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US quits Paris climate pact

bbc.com

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Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#211

Post by gonvaled »

twoodfin wrote: post #160
fusiongyro wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even controlling for the harm to the environment, you have to consider the harm to our foreign policy if we become unable to uphold any agreement for more than 4 years.

I'd hope our counterparts from other nations would be sophisticated enough about our Constitutional system to understand that what one President can agree to without enshrining it in law through Congress, a later President can just as easily disregard.

Irrelevant. I don't care why your country is not trustworthy.

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#212

Post by scarmig »

rayiner wrote: post #198
scarmig wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Other countries don't care about post-facto rationalizations by partisans to demonize the other side in domestic policies. The USA cannot be trusted as an ally. That is the takeaway here. Saying that "but Obama's worse than Trump!!!" isn't changing that and is entirely besides the point. ETA: And, for what its worth, the Senate ratified NATO, and that hasn't stopped Trump and Republicans from doing their utmost to sa…

> Other countries don't care about post-facto rationalizations by partisans to demonize the other side in domestic policies. Which is a key reason why international cooperation is so dangerous. It's insensitive to domestic politics and law.

But other countries can and do maintain international commitments and cooperation. The USA did for most of its lifetime. That tool is increasingly less available to the USA, as a result of this (and NATO).

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#213

Post by muninn_ »

devnonymous wrote: post #55
muninn_ wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, not really. If it stays like this for 20+ years, then definitely.

Umm, I think people who say things like "20+ years..." haven't been paying attention to the change in rate of large scale social change over the last few decades. Do you really think anyone could have predicted today in 1997 ? (today as in, Brexit, Trump, Nsa/Privacy, Fb...etc)

Sure, but the idea that all of a sudden we aren't going to have MIT, Stanford, Caltech, Google, Facebook, and all these other world-class, leading institutions because of 4 years of Trump is nonsense. If we had 4 years of Trump for 5x as long, then yeah maybe it would start. But that's not going to happen.

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#214

Post by aaron-lebo »

walshemj wrote: post #133
hencq wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To me it signifies another nail in the coffin of the American-led rule based world order. In the 20th century the US carefully established an international framework based on the rule of law. In a mere four months that has been thoroughly undermined. Apart from the morally bankrupt policies of pushing down the effect of climate change onto future generations, in the short term it also signals to countries they don't…

I saw one serving senior officer on twitter comment "this must be what suez felt like to the brits"

To be fair, it's not that hard to make bad historical analogies.

"This is what Dwight Clark's catch in the 1982 championship game must have felt like to Ringo Starr."

Yeah?

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#215

Post by entee »

nthcolumn wrote: post #176
sergiotapia wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand how you think the NATO meeting was bad. Countries should pay their fair (and agreed to!) share towards NATO.

Germany is exiting NATO. They have already deferred any spending commitment until after BREXIT (UK leaving the EU). I don't think Trump's weird behaviour prompted Merkel's 'We can't depend on them anymore' speech. But bad? meh. depends if you think the demise of NATO is bad.

Any sources for that claim on Germany exiting NATO? Also strange how they didn't seem to make those speeches during the last administration. And the one before that. And the one before that. And the one before that...

Remember, Article V has been invoked just once: Afghanistan after 9/11. We can debate if that was a good or bad action, but strictly speaking, it's only ever been invoked in defense of the USA.

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#216

Post by knz »

rayiner wrote: post #102
scarmig wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pulling out of it is indication that the USA's politics is primarily driven by virtue signaling among different segments of its governing elite, not by policy or objective reality. If you believe the USA should be involved at all on the international stage, this creation of new public knowledge is a big detriment to that end.

> If you believe the USA should be involved at all on the international stage, this creation of new public knowledge is a big detriment to that end. The belief that the U.S. needs to be involved in the international stage is based on the fallacious assumption that international cooperation can fix climate change. There is no scenario in which that happens. Without fundamental technological leaps, we'd have to decreas…

> The belief that the U.S. needs to be involved in the international stage

It's in the financial interests of the US to be involved on the international stage. I listened to Trump's speech today and heard nothing but "Boohoo, it's so hard to be America". The reality is that the US is the gorilla in every room - we have the largest economy, largest military, and American hegemony has been a massive benefit to the country. Countries bend over backwards to gain access to US markets and millions still aspire to move here looking for better opportunities.

The whole situation reminds me of a quote from Interstellar - "We used to look up at the sky and wonder at our place in the stars. Now we just look down and worry about our place in the dirt."

We've giving up our global leadership for the sake of a few extra dollars in our pocket now - never mind the cost of inaction or every bit of scientific evidence that tells us something must be done. Even the Department of Defense believes that climate change is real and will have significant consequences for the US.

When did American exceptionalism turn into "It's too hard so I'm going to do nothing"?

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#218

Post by gph »

pavlov wrote: post #37

The United States of America spent a hundred years building up a global leadership position. President Trump has effectively destroyed it in a mere four months. China is adeptly stepping up to fill the void left by the United States. Last week Trump did his best to alienate America's long-standing European allies, who now feel that they are on their own against Russia's expanding European power plays. So Europe is tu…

>The United States of America spent a hundred years building up a global leadership position. President Trump has effectively destroyed it in a mere four months.

I'm no Trump fan, but the slide in American global leadership has been underway since well before Trump. Probably the first big blow was our unilateral invasion of Iraq under Bush. But even under Obama we didn't exactly right the ship.

And while Clinton would have tried to restore our image, in the long run I don't think she would make a big difference.

Countries used to look to America as the leader of liberal globalism because there basically was no alternative. Now there's a few alternatives.

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#219

Post by gonvaled »

rayiner wrote: post #198
scarmig wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Other countries don't care about post-facto rationalizations by partisans to demonize the other side in domestic policies. The USA cannot be trusted as an ally. That is the takeaway here. Saying that "but Obama's worse than Trump!!!" isn't changing that and is entirely besides the point. ETA: And, for what its worth, the Senate ratified NATO, and that hasn't stopped Trump and Republicans from doing their utmost to sa…

> Other countries don't care about post-facto rationalizations by partisans to demonize the other side in domestic policies. Which is a key reason why international cooperation is so dangerous. It's insensitive to domestic politics and law.

There are things that must be dealt with at the international level.

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#220

Post by twobuy »

aaron-lebo wrote: post #85
dismantlethesun wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps the US isn't a good global leader. It is, after all, only the aftermath of WW2 that left enough of a power vacuum for two countries at the edges of "proprer civilisation" like the USA and Russia to take the central position as the world superpowers. I wouldn't be sad if the USA returns to a position of only interfering within its sphere of influence in North and South America. Being a global leader isn't mere…

What? The US is a nation of immigrants. It doesn't see other nations as "other" any more than any other nation, and probably less so because we're very culturally diverse. But yeah, if you want to go back to the days where benevolent places like the British Empire, Imperial Germany, and the USSR ruled the world, have at it. Because they were benevolent, right? The US isn't doing a great job, but if American power get…

Imperial Germany.... you mean like Koenigsberg?
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