everyone else.
That is the difference, and is why intellectual property is fundamentally different. No free market can produce an optimal outcome for an economy containing non-rival goods (see my other post on the first theorem of welfare economics). With no IP protection there's too little incentive to generate IP. With IP protection people who might benefit from the IP but not by enough to pay the market price cannot make use of it, and this can add up to a lot of lost economic welfare (especially for those in poorer countries - consider AIDS drugs). There's a second-best maxima at some level of IP protection, but it isn't as much as the perfect economic choices (all IP which costs less to produce than the total benefits is produced, and anyone who can benefit from it uses it freely).
Per capita....
Great way to offset the reality.
US: 300 million
China: 1.5 BILLION
Translation, what China doesn't have on a per-capita basis, they make up for in sheer quantity.
What's more, the drive to modernize China will cause a per-capita increase.
Additionally, there are initiatives in the US already to reduce emissions. Sure, they may not move as quickly (the day before yesterday please!) as you'd like. But they ARE in progress.
Yet you want to excuse it because "Oh, they're a developing country!"
Essentially what you want is for us to wreck our economy around the same time China finishes building theirs.
Good idea! (NOT!)
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
No, actually, they don't.
If you follow this link you'll see that the emission of the US is still WAY higher than China, even as China has a much larger number of inhabitants. (data is from '96, couldn't find more recent data using a quick google search and I'm too lazy to keep on looking).
The US isn't doing nearly enough, since the US is so wastefull compared to the rest of the developed world it should be relatively easy to cut down, 'we' already demonstrated it can be done. E.g. increase the gas prices through taxation so people will stop buying ridicious cars. (Contrary to popular belief US gas prices are insanely low).
For some other sources, check this graphic for per-capita emissions in 2002. For the US, we have about 19.8 tons, while for China it's about 2.2 tons. Using the CIA World Factbook for current population numbers, we get:
Of course, there is also Wikipedia: