US quits Paris climate pact • Hacker News Board

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#401

Post by AnimalMuppet » Fri, Jun 02, 2017, 11:38 PM UTC

ajross wrote: post #372

fvdessen wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

European countries have no intentions to ever pay the 2%. For example the Belgian Government reiterated right after the G7 that it had no intention to meet that target and plans instead for 1.3% towards 2030. [1] I work in Brussels and I very often heard members of the European Commission / Parliament tell me how nice it was that the USA was paying for everything defence related. [1] http://www.lavenir.net/cnt/dmf201…

Again, though, that's a completely insincere argument. If you are worried that NATO is being weakened and undermined by underfunded member militaries, the corrective course of action is to strengthen those militaries and very much not to announce to the world you might not necessarily honor your treaty obligations if they don't. That weakens it further. Trump doesn't care what Belgium spends on defense. Trump is crap…

Disagree. I think Trump is saying, "You'd better be willing to pay for your own defense. If you won't, don't expect us to bail you out," precisely because Trump feels like NATO nations keep expecting America to pay for a strong military so that they don't have to. So he threatens them into a new mindset, where they have to beef up their military because they can't count on America riding in to their rescue any more.

You want to say it's going to backfire? Fine; you're quite likely right. You want to say it's risky? Shortsighted? Yes, and yes. But I don't buy that it's because Trump is in Putin's pocket.

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#402

Post by sverige » Sat, Jun 03, 2017, 1:49 AM UTC

noobermin wrote: post #390

sverige wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And the people of the U.S. should support their president, even if they didn't vote for him.

Sorry, I'm not making or am swayed by emotive arguments, and no one should be. Nothing in the constitution or in established interpretation of it require citizens to support the president.

And nothing in the Constitution requires the president to follow popular opinion according to British papers. That's the job of some portion of the members of Congress.

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#403

Post by sverige » Sat, Jun 03, 2017, 1:52 AM UTC

maxander wrote: post #294

sverige wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Hugely popular" is an overstatement. "Everyone" excluding "Trump and his far conservative base" lost the election. And part of Trump's message was that the U.S. shouldn't be the guarantor of the security of the rest of the world. That was a hugely popular proposition with his supporters.

Remember, Trump lost the popular vote by a couple million, in an election where about half the country voted, so his base in general could be estimated at about a fourth to a fifth of the country. But if we take the "more than 5 to 1" figure from the linked article as valid, then it implies that even a bunch of people who voted for Trump liked the accord. My impression is that people didn't like Trump for policies ha…

If the Paris accord was so popular, there was plenty of time to ratify it the constitutional way before Trump was elected. Apparently it wasn't that popular. And not everyone believes climate change (f/k/a global warming) theory.

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#404

Post by rayiner » Sat, Jun 03, 2017, 1:54 AM UTC

dragonwriter wrote: post #73

rayiner wrote: post #50

Even as an environmentalist, I'm okay with this. The political reaction to climate change is a farce. The Paris accord isn't going to do anything, just like the Kyoto protocol didn't do anything. It's just a way for people to feel good without making any real lifestyle changes.

> Even as an environmentalist Huh? From your comment history here, you seem like much more of a laissez-faire capitalist than any kind of environmentalist.

I don't like regulation, in the sense of eggheads sitting around trying to micromanage the market, or thinking that high minded principle insulates them from the market. I think that's a recipe for failure. But you don't need eggheads to internalize externalities. It's easier to just tax bad things, or if the thing is sufficiently unjustifiable, to ban the categorically. Banning leaded gasoline was a great idea. Let's ban coal next. Let's impose crippling liability on companies who pollute the water or air.

The ironic thing is that regulation is bad for the environment. The EPA spends as much time litigating against environmental groups if not more than it does fighting the industry.

You misconstrue my point about there not being a "political fix" to climate change. Obviously we could just ban CO2 emissions. My point is that the set of fixes the political system can generate and the set of fixes that will work are disjoint.

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#405

Post by dguaraglia » Sat, Jun 03, 2017, 2:14 AM UTC

Danihan wrote: post #395

dguaraglia wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, moving the goalposts. The classical right-wing strategy.

How is that moving the goalposts? Any poor, overpopulated country is going to have low per-capita carbon emissions, true or false? They also have a lower quality of life and poor GDP. Not exactly a positive goal to shoot for.

You started by saying China emits double the amount of greenhouse gasses the US does. Someone pointed out that it's still lower on a per-capita basis, so you switched tack to "oh, well, yeah, but... WHY DO POOR COUNTRIES GET A PASS!" That, my friend, is moving the goalposts.

So you want the US, richest nation in the world, to be held to the same standards as developing countries. Even though, in our economy, pushing for green energy actually generates more jobs than trying to bring back polluting industries. What, exactly, is there to gain from that?

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#406

Post by unityByFreedom » Sat, Jun 03, 2017, 6:02 AM UTC

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.

Not cooperating is more dangerous - - as far as blanket statements go.

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#407

Post by agumonkey » Sat, Jun 03, 2017, 7:03 AM UTC

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…

Some people say Nicaragua boycotted the Paris pact because it wasn't doing enough and that they're already past that.

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#408

Post by gonvaled » Sat, Jun 03, 2017, 8:59 AM UTC

nirav72 wrote: post #279

gonvaled wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really do not care about Trump or his supporters. This is hurting all of us, specially the coming generations.

Well I agree with you there. Just pointing out that this they basically cutting their nose to spite the face. They might see some short-term gains, but in the long-run..it will disproportionately impact them more.

I wrote hastily, and forgot to point the most crucial observation: I do not care about Trump's supporters, but I also suspect that he does not care either.

But even that is not the most salient point: it does not matter if my suspicious is right or wrong. The bottom line is that, whether Trump cares or not, if his policies turn out hurting his voter base, he will never be affected by it.

It's a terrible situation: the long term policies of a powerful politician have absolutely no way of affecting his political career.

He can rejoice in short term benefits: rise in popularity if the economy improves short term or, in the very specific case of Trump, short term financial gain thanks to his very complex network of business interests, while destroying the planet for good.

How can we call that democracy?

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#409

Post by _ph_ » Sat, Jun 03, 2017, 9:45 AM UTC

nthcolumn wrote: post #400

_ph_ wrote: post #396

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The paper is called the "Spiegel". I can only comment on statements I can read, so if you think the Spiegel made a statement that the Nato is unraveling, please provide a link to that statement. The fact that I am a German adds quite some weight to my argument, as I am very closely following politics in my country and I can follow the news sources directly in my native language. So I can understand what Angela Merkel…

You do not have a monopoly on understanding. And it is rather arrogant of you to assume your understanding is superior. Your own lack of interpretation of what she said is highly disingenuous especially when taken in context with the plans to concentrate on an EU armed forces, the plan to withdraw Bundeswehr from all foreign NATO missions by 2024, the declaration not to meet the 70bn euros spending by 2024 because ac…

> You do not have a monopoly on understanding. And it is rather arrogant of you to assume your understanding is superior.

I do not claim to have a monopoly of understanding. I tried to establish why I consider myself well informed about what is happening in political discussions in Germany. You claimed as a fact that "Germany is exiting NATO". No where did you provide any reference to where your statement is based on. And my answer to that was: there is no indication that the German politics has any intentions of doing so. Being German is relevant here as:

- I am carefully following day to day political discussions. If there were such considerations, it is extremely likely I would have heard about them.

- Living in Germany, I have full access to all media here. I don't know how much of the media coverage is available outside of Germany.

- Being a native German and a resident (living in Munich at the moment) means, I have a very good understanding of the German language. I do not have to rely on translations and can understand original statements with at least no language barrier in place. It would be helpful for this discussion, if you could state your location and whether you are a German speaker.

> Your own lack of interpretation of what she said is highly disingenuous especially when taken in context with the plans to concentrate on an EU armed forces, the plan to withdraw Bundeswehr from all foreign NATO missions by 2024.

Not sure what I should "interpret" but, please provide any reference for these claims of yours. Yes, there are some considerations for creating an EU armed forces, but they are not even at planning state. There are no plans or withdrawing from the NATO foreign missions. If you think there are, please provide a reference.

> Europa muss sein Schicksal selbst in die Hand nehmen.

Yes. Merkel said that. The video of the speech can be found here: http://www.zeit.de/video/2017-05/5451383425001/angela-merkel...

She is saying: Wir Europäer müssen unser Schicksal wirklich in die eigene Hand nehmen. Natürlich in Freundschaft mit den Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika, in Freundschaft mit Großbritannien, in guter Nachbarschaft, wo immer das geht, auch mit Russland, auch mit anderen Ländern, aber wir müssen wissen, wir müssen selbst für unsere Zukunft kämpfen, als Europäer, für unser Schicksal und das will ich gerne mit ihnen gemeinsam tun.

So this is just a call for a stronger Europe, which does not just depend on the US for guidance and defense. Which is incidentally the thing the US has asked from Europe for years, including raising the defense budgets. There is no hint at leaving the NATO. Looking at the defense situation of Germany that would be just bizarre. The state of the German military is not compatible with these thoughts. Since the reunification, the size of the German military has been greatly reduced, partly because of the requirements of the 2+4 contract, partly of the changed situation in the world. What is left of the armed forces, is mostly on NATO duties. So there is no doubt of our commitment to the NATO. But for sure, there are discussions about increasing our defense efforts (as asked by the NATO), but equally, but equally, whether all of our military should be tied up in NATO missions.

> FWIW and as you must already know being German https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Der_Spiegel is called 'The Mirror' not 'Mirror'! as that makes no sense in German nor English.

Yes, I am aware. I was just referring to your spelling of the word "Spiegel". By the way, the magazine itself uses its name with and without the article: http://www.spiegel.de

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#410

Post by ajross » Sat, Jun 03, 2017, 1:47 PM UTC

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #401

ajross wrote: post #372

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Again, though, that's a completely insincere argument. If you are worried that NATO is being weakened and undermined by underfunded member militaries, the corrective course of action is to strengthen those militaries and very much not to announce to the world you might not necessarily honor your treaty obligations if they don't. That weakens it further. Trump doesn't care what Belgium spends on defense. Trump is crap…

Disagree. I think Trump is saying, "You'd better be willing to pay for your own defense. If you won't, don't expect us to bail you out," precisely because Trump feels like NATO nations keep expecting America to pay for a strong military so that they don't have to. So he threatens them into a new mindset, where they have to beef up their military because they can't count on America riding in to their rescue any more.…

That doesn't sound like disagreement to me. I didn't say anything about "pockets", just that the undeniably biggest benefactor from intra-NATO bitching like this is the nation that literally just invaded another in the region.

The US never gets paid here, so I'll saying it again: Trump is not trying to strengthen NATO here. He's trying to weaken it. You can decide for yourself why.