http://blog.markhertsgaard.com Most recent posts at Mark Hertsgaard's Blog posterous.com http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/wp-content/themes/talian-derived/images/feedhead.jpgMarkHertsgaardsBloghttp://feedburner.google.com Wed, 21 Apr 2010 21:13:47 -0700 http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/video-tougher-cap-and-trade-legislation-gritt http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/video-tougher-cap-and-trade-legislation-gritt <p> <em>Nation</em> Environmental Correspondent Mark Hertsgaard sits down with GRITtv's Laura Flanders to talk about the environmental movement and the current climate legislation. Flanders is pessimistic that the current bill will actually reduce emissions. Hertsgaard agrees that the loopholes in the bill will make it difficult to actually cap emissions: "Cap and trade could work if you get tough legislation but that is a very big if in the United States of America," Hertsgaard says. <object height="345" classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" width="480" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0"><param name="src" value="http://blip.tv/play/gdElgdfWMAI" /> <param name="allowfullscreen" value="true" /> <embed src="http://blip.tv/play/gdElgdfWMAI" allowfullscreen="true" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" height="345" width="480"></embed></object> </p> <p><a href="http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/video-tougher-cap-and-trade-legislation-gritt">Permalink</a> </p><div class="feedflare"> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=jIua2jUpIWg:Vrsyr_pzwxE:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=jIua2jUpIWg:Vrsyr_pzwxE:F7zBnMyn0Lo"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=jIua2jUpIWg:Vrsyr_pzwxE:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=jIua2jUpIWg:Vrsyr_pzwxE:V_sGLiPBpWU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=jIua2jUpIWg:Vrsyr_pzwxE:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=jIua2jUpIWg:Vrsyr_pzwxE:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=jIua2jUpIWg:Vrsyr_pzwxE:gIN9vFwOqvQ"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=jIua2jUpIWg:Vrsyr_pzwxE:gIN9vFwOqvQ" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=jIua2jUpIWg:Vrsyr_pzwxE:I9og5sOYxJI"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=I9og5sOYxJI" border="0"></img></a> </div><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarkHertsgaardsBlog/~4/jIua2jUpIWg" height="1" width="1"/> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/825415/mh_head.jpg http://posterous.com/people/Z2H0DdEgTWp Mark Hertsgaard mark Mark Hertsgaard Thu, 21 Jan 2010 07:14:39 -0800 http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/mass-alert-wake-up http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/mass-alert-wake-up <p> I won't say I predicted it, but I had a hunch that Tuesday's U.S. Senate election in Massachusetts might go badly for the Democrats and the White House. I happened to spend a few days in western Mass a week before the election, speaking for the Dowmel Lecture Series about the Copenhagen climate summit and what comes next. I had taken Amtrak up from New York City, a beautiful two hour ride along an often-frozen Hudson river. I was then fetched from the train station and driven an hour east to the charming town of Stockbridge, in the heart of the Berkshires, a region known for its glorious summers, ample cultural offerings and generally liberal politics. As we passed through lovely rolling hills and farmland, I kept seeing lawn signs with the name Brown on them. I hadn't followed the Massachusetts raise close enough to know, so I asked my companions who Brown was. "Oh, he's the Republican running to take over Teddy Kennedy's old seat," the husband replied. "Looks like he's got some support," I ventured. "Well, maybe," the wife said. "We've been hearing about polls saying that the race is tightening. That's okay, it reminds us to call people and get them out to vote next Tuesday." You all know what happened next. Scott Brown, the Republican challenger, took 52 percent of the vote, against 47 percent for the Democrat, Martha Coakley. This, despite the fact that Massachusetts has long been the most reliably Democratic state in the Union, and despite the fact that President Obama made a last-minute trip to Massachusetts to try to salvage Coakley's faltering campaign. So what's it all mean? Coakley did herself no favors as a candidate--she hammered the final nail in her coffin a few days before the election, when she mindlessly claimed that Boston Red Sox star pitcher Curt Schilling was a Yankees fan--but I suspect the real problem goes deeper, and straight to the White House. As I said at a brown-bag lunch at OSI on Tuesday, the White House has lost control of the narrative of the Obama presidency. Obama--surely the most naturally gifted communicator who has occupied the Oval Office since at least Ronald Reagan--and his aides have somehow allowed their opponents to define the terms and direction of the national political conversation. Through their own strategic choices, Obama and his staff have let his presidency be painted as taking the side of the much-hated bankers over the common person. On health care, Obama is now seen as favoring higher taxes over better care. On climate change, the White House and Democrats are in danger of losing the congressional vote on climate legislation because they have failed to make the case that tackling climate change will actually save, not ruin, our economy. The common thread through all of this is: Obama and his staff have abandoned the political principles and organizing strategies that got them elected in favor of cozying up to the powerful interests and inside-the-Beltway thinking that Obama the candidate derided. The American people, no dummies, have responded by turning increasingly critical of and impatient with the White House. But maybe something good will come out of this. If Obama and his advisers draw the right lessons from the Massachusetts debacle, if they return to first principles and make a point of siding with the people over the powerful, they might still recover in time to avoid a route in this fall's congressional elections. There is some evidence this about-face is under consideration. At the end of last week, the president finally signaled he was going to take on the banks. Announcing the administration's plan to impose a fee on banks to recover $170 billion in federal subsidies that saved the banks from bankruptcy, Obama delivered a pretty good sound bite: "We want our money back." He'll have to go much further than that, though. Many of the people who voted for Obama in November 2008 have been left feeling disillusioned by his first year in office. This was not the kind of change we were promised. One of his supporters recently posted an angry blog, listing one issue after another where president Obama violated what candidate Obama had promised: Afghanistan, Iraq, the economy, health care, climate change. The supporter, after noting that he had contributed a couple hundred dollars to Obama's campaign-- a large sum for a grassroots activist--then concluded by saying, "I want my money back." </p> <p><a href="http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/mass-alert-wake-up">Permalink</a> </p><div class="feedflare"> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=Ecqiidco2ZQ:aJx1VOJZ47w:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=Ecqiidco2ZQ:aJx1VOJZ47w:F7zBnMyn0Lo"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=Ecqiidco2ZQ:aJx1VOJZ47w:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=Ecqiidco2ZQ:aJx1VOJZ47w:V_sGLiPBpWU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=Ecqiidco2ZQ:aJx1VOJZ47w:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=Ecqiidco2ZQ:aJx1VOJZ47w:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=Ecqiidco2ZQ:aJx1VOJZ47w:gIN9vFwOqvQ"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=Ecqiidco2ZQ:aJx1VOJZ47w:gIN9vFwOqvQ" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=Ecqiidco2ZQ:aJx1VOJZ47w:I9og5sOYxJI"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=I9og5sOYxJI" border="0"></img></a> </div><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarkHertsgaardsBlog/~4/Ecqiidco2ZQ" height="1" width="1"/> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/825415/mh_head.jpg http://posterous.com/people/Z2H0DdEgTWp Mark Hertsgaard mark Mark Hertsgaard Tue, 12 Jan 2010 21:42:45 -0800 http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/article-the-copenhagen-disaccord http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/article-the-copenhagen-disaccord <p> <p>by Mark Hertsgaard, for <em>The Nation</em></p> <em>We have entered the post-Copenhagen era of climate politics&mdash;but just what that means is still very much undecided. The summit was widely regarded as humanity's last good chance to prevent catastrophic climate change. It plainly fell short of that goal ...</em> The full article is available at my website: <a href="http://www.markhertsgaard.com/articles/246">http://www.markhertsgaard.com/articles/246</a> </p> <p><a href="http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/article-the-copenhagen-disaccord">Permalink</a> </p><div class="feedflare"> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=q9zqsjfNwmA:kt1IHZ9RtdQ:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=q9zqsjfNwmA:kt1IHZ9RtdQ:F7zBnMyn0Lo"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=q9zqsjfNwmA:kt1IHZ9RtdQ:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=q9zqsjfNwmA:kt1IHZ9RtdQ:V_sGLiPBpWU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=q9zqsjfNwmA:kt1IHZ9RtdQ:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=q9zqsjfNwmA:kt1IHZ9RtdQ:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=q9zqsjfNwmA:kt1IHZ9RtdQ:gIN9vFwOqvQ"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=q9zqsjfNwmA:kt1IHZ9RtdQ:gIN9vFwOqvQ" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=q9zqsjfNwmA:kt1IHZ9RtdQ:I9og5sOYxJI"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=I9og5sOYxJI" border="0"></img></a> </div><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarkHertsgaardsBlog/~4/q9zqsjfNwmA" height="1" width="1"/> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/825415/mh_head.jpg http://posterous.com/people/Z2H0DdEgTWp Mark Hertsgaard mark Mark Hertsgaard Mon, 21 Dec 2009 18:45:49 -0800 http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/the-ugly-truth-about-obamas-copenhagen-accord http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/the-ugly-truth-about-obamas-copenhagen-accord <p> <p>by Mark Hertsgaard, for <a href="http://www.vanityfair.com/online/politics/2009/12/copenhagen-alert-obamas-speech-flops-summit-in-crisis.html">VANITYFAIR.com</a></p> Well, so much for Hopenhagen. Organizers of the U.N. climate summit had proposed that upbeat respelling of the Danish capital when negotiations began two weeks ago, and one saw it everywhere in Copenhagen: in metro station advertisements, activist press releases and newspaper headlines. But the cheery new name did not survive the talks themselves. In the end, Hopenhagen became Nopenhagen. Boarding the plane home on Saturday after the summit&rsquo;s collapse, my eye was caught by a large wall photo of Barack Obama. Something about it wasn&rsquo;t right, though. Bleary-eyed after an exceptionally late night of covering the dueling press conferences of the summit&rsquo;s final hours, it took me a moment to see what was off. Only when I read the accompanying text did I notice that this Obama had a head of lightly gray hair. <em>Barack Obama 2020</em>, the text said, followed by a quote: &ldquo;I&rsquo;m Sorry. We Could Have Stopped Catastrophic Climate Change &hellip; We Didn&rsquo;t.&rdquo; Sponsored by Greenpeace, the Obama ad&mdash;and similar ones featuring the faces of Chinese president Hu Jintao, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, and other leaders&mdash;had been erected prior to Copenhagen as an exhortation to reach an ambitious and binding agreement there. Now, the ads read less like an exhortation than a prophecy. Despite what you may have heard, the Copenhagen summit did not reach an agreement to tackle climate change. What it produced instead was merely a side deal, put together on Friday evening by a handful of the world&rsquo;s biggest greenhouse-gas-emitting nations, including the United States and China, the two climate superpowers. This side deal was then very grudgingly endorsed late Friday night by the European Union and other rich industrial nations, and accepted even more reluctantly on Saturday by many, but by no means all, developing nations. International opinion was so divided, and the side deal so unpopular, that the full summit explicitly declined to approve it on Saturday afternoon. Rather, it voted merely to &ldquo;take note&rdquo; of it. No surprise, really: the side deal was in substance all but toothless, and the U.S. and other world powers imposed it at the last minute in a take-it-or-leave-it fashion. In a brief press conference before returning to Washington, Obama hailed the deal as an &ldquo;unprecedented breakthrough,&rdquo; but his own words undercut that claim. What was agreed, the president explained, was not a legally binding accord but a mere &ldquo;political declaration&rdquo; that he acknowledged fell well short of what climate science required. &ldquo;There is much further to go,&rdquo; he said. According to many news reports, the side deal pledges to limit global temperature rise to 2 degrees Celsius over the pre-industrial level in which our civilization developed and to which the earth&rsquo;s ecosystems have adapted. Would that this were true. In fact, the deal merely &ldquo;recognize[s] the scientific view&rdquo; that the increase should be kept to 2C. Worse, the deal does little to bring this result about. It neither enumerates nor prescribes binding limits on the emissions that drive global warming; it merely commits both developed and developing nations to &ldquo;take action&rdquo; to &ldquo;achiev[e] the peaking of global and national emissions as soon as possible&hellip;.&rdquo; Emissions reductions will remain purely voluntary, and failing to achieve them will result in no penalties. It &ldquo;is not hard to guess&rdquo; why binding targets on emissions reductions were not mandated, Brazil&rsquo;s ambassador of climate change, Sergio Barbosa Serra, told reporters late Friday night. &ldquo;Targets,&rdquo; he explained, &ldquo;are supposed to come in the second period of the Kyoto protocol&rdquo;&mdash;that is, beginning in 2012&mdash;and neither the U.S. nor China are or want to be signatories to Kyoto. The original formulation of the side deal included calls for rich industrial nations to reduce their emissions by 80 percent from 1990 levels by 2050 and for global emissions&mdash;in other words, including emissions from China, India, Brazil, and other emerging economies&mdash;to fall 50 percent by 2050. But the final three-page text dropped these stipulations, said Serra. Contrary to the White House spin, ambassador Serra did not deny that the side deal was a major disappointment. The outcome in Copenhagen, he said, was &ldquo;certainly not what we expected&hellip;. But if we [the government of Brazil] had not been involved as intensively as we were, we wouldn&rsquo;t even have gotten this far.&rdquo; There is plenty of blame to go around. The Obama administration&rsquo;s refusal to offer more than 4 percent emissions cuts by 2020 was seen by many other countries, rich and poor alike, as evidence that the U.S. under Obama was not that different than it had been under George W. Bush. The claim that Obama&rsquo;s hands are tied by Congress was likewise challenged; after all, three days before the Copenhagen summit began, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency had affirmed its authority to regulate greenhouse-gas emissions regardless of what Congress did. The other climate superpower was no better. China dragged its feet throughout the summit, resisting calls to accept even long-term limits on its emissions and pressuring poor and vulnerable nations to toe its diplomatic line or risk the loss of development aid. It was China that vetoed the 50- and 80-percent emissions cuts, Ed Milliband, the climate secretary of Great Britain, <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/dec/20/copenhagen-climate-change-accord">charges today in an opinion piece in <em>The Guardian</em></a> in which he calls for the U.N. process to be reformed to prevent such blocking tactics in the future. The one semi-bright spot in the side deal concerned finance. The treaty currently governing international climate action, the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, obliges rich industrial nations&mdash;whose past greenhouse-gas emissions are what caused global warming in the first place&mdash;to provide aid to the poor nations that are and increasingly will be the hardest hit by sea-level rise, drought, and other effects of climate change. The side deal includes a guarantee of $30 billion over the next three years in climate aid; furthermore, it endorses a goal of mobilizing $100 billion a year by 2020. No doubt, $100 billion a year is a serious amount of money, as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton commented when first proposing this sum at the summit last Thursday. Still, it falls short of what even the World Bank, an institution dominated by rich countries, has estimated is necessary to relocate vulnerable communities, safeguard dwindling water supplies, and otherwise protect people and economies from the intensifying impacts of rising temperatures. Nor is it clear how much of this envisioned $100 billion will actually materialize. The text of the side deal refers to both public and private funds, as well as &ldquo;alternative sources of finance.&rdquo; This phrasing suggests that governments hope to persuade investors to join them in assisting the poor, presumably through money raised from cap-and-trade and other forms of carbon markets. Good luck with that; the record on carbon markets so far is not terribly encouraging. Like the White House, U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon tried to put the best face on what happened in Copenhagen, calling the side deal an &ldquo;essential beginning.&rdquo; The problem is, Copenhagen was supposed to be a conclusion, not a beginning. As Richard Black, the excellent environment correspondent for the BBC, <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/richardblack/2009/12/cop15_no_hopenhagen.html">has observed</a>, the landmark U.N. climate conference in &ldquo;Bali in 2007 was the &lsquo;first step&rsquo;; come to that, [the Earth Summit] Rio in 1992 was the &lsquo;first step.&rdquo; I watched in Rio as the world&rsquo;s heads of state pledged to do what was necessary &ldquo;to prevent dangerous anthropogenic [i.e., man-made] climate change.&rdquo; In the 17 years since, our understanding of climate change has progressed enormously. Alas, we now know that the early studies dramatically underestimated how sensitive the earth&rsquo;s climate system was&mdash;how easily the increase in temperatures known as global warming could trigger the stronger and more frequent droughts, storms, and other impacts known as climate change. In Rio, scientists warned that if global emissions were not soon cut, dangerous climate change could occur by 2100. But climate change ended up arriving 100 years sooner than projected, as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change documented in its <a href="http://www.ipcc.ch/ipccreports/ar4-wg1.htm">Fourth Assessment Report</a>, in 2007. And because of the inertia of Earth&rsquo;s climate system&mdash;the physical fact that carbon dioxide remains in the atmosphere for decades and longer&mdash;our planet is now locked in to another 50 years at least of rising temperatures and the impacts they bring, no matter how quickly we might reduce our emissions. None of this is any secret. The basic science has been explained again and again, not just by the I.P.C.C. but the National Academy of Sciences in the U.S., the Royal Society in Britain, and their counterparts throughout the world. Political leaders, in their rhetoric, have claimed to grasp the gravity of the situation and the need for bold reforms. But actions speak louder than words, and Copenhagen was a travesty of slight actions and broken promises. And though the survival of our children compels us to find one, the road ahead is, for now, difficult to discern. </p> <p><a href="http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/the-ugly-truth-about-obamas-copenhagen-accord">Permalink</a> </p><div class="feedflare"> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=5NQjkrJDQWQ:nZqk6JY49_Y:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=5NQjkrJDQWQ:nZqk6JY49_Y:F7zBnMyn0Lo"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=5NQjkrJDQWQ:nZqk6JY49_Y:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=5NQjkrJDQWQ:nZqk6JY49_Y:V_sGLiPBpWU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=5NQjkrJDQWQ:nZqk6JY49_Y:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=5NQjkrJDQWQ:nZqk6JY49_Y:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=5NQjkrJDQWQ:nZqk6JY49_Y:gIN9vFwOqvQ"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=5NQjkrJDQWQ:nZqk6JY49_Y:gIN9vFwOqvQ" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=5NQjkrJDQWQ:nZqk6JY49_Y:I9og5sOYxJI"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=I9og5sOYxJI" border="0"></img></a> </div><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarkHertsgaardsBlog/~4/5NQjkrJDQWQ" height="1" width="1"/> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/825415/mh_head.jpg http://posterous.com/people/Z2H0DdEgTWp Mark Hertsgaard mark Mark Hertsgaard Fri, 18 Dec 2009 16:44:56 -0800 http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/copenhagen-obamas-speech-flops-summit-in-cris http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/copenhagen-obamas-speech-flops-summit-in-cris <p> <p>by Mark Hertsgaard, for <a href="http://www.vanityfair.com/online/politics/2009/12/copenhagen-alert-obamas-speech-flops-summit-in-crisis.html">VANITYFAIR.com</a></p> He came, he saw, he disappointed. As President Barack Obama arrived in Copenhagen on Friday morning for the last day of the U.N. climate summit, all eyes were upon him. Only Obama, the argument went, had the power and prestige to break the deadlock at this summit, widely regarded as humanity&rsquo;s last good chance to preserve a livable climate. But hopes that the president would bring something new to Copenhagen, that the U.S. position would move closer to what science says is required to avoid catastrophic climate change, were dashed by the president&rsquo;s surprisingly lackluster remarks. Looking tired from his overnight flight from Washington, Obama told his fellow heads of state and government, &ldquo;I did not come here to talk. I came here to act.&rdquo; But Obama&rsquo;s speech for the most part merely restated what has long been the U.S. position: a mere 4 percent reduction in U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 2020, when science says reductions of at least 25 to 40 percent are necessary. Obama did not put it this way, of course. He said that the U.S. will cut emissions by 17 percent by 2020, in line with the Waxman-Markey climate bill that passed the House of Representatives over the summer. But the U.S. has moved the goalposts. By employing a baseline of 2005, rather than the international scientific standard of 1990, Washington makes its proposed emissions cuts look much larger than they actually are. It&rsquo;s like promising to kick a 50-yard field goal from the 30 yard line. &ldquo;Speaking about 17 percent cuts by 2020&mdash;to present it that way was, I&rsquo;m afraid, dishonest,&rdquo; said Kumi Naidoo, the executive director of Greenpeace International. Obama was apparently trying to strike a balance between what the outside world wants to hear and what the U.S. Congress will accept. The Waxman-Markey bill passed the House by a mere seven votes, and similar legislation faces a difficult battle in the Senate. What&rsquo;s more, any treaty signed in Copenhagen or later could be blocked by a mere 34 votes in the Senate. Since Republicans have 40 Senate seats and most of them are adamantly opposed to taking serious action against climate change, Obama faces a conundrum. But this political calculation&mdash;shared not only by the White House and leading congressional Democrats but also many big environmental groups&mdash;overlooks the big club Obama has at his disposal: the newly affirmed authority of the Environmental Protection Agency to regulate greenhouse-gas emissions. The Supreme Court ruled in 2007 that E.P.A. had this authority if greenhouse gases were deemed to pose a threat to public health and welfare. The E.P.A. so ruled on December 4, just days before the Copenhagen summit began. &ldquo;Contrary to what we keep hearing from Washington, Obama&rsquo;s hands are not tied by the tragically weak cap-and-trade bills being debated in Congress,&rdquo; said Kassie Siegel, executive director of the Center for Biological Diversity. &ldquo;His administration already has the legal tools to achieve deep and rapid greenhouse emissions reductions from major polluters, consistent with what science demands, through the Clean Air Act. The next step is for E.P.A. to issue pollution-reduction rules for vehicles, smokestacks, and other polluters, and to set a science-based national pollution cap for greenhouse gases.&rdquo; &ldquo;But this thing is not over yet,&rdquo; Naidoo emphasized about the Copenhagen summit. &ldquo;At this point in the Kyoto talks [in 1997, when the world&rsquo;s nations approved the Kyoto Protocol to the UN Framework Convention on Climate change], everyone in the hallways was saying, &lsquo;It&rsquo;s over, there&rsquo;s no hope of reaching an agreement.&rsquo; But in fact governments did reach an agreement in Kyoto. They stayed and worked until the early hours of the morning, and that&rsquo;s what leaders will do today if they believe all their rhetoric about climate change threatening mass extinctions, droughts, and other catastrophic impacts.&rdquo; Obama&rsquo;s speech was all the more important given the fact&mdash;so little understood in the United States&mdash;that the U.S. is by far the world&rsquo;s leading climate polluter. Yes, China now emits slightly more "greenhouse gases on an annual basis. But annual is not the most relevant measure. Because the U.S. (like its fellow industrial nations in Europe, Japan, and Australia) has been burning coal, driving vehicles, felling forests, and plowing farmland for many more years than China has, it has put far more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere on a cumulative basis than China has. It is these cumulative emissions that drive global warming, because carbon dioxide in particular stays in the atmosphere for centuries. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t think the speech will be very well received by China, among others,&rdquo; said Richard Klein, an I.P.C.C. climate scientist with the Stockholm Environment Institute. &ldquo;There is such a thing as historical responsibility. [President Obama] has a way with words that works for the media, for the general public, but it doesn&rsquo;t work for seasoned negotiators who know the ins and outs of these issues and who won&rsquo;t be reassured that this is a different U.S. from what we&rsquo;ve seen over the last eight years.&rdquo; And so it was when Chinese premier Wen Jiabao gave his plenary speech. In addressing climate change, Wen said, the world must not &ldquo;turn a blind eye to historical responsibilities &hellip; and different levels of development&rdquo;&mdash;diplomatic code for the position shared by China, India, and other emerging and developing countries that the rich industrial nations make make the largest emissions cuts, soonest. The dangers of the continuing stalemate in Copenahgen were powerfully illustrated yesterday by documents leaked yesterday by the U.N. conference secretariat here. The documents showed that the proposed emissions cuts currently on offer in Copenhagen&mdash;not only from the U.S. but all countries&mdash;come nowhere to preventing catastrophic climate change. According to the leaked document, which the secretariat confirmed is authentic, the current proposals will lead to 3 degrees Celsius (5.4 Fahrenheit) of temperature rise over the pre-industrial level in which civilization developed. Obama and other leaders of the Group of 8 rich industrial nations agreed in July to limit temperature rise to 2 Celsius, and even that is hardly a safe level. &ldquo;It will mean 100 feet of sea level rise,&rdquo; Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, the chief climate adviser to the German government, said of the 2 degree limit. &ldquo;True, this will be over the next thousand years, but that amounts to ten feet per century and this will be all but irreversible. A 2C temperature rise will also mean the loss of the Himalayan glaciers and coral reefs. What really makes for sleepless nights is the possibility that [2C] will &hellip; trigger runaway global warming.&rdquo; &ldquo;In the face of leaked U.N. documents showing that this agreement is a sham, we were hoping for some movement from the president,&rdquo; said author Bill McKibben of the activist group 350.org. &ldquo;Instead, his response was take it or leave it. One hundred other nations are not making reasonable demands because they want to make the president&rsquo;s life harder. It&rsquo;s because they would like their countries to actually survive the century.&rdquo; But it ain&rsquo;t over yet here in Copenhagen. Negotiations, including reported meetings between and among Obama, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, and other heads of state and government, are scheduled to continue throughout the day and perhaps into the evening. &ldquo;We can get this done today,&rdquo; Obama said in his speech. But what &ldquo;this&rdquo; will be remains the question, for all of us. </p> <p><a href="http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/copenhagen-obamas-speech-flops-summit-in-cris">Permalink</a> </p><div class="feedflare"> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=CX77eug6Mew:aRTelOUQvec:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=CX77eug6Mew:aRTelOUQvec:F7zBnMyn0Lo"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=CX77eug6Mew:aRTelOUQvec:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=CX77eug6Mew:aRTelOUQvec:V_sGLiPBpWU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=CX77eug6Mew:aRTelOUQvec:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=CX77eug6Mew:aRTelOUQvec:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=CX77eug6Mew:aRTelOUQvec:gIN9vFwOqvQ"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=CX77eug6Mew:aRTelOUQvec:gIN9vFwOqvQ" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=CX77eug6Mew:aRTelOUQvec:I9og5sOYxJI"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=I9og5sOYxJI" border="0"></img></a> </div><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarkHertsgaardsBlog/~4/CX77eug6Mew" height="1" width="1"/> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/825415/mh_head.jpg http://posterous.com/people/Z2H0DdEgTWp Mark Hertsgaard mark Mark Hertsgaard Fri, 18 Dec 2009 06:44:15 -0800 http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/copenhagen-obama-to-meet-with-chinese-premier http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/copenhagen-obama-to-meet-with-chinese-premier <p> <p>by Mark Hertsgaard, for <a href="http://www.thenation.com/blogs/copenhagen/507222/obama_to_meet_with_chinese_premier_wen">The Nation Blogs</a></p> The Chinese premier Wen Jiabao will meet one-on-one with President Barack Obama soon in Copenhagen to try to reach agreement on a new international climate treaty, according to He Yafei, the vice chairman of the Chinese Foreign Ministry. "Yes, I believe so," responded He in the hallways of Copenhagen's Bella Center, when he was asked if Wen and Obama, the heads of government of the world's two climate superpowers, would meet to resolve outstanding differences. Wen, whose country is the world's largest emitter of greenhouse gases on an annual basis, arrived in Copenhagen yesterday for the UN climate summit. Obama, whose country is the world's largest emitter on a cumulative basis, is due to arrive in time for the summit's concluding sessions on Friday, December 18. Together, the two countries are responsible for 42 percent of the world's annual emissions, making their actions crucial to the effort to combat global warming. In a major break from past climate change diplomacy, Obama and Chinese president Hu Jintao agreed in Beijing in November that both nations would limit their future emissions--the first the two climate superpowers had made that promise to the international community--and also that they would work together for a successful outcome to the Copenhagen summit. But as the summit approaches its final 24 hours, the difference between the proposals on the table and established climate science remains vast. A document leaked this afternoon from the United Nations agency organizing the summit, the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, stated the the proposals currently on offer will lead to an estimated global temperature rise of 3 degrees Celsius over pre-industrial levels, well beyond what scientists believe is safe and what virtually all governments assembled here rhetorically support. The governments of the US and other members of the Group of 8 rich industrial countries pledged in July 2009 to limit global temperatures to 2 Celsius. More than 100 nations, mainly the poor and island states that are most vulnerable to sea level rise and other impacts of climate change, have called on the Copenhagen summit to endorse a goal of 1.5Celsius. "Anything more than that, and we've had it," said Mohammed Nasheed, the president of Maldives. At a press conference this afternoon in Copenhagen, He said that, according to Premier Wen, the final text of the agreement under discussion in Copenhagen could include a limit of 2C as a "long-term," aspirational goal. But "to make it a balanced approach," He added, the text should make it clear that the fight against poverty is to remain the top priority for developing countries. Responding to an American demand for transparent verification of China's promised future emissions cuts, He said that China was ready to engage in "dialogue and co-operation that is not intrusive, that does not infringe on China's sovereignty." Meanwhile, at a press conference held immediately before China's, a leading US Member of Congress on climate issues, Henry Waxman of California, the co-sponsor of the Waxman-Markey bill that passed the House of Representatives over the summer, contradicted mainstream science by repeatedly asserting that the emissions reductions the Obama administration has pledged are "completely consistent" with the 2C limit. "The targets we set out in our legislation, and that the President has articulated--a 17% cut in emissions by 2020 and an 85% reduction by 2050--are consistent with what the science says is needed to prevent the [world from crossing] tipping points and the dire consequences that would bring," Waxman told the press conference. Crucially, these proposed cuts on the part of the US, which await action by the US Senate, are based on a 2005 baseline. When compared to the 1990 baseline that is the international standard, the proposed US cuts amount to a mere 4 percent by 2020. The UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and other leading scientific bodies around the world have concluded that reductions of 25 to 40 percent from 1990 levels by 2020 are necessary to give the world a meaningful chance to limit temperature rise to 2 C. "That is the determination we have made," Waxman responded in the hallway after the press conference when asked about the contradiction between his statement and the prevailing scientific consensus. "Many environmental organizations have said that [our goals] are consistent [with 2 C]. And as Congressman Markey just said, I think we may actually end up doing much more than is projected once we get going. The important thing is to get started." "We're trying to find a way to work together for the betterment of the planet," Pelosi told the press conference. Noting that she had visited China in May and been "very impressed" by its progress in solar and other alternative forms of energy, Pelosi indicated that China's recent pledge to reduce the energy intensity of its economy 45 percent by 2020 was a sign of progress. "China is still a net emitter, but without these [alternative energy] measures, things would be much worse." Earlier in the day, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced that the US would "work toward" the provision of $100 billion in aid to developing countries to help them shift to low-carbon energy and to adapt to the impacts of climate change, and that the US would pay "its fair share." But Clinton gave no further details about how much of the $100 billion would come from the US, how much would be new money rather than a reshuffling of existing commitments and how much of it might come from private sector investments. </p> <p><a href="http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/copenhagen-obama-to-meet-with-chinese-premier">Permalink</a> </p><div class="feedflare"> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=EIohYGMhHNM:P6NYjew71IM:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=EIohYGMhHNM:P6NYjew71IM:F7zBnMyn0Lo"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=EIohYGMhHNM:P6NYjew71IM:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=EIohYGMhHNM:P6NYjew71IM:V_sGLiPBpWU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=EIohYGMhHNM:P6NYjew71IM:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=EIohYGMhHNM:P6NYjew71IM:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=EIohYGMhHNM:P6NYjew71IM:gIN9vFwOqvQ"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=EIohYGMhHNM:P6NYjew71IM:gIN9vFwOqvQ" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=EIohYGMhHNM:P6NYjew71IM:I9og5sOYxJI"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=I9og5sOYxJI" border="0"></img></a> </div><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarkHertsgaardsBlog/~4/EIohYGMhHNM" height="1" width="1"/> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/825415/mh_head.jpg http://posterous.com/people/Z2H0DdEgTWp Mark Hertsgaard mark Mark Hertsgaard Mon, 14 Dec 2009 15:34:32 -0800 http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/a-thrilling-day-in-copenhagen http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/a-thrilling-day-in-copenhagen <p> <p>by Mark Hertsgaard, for <a href="http://www.vanityfair.com/online/politics/2009/12/in-copenhagen-protesters-call-for-a-planetary-bailout.html">VANITYFAIR.com</a></p> Bright yellow with black letters, the first placards I saw at the massive climate rally in Copenhagen on Saturday said, <span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Bla Bla Bla&mdash;Action Now!</span> and <span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Nature Doesn't Compromise</span>. Handed out free to all comers by Greenpeace, they bobbed up and down in a sea of humanity that was gathered beneath the austerely beautiful, neo-baroque palace housing Denmark&rsquo;s parliament. But the placards also crystallized the vast gap between what science requires and what&mdash;so far&mdash;the world&rsquo;s governments have been talking about doing here at the Copenhagen climate summit. Despite a wind-chill index below freezing, the crowd in Parliament Square numbered in the many tens of thousands. Organizers claimed 100,000; a police spokesperson told me they did not have an exact figure, &ldquo;but there were many.&rdquo; Judging by the diversity of faces and accents, the majority of demonstrators seemed to have come from abroad&mdash;not just the rest of Europe but Asia, Africa, and North and South America&mdash;although there was also a sizable contingent of Danes, including supermodel Helena Christensen, who addressed the rally on behalf of the humanitarian group Oxfam and, she said, of people she had recently photographed in the mountains of Peru (her mother&rsquo;s homeland) who are suffering from drought, thanks to the melting of mountain glaciers. &ldquo;We have one question for the political leaders of the world,&rdquo; Kumi Naidoo, international executive director of Greenpeace International, told the rally. &ldquo;If you can find not millions, not billions, but trillions of dollars to bail out the banks, the bankers, and their bonuses, how is it that you cannot find the money to bail out the planet, the poor, and our children?&rdquo; Coming at the mid-point of the U.N.-sponsored climate talks, the Copenhagen demonstration was part of a worldwide day of actions&mdash;some 3,000 events in virtually every country on Earth, according to organizers&mdash;which were intended to send a message to President Obama, Chinese premier Wen Jiabao, and the hundred or so other heads of state and government due to arrive here later this week. &ldquo;Everyone here knows exactly what they want,&rdquo; said author and activist Bill McKibben of 350.org, one of the chief organizers of the global day of action, as he scanned the huge crowd in Copenhagen. &ldquo;They aren&rsquo;t anti-something. They&rsquo;re for a fair, binding, ambitious agreement that reduces the CO2 in the atmosphere to 350 parts per million.&rdquo; The mood throughout the day was good-humored, noisy, and peaceful, including during the four-mile march across town to the Bella Center complex, where delegates from some 190 nations have spent the last seven days haggling, and mainly disagreeing, over elements of a new climate treaty. Pushing a stroller holding Sally, her 18-month-old daughter, Copenhagen native Kanya Rorbech said that, as a new mother, she had felt compelled to march. &ldquo;I just passed a banner that said, <span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Life Has Just Begun</span>, and it almost made me cry,&rdquo; said the 33-year-old Rorbech. &ldquo;You see things in a different way when you become a parent. It&rsquo;s no longer just a matter of how you live your own life. You have to take care of other people as well.&rdquo; By the way, don&rsquo;t be misled by the many media reports emphasizing &ldquo;hundreds of arrests&rdquo; in Copenhagen. It&rsquo;s true that a tiny fringe of troublemakers infiltrated the tail end of the march. Donning black face masks, they broke a couple of windows in Copenhagen&rsquo;s former stock exchange, now the headquarters of the Danish Foreign Ministry. But the members of the self-proclaimed &ldquo;Black Bloc&rdquo; had nothing to do with the larger march&mdash;most demonstrators weren&rsquo;t even aware they were around&mdash;and at the first sign of trouble the Black Bloc members were surrounded by police, who eventually arrested some 900 of them. The security presence in Copenhagen is massive and ubiquitous, though not aggressive or threatening. With the city about to host one of the largest gatherings of heads of government in history, authorities are taking no chances. Security is especially tight around the Bella Center, and appears to include forces brought in from other countries. Walking around the back of the complex after the march terminated there late Saturday afternoon, I passed one group of security officers speaking to each other in French and a second conversing in either Spanish or Italian. After all, Copenhagen is planet central this week. As Mary Robinson, the former president of Ireland, told the demonstration&rsquo;s concluding rally outside the Bella Center, &ldquo;The future of the world is being decided here over the next few days.&rdquo; &ldquo;The tension over this coming week will be between leaders wanting to sign a weak deal in order to claim they accomplished something, and getting them to sign a deal that delivers what the planet really needs,&rdquo; said McKibben. On Friday, the chairmen of the U.N. conference released a draft treaty calling on rich industrial countries to cut emissions by 25 to 40 percent by 2020, compared to 1990 levels. The European Union and Japan have pledged targets at the low end of that range, but the Obama administration, facing stiff resistance in Congress, especially among Republicans who dispute that man-made global warming even exists, has proposed cuts of less than 5 percent. The administration disguises this paltry amount by moving the goalposts: in line with the Waxman-Markey climate legislation that has passed the House of Representatives and a similar measure awaiting action in the Senate, Obama has promised cuts of 17 percent by 2020&mdash;but that 17 percent is compared to a baseline of 2005, not the international standard of 1990. Developing countries and activist groups say that even these proposed 25- to 40-percent cuts fall well short of what&rsquo;s needed. Also on Friday, the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) issued a proposed treaty that, like the worldwide protests Saturday, called for reducing the level of CO2 in the atmosphere to 350 p.p.m., in hopes of limiting global warming to 1.5&deg; Celsius over pre-industrial levels. The planet is already about halfway there&mdash;average temperatures have risen approximately 0.7&deg; over the past century&mdash;and poor and developing countries in particular are feeling the effects. In the vast delta of southern Bangladesh, for example, rising sea levels have pushed salt water farther inland, salinating soil and crashing rice production. &ldquo;We are not backing 350 because it&rsquo;s a beautiful number,&rdquo; diplomat Antonio Lima of Cape Verde, the vice president of AOSIS, told a press conference on Friday. &ldquo;No, it is because of science. Some of our members will disappear [beneath rising seas] if we go above 1.5&deg; C.&rdquo; Not only the U.S. but also China and other big emitting nations consider talk of 350 p.p.m. naive, even crazy talk. Since the level of CO2 in the atmosphere currently stands at 389 p.p.m., a target of 350 p.p.m. would require truly radical emissions cuts, including from China (as well as steps to remove carbon from the atmosphere through growing trees and other so-called &ldquo;carbon negative&rdquo; practices). Specifically, the AOSIS proposal would oblige rich industrial countries&mdash;whose emissions over the last 200 years are what unwittingly caused global warming&mdash;to reduce annual emissions by 45 percent by 2020. And global emissions&mdash;that is, including those of China and other large emerging economies&mdash;would have to fall by 85 percent by 2050. Chinese negotiators are plainly not pleased by the AOSIS proposal and have allegedly tried to squelch it, in part by offering increased aid to African and other developing nations to deter them from siding with AOSIS. &ldquo;China says it will help with building hospitals and schools for us,&rdquo; said Landry Ninteretse, a 25-year-old journalist from the east African nation of Burundi. &ldquo;I told my country&rsquo;s delegate to these [Copenhagen] negotiations, &lsquo;Don&rsquo;t take [China&rsquo;s] position, as this will compromise future generations. We can build hospitals and schools later, but only if we fight climate change now.&rsquo;&rdquo; According to Ninteretse, the delegate was unimpressed. &ldquo;She told me, &lsquo;You are a young man, and there are many things you don&rsquo;t understand.&rsquo;&rdquo; Which way developing nations go this week may well shape the outcome of this summit. Will they stand with AOSIS and demand, if not 350 p.p.m., at least a much stronger treaty? Or will they fold in the face of pressure from China, the U.S., and other big emitters? Going into the summit, 92 countries had endorsed the 350 target, according to Jamie Henn, a coordinator of 350.org, and more have indicated here in Copenhagen that they will do likewise. &ldquo;The big guys are assuming they can bully or buy off developing nations, but what if the developing nations don&rsquo;t play ball?&rdquo; asked Saleemul Huq, the director of the Climate Group at the International Institute for Environment and Development in London, who has been training climate negotiators from developing nations since 2001. &ldquo;If developing nations don&rsquo;t get what they need for their survival, they may say to Obama and the big powers, &lsquo;We&rsquo;re prepared to fly home without an agreement&mdash;are you?&rsquo;&rdquo; Everyone agrees that the role of Obama, who is scheduled to arrive here on Friday, will be crucial. The president faces a conundrum. His past statements and many of his actions suggest he understands the urgency of the climate threat and would like to take strong action against it. But any treaty agreed to in Copenhagen can be blocked by a mere 34 votes in the U.S. Senate. The Republicans, who generally oppose robust efforts to reduce carbon emissions, have 40 seats, and more than a few Democratic Senators, especially from coal and oil states, aren&rsquo;t eager to act against climate change either. But Obama isn&rsquo;t trying hard enough, says President Mohamed Nasheed of Maldives, whose country, a high-end tourist destination in the Indian Ocean, is one of the lowest-lying in the world. Asked how Obama should overcome the Senate roadblock, Nasheed told <em>Vanity Fair</em> that Obama seems to be avoiding the climate issue in public instead of showing leadership. &ldquo;He must go to the country and speak to Democrats and Republicans alike, and convince them that this is important for everyone&rsquo;s children, whatever their political views,&rdquo; said Nasheed. Meanwhile, the massive outpouring of public pressure on Saturday suggests that activists could soon deliver the one message politicians of all stripes hear clearly: defeat at the ballot box. As one more of the black-and-yellow placards I saw at the Copenhagen rally put it, <span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Change the Politics, Not the Climate</span> . </p> <p><a href="http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/a-thrilling-day-in-copenhagen">Permalink</a> </p><div class="feedflare"> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=vgtDGMrGolY:9BjYe0eNoA4:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=vgtDGMrGolY:9BjYe0eNoA4:F7zBnMyn0Lo"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=vgtDGMrGolY:9BjYe0eNoA4:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=vgtDGMrGolY:9BjYe0eNoA4:V_sGLiPBpWU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=vgtDGMrGolY:9BjYe0eNoA4:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=vgtDGMrGolY:9BjYe0eNoA4:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=vgtDGMrGolY:9BjYe0eNoA4:gIN9vFwOqvQ"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=vgtDGMrGolY:9BjYe0eNoA4:gIN9vFwOqvQ" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=vgtDGMrGolY:9BjYe0eNoA4:I9og5sOYxJI"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=I9og5sOYxJI" border="0"></img></a> </div><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarkHertsgaardsBlog/~4/vgtDGMrGolY" height="1" width="1"/> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/825415/mh_head.jpg http://posterous.com/people/Z2H0DdEgTWp Mark Hertsgaard mark Mark Hertsgaard Fri, 11 Dec 2009 17:00:57 -0800 http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/copenhagen-radical-cuts-urged-deal-in-jeopard http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/copenhagen-radical-cuts-urged-deal-in-jeopard <p> <p>by Mark Hertsgaard, for <a href="http://www.thenation.com/blogs/copenhagen/505411/">The Nation Blogs</a></p> Big news from Copenhagen Friday, where the divide between big emitters and at-risk nations deepened, threatening the prospects of reaching a climate deal for president Obama and other heads of state to sign when they arrive at the summit next week. In a day of major developments, the Alliance of Small Island Nations put forth a radically tougher proposal for confronting climate change than the US, China and other major emitters favor. The AOSIS proposal, which calls for temperature rise not to exceed 1.5 Celsius above pre-industrial levels, ran counter to a separate text released today by the chairmen of the summit that called for smaller but still significant cuts. Meanwhile, activists prepared for a worldwide day of demonstrations on Saturday that organizer Bill McKibben of 350.org said were "explicitly endorsing" the AOSIS proposal and would involve "millions of people" and 3,000 actions around the world. "We are not backing 350 because it's a beautiful number," said diplomat Antonio Lima of Cape Verde, the vice president of AOSIS, referring to the alliance's call to reduce the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to 350 parts per million from today's 389. "No, it is because of science," he added. "Some of our members will disappear [beneath rising seas] if we go above 1.5 C." The rich-poor divide also reared its head on the all-important question of who will pay the bill for climate change. Todd Stern, the Obama administration's chief climate negotiator, said Thursday that he "categorically reject[s]" the suggestion that rich industrial countries owe compensation to the victims of climate change. Stern acknowledged that the emissions of rich nations over the past two hundred years of industrialization had caused global warming, telling a press conference, "We absolutely recognize our historic role in putting emissions in the atmosphere." But, Stern added, "the sense of guilt or culpability or reparations--I just categorically reject that." Stern's statement put him at odds not only with international law but with America's European allies. European Union leaders announced in Brussels today that their governments would provide 7.2 billion Euros over the next three years to help poor nations adapt to sea level rise, drought and other intensifying impacts of climate change. The EU's offer was in keeping with the provisions of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change--the climate treaty President George H.W. Bush signed at the Earth Summit in 1992 and which the Copenhagen negotiations are seeking to extend. Nevertheless, it was quickly rejected by developing nations and aid agencies as grossly inadequate. "We have talked about $100 billion a year," ambassador Lima told The Nation, citing an estimate the World Bank has made for climate change adaptation by poor nations. "Now we are hearing about $10 billion for three years." "Worst of all, this money is not even new," Tim Gore, the climate adviser to Oxfam EU, told the BBC. "It's made up of a recycling of past promises and payments that have already been made." The emissions reductions included in the AOSIS proposal go far beyond what is currently on the table in Copenhagen. AOSIS calls for global emissions to peak "no later than 2015," which aligns with statements made by IPCC Chair Ranjendra Pachauri. But AOSIS then demands that the US and other developed nations cut emissions by 45 percent (compared to 1990 levels) by 2020. Furthermore, global emissions, including from large developing countries such as China and India, are to fall at least 85 percent by 2050. Noting that Pachauri, NASA scientist James Hansen and other experts have endorsed reducing carbon dioxide levels to 350 parts per million as soon as possible, McKibben hailed the AOSIS proposal as "the first truly rational attempt to grapple with what the science of climate change tells us." But the US, China and other big emitters are backing much smaller cuts. The EU has offered to cut its emissions by 20 percent from 1990 levels by 2020, and by 30 percent if other nations do the same. Japan has made a similar pledge, while the Obama administration, facing congressional resistance, has offered to cut by a mere 4 percent. China and India have said they will limit the growth of their emissions but that population growth and the need to fight poverty require absolute emissions to grow for years to come. Thus the stage is set for a showdown in Copenhagen next week. Heads of state do not generally come to high-profile international negotiations like this one unless they expect to sign a deal. Poor and vulnerable nations are counting on global public pressure to compel the biggest emitters to go further, much further, than they have in mind. "If we leave Copenhagen without a legally binding outcome and without very strong commitment on finance, how can we go in front of our children and tell them, We couldn't reach [an agreement]," ambassador Lima told a roomful of young activists holding signs saying, "We stand with AOSIS." That's why we need the support of you, the youth," he continued, "because you are the ones who are going to suffer if we don't have a good result. &nbsp;And sometimes your governments will hear you when they do not hear us." </p> <p><a href="http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/copenhagen-radical-cuts-urged-deal-in-jeopard">Permalink</a> </p><div class="feedflare"> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=NDJ9o5dAZa0:b908yDX3QxA:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=NDJ9o5dAZa0:b908yDX3QxA:F7zBnMyn0Lo"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=NDJ9o5dAZa0:b908yDX3QxA:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=NDJ9o5dAZa0:b908yDX3QxA:V_sGLiPBpWU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=NDJ9o5dAZa0:b908yDX3QxA:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=NDJ9o5dAZa0:b908yDX3QxA:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=NDJ9o5dAZa0:b908yDX3QxA:gIN9vFwOqvQ"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=NDJ9o5dAZa0:b908yDX3QxA:gIN9vFwOqvQ" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=NDJ9o5dAZa0:b908yDX3QxA:I9og5sOYxJI"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=I9og5sOYxJI" border="0"></img></a> </div><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarkHertsgaardsBlog/~4/NDJ9o5dAZa0" height="1" width="1"/> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/825415/mh_head.jpg http://posterous.com/people/Z2H0DdEgTWp Mark Hertsgaard mark Mark Hertsgaard Tue, 08 Dec 2009 07:26:44 -0800 http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/copenhagen-a-historic-breakthrough http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/copenhagen-a-historic-breakthrough <p> <p>by Mark Hertsgaard, for&nbsp;<a href="http://www.thenation.com/blogs/copenhagen/503985/a_historic_breakthrough">The Nation Blogs</a></p> The Copenhagen climate summit just keeps getting bigger and bigger. As a journalist who has covered the climate story for twenty years now, including the historic Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992 that produced the climate treaty being updated in Copenhagen, I can't recall a moment more filled with genuine possibility and hope. To be sure, there are a thousand ways things could still go wrong in Copenhagen. But make no mistake: momentum is building, governments are feeling the heat and Copenhagen could bring an historic breakthrough&mdash;if the public pressure that got us this far is sustained over the next fourteen days. Last Friday's stunning announcement by the White House that President Obama would attend the end of the climate summit, rather than the beginning, is just the latest in a series of developments that have upended the conventional wisdom about Copenhagen. Remember: it had long been assumed that Obama wouldn't even attend the summit; administration officials were saying as much as recently as a month ago, in a clear attempt to lower expectations. But Obama declared otherwise in a Nov 9 interview with Reuters, saying he would come to Copenhagen if negotiations were making progress. Obama followed that with a real game-changer, though it's one that still hasn't registered with most people: he reached a climate deal with China, in the culmination of backchannel talks that began in July 2008, before he was elected president. When Obama and Chinese president Hu Jintao jointly announced on November 17 steps that each nation would take to tackle climate change, it marked the first time the two climate superpowers had publicly told the world they would limit their emissions. News accounts and activist comments generally saw this announcement as a glass half-empty, noting that neither side specified how much it would cut emissions by when. A few days later, both China and the US answered this criticism by outlining specific targets. Again, commentators complained they didn't go far enough. That is true, but it misses the larger point. To draw a parallel with the nuclear arms race of the Cold War, the Obama-Hu announcement was akin to the first meeting between US President Reagan and the Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, in 1985. In that meeting, the leaders of the two nuclear superpowers agreed for the first time to put down the pistols they had long had pointed at each other's foreheads. It took the US and USSR more time and more meetings to agree on the necessary next steps: unloading the pistols and doing away with the bullets inside. The same will be true for today's climate superpowers, China and the US, but the shift in mood and intent is unmistakable, and it may have encouraged some of the other remarkable announcements of recent weeks, including offers from Brazil, South Africa and India to limit their own emissions, even though as developing nations they are not legally obligated to do so. But, again as with the nuclear arms talks, there remain serious obstacles to reaching a fair, ambitious and binding agreement on climate change, and it appears that the Obama administration is responsible for one of the biggest. Obama's climate negotiators have been insisting that the existing international procedures for confronting climate change&mdash;codified in the Kyoto Protocol to the treaty signed in Rio in 1992&mdash;be scrapped and a new mechanism created. The arguments pro and con on this are long and complicated. The upshot, however, is not: the US proposal would create a system where future emissions reductions would in effect be voluntary--nations would pledge to reduce emissions by such-and-such amount by such-and-such date, but there would be no international enforcement of these pledges. Such a voluntary scheme would plainly invite disaster, which helps explain why governments from rich and poor nations alike have rejected the US position. This is one of the stories I'm going to be following most closely in Copenhagen. It's also one where pressure from civil society could do the most good. President Obama has given many signs that he is serious about tackling climate change, a very welcome shift from his predecessor's malign neglect. But Obama cannot claim to be serious about combatting climate chaos if he meanwhile backs a voluntary approach to emissions reductions. Nevertheless, the US position might well shift over the coming days, especially if more pressure is brought to bear. After all, the positions of many governments have changed substantially in recent weeks as the world's attention focuses on Copenhagen and momentum builds. The UN has christened this summit "Hopenhagen," a nice touch. Just remember: hope is a verb. </p> <p><a href="http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/copenhagen-a-historic-breakthrough">Permalink</a> </p><div class="feedflare"> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=q-l1D5p5aC4:GUc4rh4-meA:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=q-l1D5p5aC4:GUc4rh4-meA:F7zBnMyn0Lo"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=q-l1D5p5aC4:GUc4rh4-meA:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=q-l1D5p5aC4:GUc4rh4-meA:V_sGLiPBpWU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=q-l1D5p5aC4:GUc4rh4-meA:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=q-l1D5p5aC4:GUc4rh4-meA:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=q-l1D5p5aC4:GUc4rh4-meA:gIN9vFwOqvQ"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=q-l1D5p5aC4:GUc4rh4-meA:gIN9vFwOqvQ" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=q-l1D5p5aC4:GUc4rh4-meA:I9og5sOYxJI"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=I9og5sOYxJI" border="0"></img></a> </div><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarkHertsgaardsBlog/~4/q-l1D5p5aC4" height="1" width="1"/> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/825415/mh_head.jpg http://posterous.com/people/Z2H0DdEgTWp Mark Hertsgaard mark Mark Hertsgaard Tue, 08 Dec 2009 07:20:36 -0800 http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/copenhagen-2009 http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/copenhagen-2009 <p> So the Copenhagen summit has now begun, and it looks like it's going to be a hell of a news event and maybe&mdash;though this is much less certain&mdash;even produce a real breakthrough.&nbsp; I'll be there from Dec 10 morning through the conclusion on Dec 18, departing on the 19th.&nbsp; I'll&nbsp; be covering events for The Nation, Vanity Fair and Marketplace radio and perhaps L'espresso, as well as gathering material for the Epilogue to my book. Copenhagen, here I come! </p> <p><a href="http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/copenhagen-2009">Permalink</a> </p><div class="feedflare"> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=yDr-pehIBlg:S2giSuV3wDM:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=yDr-pehIBlg:S2giSuV3wDM:F7zBnMyn0Lo"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=yDr-pehIBlg:S2giSuV3wDM:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=yDr-pehIBlg:S2giSuV3wDM:V_sGLiPBpWU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=yDr-pehIBlg:S2giSuV3wDM:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=yDr-pehIBlg:S2giSuV3wDM:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=yDr-pehIBlg:S2giSuV3wDM:gIN9vFwOqvQ"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=yDr-pehIBlg:S2giSuV3wDM:gIN9vFwOqvQ" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=yDr-pehIBlg:S2giSuV3wDM:I9og5sOYxJI"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=I9og5sOYxJI" border="0"></img></a> </div><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarkHertsgaardsBlog/~4/yDr-pehIBlg" height="1" width="1"/> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/825415/mh_head.jpg http://posterous.com/people/Z2H0DdEgTWp Mark Hertsgaard mark Mark Hertsgaard Wed, 19 Aug 2009 07:17:43 -0700 http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/hertsgaard-fighting-drought-with-trees-in-bur http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/hertsgaard-fighting-drought-with-trees-in-bur <p> <strong>Reporter's notebook, on PRI's The World, August 17, 2009</strong> <em>"The paved road heading north from Burkina Faso&rsquo;s capital ends in the hot, dusty town of Ouahigouya. Most locals here are farmers, scratching out a living in the savannah that stretches to the horizon on all sides. I&rsquo;d come here hoping to get a glimpse of how Africa might feed itself under a hotter, more volatile climate. Africa already has the highest proportion of malnourished people on earth. And scientists say climate change will hit this continent hard. ..." </em> Download the audio file (MP3/2.6MB):&nbsp; <a href="http://www.theworld.org/2009/08/17/fighting-drought-with-trees-in-burkina-faso/" title="http://www.theworld.org/2009/08/17/fighting-drought-with-trees-in-burkina-faso/"><div id="quicktime_embed-AEjmHrhlEr"> <embed href="http://64.71.145.108/audio/0817094.mp3" scale="aspect" src="http://posterous.com/mp3player/mp3_shell.png" autoplay="false" type="video/quicktime" height="100" target="myself" controller="false" width="500"> </embed> </div> <div id="flash_embed-AEjmHrhlEr"> <embed src="/mp3player/posterousplayer.swf" height="100" flashvars="file=http%3A%2F%2F64.71.145.108%2Faudio%2F0817094.mp3" width="500" bgcolor="#FFFFFF" /> </div> <script language="javascript" type="text/javascript"> var agent=navigator.userAgent.toLowerCase(); var is_iphone = (agent.indexOf('mobile')!=-1) && ((agent.indexOf('iphone')!=-1) || (agent.indexOf('ipod')!=-1)); if (is_iphone) { $('quicktime_embed-AEjmHrhlEr').show(); $('flash_embed-AEjmHrhlEr').hide(); } else { $('flash_embed-AEjmHrhlEr').show(); $('quicktime_embed-AEjmHrhlEr').hide(); } </script></a> Or view the transcript at: <a href="http://www.theworld.org/2009/08/17/fighting-drought-with-trees-in-burkina-faso/" title="http://www.theworld.org/2009/08/17/fighting-drought-with-trees-in-burkina-faso/">http://www.theworld.org/2009/08/17/fighting-drought-with-trees-in-burkina-faso/</a> </p> <p><a href="http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/hertsgaard-fighting-drought-with-trees-in-bur">Permalink</a> </p><div class="feedflare"> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=NwjihmzVy6Y:b1IHYaKA-SM:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=NwjihmzVy6Y:b1IHYaKA-SM:F7zBnMyn0Lo"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=NwjihmzVy6Y:b1IHYaKA-SM:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=NwjihmzVy6Y:b1IHYaKA-SM:V_sGLiPBpWU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=NwjihmzVy6Y:b1IHYaKA-SM:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=NwjihmzVy6Y:b1IHYaKA-SM:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=NwjihmzVy6Y:b1IHYaKA-SM:gIN9vFwOqvQ"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=NwjihmzVy6Y:b1IHYaKA-SM:gIN9vFwOqvQ" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=NwjihmzVy6Y:b1IHYaKA-SM:I9og5sOYxJI"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=I9og5sOYxJI" border="0"></img></a> </div><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarkHertsgaardsBlog/~4/NwjihmzVy6Y" height="1" width="1"/> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/825415/mh_head.jpg http://posterous.com/people/Z2H0DdEgTWp Mark Hertsgaard mark Mark Hertsgaard Sun, 01 Mar 2009 12:40:06 -0800 http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/hertsgaard-on-obamas-plan-for-the-environment http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/hertsgaard-on-obamas-plan-for-the-environment <p> <strong>Interviewed by Lisa Mullins on PRI's The World (Feb 26, 2009)</strong> <em>&nbsp;Journalist Mark Hertsgaard writes about the environment for The Nation. So, Mark, when you hear about not only an investment in more efficient energy sources but something also that will put people back to work and make the nation more secure, as the President said, sounds too good to be true. Do you think it is? ... </em> Download the audio file (MP3/2.3MB): <div id="quicktime_embed-IgyzIdyHhr"> <embed href="http://www.theworld.org/audio/0226092.mp3" scale="aspect" src="http://posterous.com/mp3player/mp3_shell.png" autoplay="false" type="video/quicktime" height="100" target="myself" controller="false" width="500"> </embed> </div> <div id="flash_embed-IgyzIdyHhr"> <embed src="/mp3player/posterousplayer.swf" height="100" flashvars="file=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.theworld.org%2Faudio%2F0226092.mp3" width="500" bgcolor="#FFFFFF" /> </div> <script language="javascript" type="text/javascript"> var agent=navigator.userAgent.toLowerCase(); var is_iphone = (agent.indexOf('mobile')!=-1) && ((agent.indexOf('iphone')!=-1) || (agent.indexOf('ipod')!=-1)); if (is_iphone) { $('quicktime_embed-IgyzIdyHhr').show(); $('flash_embed-IgyzIdyHhr').hide(); } else { $('flash_embed-IgyzIdyHhr').show(); $('quicktime_embed-IgyzIdyHhr').hide(); } </script> Or view the transcript at:&nbsp; <a href="http://www.theworld.org/node/24757/" title="http://www.theworld.org/node/24757/">http://www.theworld.org/node/24757/</a> </p> <p><a href="http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/hertsgaard-on-obamas-plan-for-the-environment">Permalink</a> </p><div class="feedflare"> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=3dcjRovtK00:SiFvjvkkilM:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=3dcjRovtK00:SiFvjvkkilM:F7zBnMyn0Lo"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=3dcjRovtK00:SiFvjvkkilM:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=3dcjRovtK00:SiFvjvkkilM:V_sGLiPBpWU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=3dcjRovtK00:SiFvjvkkilM:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=3dcjRovtK00:SiFvjvkkilM:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=3dcjRovtK00:SiFvjvkkilM:gIN9vFwOqvQ"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=3dcjRovtK00:SiFvjvkkilM:gIN9vFwOqvQ" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=3dcjRovtK00:SiFvjvkkilM:I9og5sOYxJI"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=I9og5sOYxJI" border="0"></img></a> </div><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarkHertsgaardsBlog/~4/3dcjRovtK00" height="1" width="1"/> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/825415/mh_head.jpg http://posterous.com/people/Z2H0DdEgTWp Mark Hertsgaard mark Mark Hertsgaard Tue, 04 Nov 2008 22:02:51 -0800 http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/luke-the-plumber http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/luke-the-plumber <p> <p style="border: 1px solid black; margin: 0pt 4em 1.5em; padding: 0.8em;"><em>Mark Hertsgaard is blogging the 2008 Election day from Chicago for Vanity Fair, The Nation and Italian radio. </em></p> Just back to Chicago after a day spent in neighboring Indiana, a battleground state Democrats haven't won since 1964 but might tonight.&nbsp; In any case, it looks like it will be close.&nbsp; The polls closed in the eastern half of the state an hour ago and will close in the western half in a few minutes.&nbsp; Turnout seems to have been very high across the state, including in the traditionally strongly Republican town of Elkhart, where I was this afternoon and where the Obama campaign mounted a major push. Elkhart is the RV manufacturing capital of the world and so has been slammed economically in recent years, so the Obama campaign targeted it early as a place where they might pick up votes. The investment seems to have paid off:&nbsp; turnout was up 500% over 2004 in the precincts I visited in southern Elkhart, according to local volunteer Luke Lefever, a plumber who grew up in Elkhart and introduces himself, of course, as Luke the Plumber (and shows you his plumber's license to prove it).&nbsp; "I'm feeling very good tonight," said Lefever, who dared say the Democrats might take the state when all the votes are counted.&nbsp; "At the very least, we forced McCain to defend it." </p> <p><a href="http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/luke-the-plumber">Permalink</a> </p><div class="feedflare"> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=Ecvn6wru96w:SYjz50ze6nw:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=Ecvn6wru96w:SYjz50ze6nw:F7zBnMyn0Lo"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=Ecvn6wru96w:SYjz50ze6nw:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=Ecvn6wru96w:SYjz50ze6nw:V_sGLiPBpWU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=Ecvn6wru96w:SYjz50ze6nw:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=Ecvn6wru96w:SYjz50ze6nw:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=Ecvn6wru96w:SYjz50ze6nw:gIN9vFwOqvQ"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=Ecvn6wru96w:SYjz50ze6nw:gIN9vFwOqvQ" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=Ecvn6wru96w:SYjz50ze6nw:I9og5sOYxJI"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=I9og5sOYxJI" border="0"></img></a> </div><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarkHertsgaardsBlog/~4/Ecvn6wru96w" height="1" width="1"/> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/825415/mh_head.jpg http://posterous.com/people/Z2H0DdEgTWp Mark Hertsgaard mark Mark Hertsgaard Tue, 04 Nov 2008 21:57:21 -0800 http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/culture-clash-of-the-day http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/culture-clash-of-the-day <p> <p style="border: 1px solid black; margin: 0pt 4em 1.5em; padding: 0.8em;"><em>Mark Hertsgaard is blogging the 2008 Election day from Chicago for Vanity Fair, The Nation and Italian radio. </em></p> Kamala Harris, the co-chair of Obama's campaign in California and as District Attorney of San Francisco one of the first elected officials in the nation to endorse him back when he first announced his candidacy (and nobody gave him much of a chance), came to Chicago for Election Night but spent the day half an hour away in heavily African-American Gary, Indiana, doing legal protection work.&nbsp; When she reached her assigned polling station, she was introduced to one of her Republican counterparts, a local lawyer. "Where are you from? he asked Harris, who, like Obama, is not only of mixed white-and-African-American heritage but strikingly attractive. "California," she replied. "Whereabouts?" the local Republican asked. "San Francisco," said Harris. "Oh, the land of fruits and nuts, huh?" Harris, an obvious possibility for a high post in a future Obama administration, smiled and said nothing.&nbsp; When the Republican turned back to his group, she explained, "I've learned to save my breath.&nbsp; Some people, you're never going to change their minds." </p> <p><a href="http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/culture-clash-of-the-day">Permalink</a> </p><div class="feedflare"> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=f4cGZRoBUxk:wm530scpnVM:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=f4cGZRoBUxk:wm530scpnVM:F7zBnMyn0Lo"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=f4cGZRoBUxk:wm530scpnVM:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=f4cGZRoBUxk:wm530scpnVM:V_sGLiPBpWU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=f4cGZRoBUxk:wm530scpnVM:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=f4cGZRoBUxk:wm530scpnVM:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=f4cGZRoBUxk:wm530scpnVM:gIN9vFwOqvQ"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=f4cGZRoBUxk:wm530scpnVM:gIN9vFwOqvQ" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=f4cGZRoBUxk:wm530scpnVM:I9og5sOYxJI"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=I9og5sOYxJI" border="0"></img></a> </div><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarkHertsgaardsBlog/~4/f4cGZRoBUxk" height="1" width="1"/> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/825415/mh_head.jpg http://posterous.com/people/Z2H0DdEgTWp Mark Hertsgaard mark Mark Hertsgaard Tue, 04 Nov 2008 00:55:10 -0800 http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/anxiety-and-anticipation-in-chicago http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/anxiety-and-anticipation-in-chicago <p> <p style="border: 1px solid black; margin: 0pt 4em 1.5em; padding: 0.8em;"><em>Mark Hertsgaard is blogging the 2008 Election day from Chicago for Vanity Fair, The Nation and Italian radio. </em></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">Here in Barak Obama&rsquo;s hometown of Chicago, there is soaring anticipation, great anxiety and one giant absence on the eve of Election Day 2008. The possibility&mdash;at this point, probability&mdash;that the hometown hero will be elected president of the United States tomorrow is the number one topic of conversation among locals and visitors alike. &ldquo;Oh, yeah, everyone&rsquo;s pretty excited here,&rdquo; said Tiffany, a heavy-set young African-American woman working the check-out counter at Walgreen&rsquo;s downtown. &ldquo;I think he&rsquo;s going to win. And I think he&rsquo;ll do a good job as president.&rdquo;</p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;"> Inside Obama&rsquo;s national campaign headquarters on Michigan Avenue on Sunday afternoon, the twenty-somethings who seem to hold all but the very highest jobs in the campaign were carrying in crock pots and grocery bags filled with home-cooked meals&mdash;prepared by local supporters to fuel the kids as they turned in yet another 18 hour work day. The national polls point to a solid, perhaps spectacular, Obama victory on Tuesday, but none of the staffers I spoke with admitted to anything but a head-down race to the finish. &ldquo;Barak told us the other day, &lsquo;Anyone who&rsquo;s feeling complacent about this election, I have two words for you: New Hampshire,&rsquo;&rdquo; said one, referring to the state whose primary election Obama was expected to win back in January but where Hillary Clinton prevailed instead, reviving her candidacy. &ldquo;Now you hear those two words around here all the time,&rdquo; the staffer continued. &ldquo;When it&rsquo;s two in the morning and you haven&rsquo;t had a full night&rsquo;s sleep in weeks and you want to go home, you tell yourself &lsquo;New Hampshire,&rdquo; and you keep going.&rdquo;</p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">Although virtually every desk on the 11th floor headquarters was full on Sunday at 5 pm as the campaign prepared last minute internet appeals and phone calling operations, the staffer (who cannot be named because the campaign press office had not approved our conversation) said that the headquarters was actually relatively empty, compared to the past few weeks, when space was so tight that campaign workers were crowding the aisles, sitting on the floor while working their computers. &ldquo;Anyone who doesn&rsquo;t have to be in headquarters at this point to do their job has been sent to the field to get out the vote,&rdquo; said the aide.</p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">Many of the staffers from Chicago have gone to Indiana, a quick thirty minute drive down Interstate 94, where Obama is running neck and neck with McCain in a state that hasn&rsquo;t voted Democrat in a presidential election since choosing Lyndon Johnson in 1964. Indiana, where I myself will be going on Election Day, is also where the second, post-Civil War incarnation of the Ku Klux Klan was born. If Obama wins Indiana&mdash;and he has been campaigning hard there, not just in the traditionally Democratic Chicago suburbs of northwestern Indiana but in rural areas as well&mdash;it would signal not just the end of John McCain&rsquo;s presidential ambitions but a historic shift in the direction of American democracy and perhaps the nation&rsquo;s soul.</p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;"> The anxiety one finds here comes in two forms: the first from Democrats who are afraid to jinx the prospect of an Obama victory by getting their hopes up too early; the second, more ominously, from African-Americans who say they are excited at the chance a black man will be elected president but often quickly add their fear that Obama might then be shot, especially if he attends the massive outdoor Election Night party planned in Grant Park, the downtown park beside Lake Michigan where Fourth of July fireworks and other city-wide are commonly held.</p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;"> &ldquo;I do worry about that, I do,&rdquo; said Sylvia Wilson, an African-American college administrator from St. Louis in town for a convention over the weekend who is extending her stay a couple of days to be an eyewitness to history (and perhaps to Obama himself, since she too is staying at the Hyatt, where Obama will watch the returns on Election Night). &ldquo;I&rsquo;m old enough to remember the shootings of the 1960s&mdash;John F. Kennedy, Medgar, Malcom, Martin. They better have good security for him, that&rsquo;s all I&rsquo;ll say.&rdquo;</p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;"> And finally the giant absence: Studs Terkel, the author, activist and radio host who symbolized Chicago, died last Friday at the age of ninety-six, reportedly in his sleep. In his best-selling oral histories (Working, Division Street: America and especially Race&mdash;Studs introduced America to itself in all of its nuanced, rambunctious diversity; his portrayals of the fundamental decency of ordinary people gave us hope of a better day. &ldquo;Redemption,&rdquo; he answered a few years ago, when asked if there was a common theme to his books. &ldquo;Anybody can be redeemed,&rdquo; he added. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve seen it.&rdquo; On Tuesday, America has its shot at redemption. What a shame Studs won&rsquo;t be here to chronicle it.</p> </p> <p><a href="http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/anxiety-and-anticipation-in-chicago">Permalink</a> </p><div class="feedflare"> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=l2ZM4_jBrBE:iLAqggF-o_A:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=l2ZM4_jBrBE:iLAqggF-o_A:F7zBnMyn0Lo"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=l2ZM4_jBrBE:iLAqggF-o_A:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=l2ZM4_jBrBE:iLAqggF-o_A:V_sGLiPBpWU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=l2ZM4_jBrBE:iLAqggF-o_A:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=l2ZM4_jBrBE:iLAqggF-o_A:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=l2ZM4_jBrBE:iLAqggF-o_A:gIN9vFwOqvQ"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=l2ZM4_jBrBE:iLAqggF-o_A:gIN9vFwOqvQ" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=l2ZM4_jBrBE:iLAqggF-o_A:I9og5sOYxJI"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=I9og5sOYxJI" border="0"></img></a> </div><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarkHertsgaardsBlog/~4/l2ZM4_jBrBE" height="1" width="1"/> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/825415/mh_head.jpg http://posterous.com/people/Z2H0DdEgTWp Mark Hertsgaard mark Mark Hertsgaard Thu, 20 Mar 2008 21:32:26 -0700 http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/mark-hertsgaard-interviews-bill-mckibben-marc http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/mark-hertsgaard-interviews-bill-mckibben-marc <p> Bill McKibben will be remembered as one of the most important U.S. journalists of his generation because he was first, and he was right, on the biggest story of our time: global climate change. His 1989 book, <em>The End of Nature</em>, was the first popular book on global warming to attract a large readership and is still the place to begin for anyone new to the subject. (Get the 10th anniversary edition.) I'll be interviewing Bill about his life and work on stage in San Francisco next Monday night, March 24, as part of the City Arts &amp; Lectures series. The program begins at 8 pm at the Herbst Theatre, 401 Van Ness Avenue (minutes from Civic Center BART stop). Tickets are $19 per person; details at <a href="http://www.cityarts.net/n.mckibben.html">http://www.cityarts.net/n.mckibben.html</a>. If you are in the Bay Area, come on by. If you have a question you'd like me to ask Bill, please send it to <a href="mailto:info@markhertsgaard.com">info@markhertsgaard.com</a> for consideration. I haven't blogged in the past few months because I've been hibernating, writing my new book, <em>Living Through the Storm: How We Survive the Next 50 Years of Climate Change</em>. But check next week's edition of <em>The Nation</em> for my article on peak oil, its paradoxical relationship to climate change and the best and worst of humanity's possible responses to it. On this 5th anniversary of Bush's war in Iraq, I also commend <em>A Climate of War</em>, an analysis by the NGO, Oil Change International, which shows what the $2.8+ billion spent on this war <em>could</em> have achieved had that money been used to fight climate change. You can find it here: <a href="http://priceofoil.org/">http://priceofoil.org/</a>. Thanks for reading, Mark Hertsgaard </p> <p><a href="http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/mark-hertsgaard-interviews-bill-mckibben-marc">Permalink</a> </p><div class="feedflare"> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=wvEBHaq1Ays:t_vCdrQZP6U:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=wvEBHaq1Ays:t_vCdrQZP6U:F7zBnMyn0Lo"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=wvEBHaq1Ays:t_vCdrQZP6U:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=wvEBHaq1Ays:t_vCdrQZP6U:V_sGLiPBpWU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=wvEBHaq1Ays:t_vCdrQZP6U:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=wvEBHaq1Ays:t_vCdrQZP6U:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=wvEBHaq1Ays:t_vCdrQZP6U:gIN9vFwOqvQ"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=wvEBHaq1Ays:t_vCdrQZP6U:gIN9vFwOqvQ" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=wvEBHaq1Ays:t_vCdrQZP6U:I9og5sOYxJI"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=I9og5sOYxJI" border="0"></img></a> </div><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarkHertsgaardsBlog/~4/wvEBHaq1Ays" height="1" width="1"/> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/825415/mh_head.jpg http://posterous.com/people/Z2H0DdEgTWp Mark Hertsgaard mark Mark Hertsgaard Fri, 14 Dec 2007 19:59:46 -0800 http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/books-and-charities-worth-supporting-this-chr http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/books-and-charities-worth-supporting-this-chr <p> <p align="left">As the world awaits news from the crucial climate talks in Bali, here are some books worth buying and some charities worth supporting this holiday season.</p> <p align="left"><br /> First, the charities. I hope you'll consider helping the valiant people of Bangladesh, who have endured two disasters this year--mega floods in the summer and Cyclone Sidr in the fall--that remind us that it is the poor who are hit first and worst by climate change. Bangladesh can be considered Ground Zero of our globally warming world, threatened by both cyclones and sea level rise from the south and floods and, years from now, droughts from the north, where the Himalayan mountains send snowmelt down to the sea. I visited Bangladesh in February to research my forthcoming book, <em>Living Through the Storm: Surviving the Next 50 Years of Climate Change</em>, and was impressed by two NGOs in particular: Oxfam and Practical Action. Each works at the local level, with rather than for the poor, while also pursuing a larger agenda of changing the global practices that maintain the status quo. If you would like to offer a donation, go to these links:</p> <p align="left">Oxfam: <a href="http://www.justgiving.com/oxfambangladeshappeal">http://www.justgiving.com/oxfambangladeshappeal</a></p> <p align="left">Practical Action: <a href="http://practicalaction.org/?id=personal_donation">http://practicalaction.org/?id=personal_donation</a></p> <p align="left">Now, the books--three on environmental matters, one non-fiction thriller and one funny/sad novel. Of course, I urge you to buy from an independent book shop. If you want to order on line, please visit the site of the estimable Powell's of Portland, which has supported me and so many other authors over the years: <a href="http://www.powells.com/">www.powells.com</a>.</p> <p align="left">1. <em>Earth Under Fire</em>, by Gary Braasch (University of California Press), is the best book on global warming I've read this year. Braasch is an intrepid and accomplished photographer who has spent years traveling to all parts of the world to document, in stunning images and well-researched accompanying text, how global warming is changing our planet NOW. Even global warming experts can learn from this book, but it's perfect for newcomers to the topic too. Plus, it looks great on a coffee table.</p> <p align="left">2. <em>Fight Global Warming Now</em>, by Bill McKibben and the Step It Up Team, (Holt), is the essential handbook for the essential task now facing us: taking organized political action to achieve major cuts in greenhouse gas emissions. As Bill points out in the book, many people know global warming must be fought, but they don't know what to do or how to go about it. This book tells you, in very accessible, non-intimidating and even, dare I say, fun ways. Go get 'em!</p> <p align="left">3. <em>Exposed</em>, by Mark Schapiro (Chelsea Green) is an environmental scoop that sends a message not only to American consumers but businesses: U.S. law allows all kinds of nasty toxic chemicals in the most common daily products (toys, cosmetics, etc.) that are banned in Europe; and because Europe is taking the environmental high road, it is gaining, not losing, global market share. (Disclosure: I offered a blurb to this book but, dammit, receive no royalties.)</p> <p align="left">4. <em>The Informant</em>, by Kurt Eichenwald (Broadway Books) is the true but almost unbelievable inside story of the rampant price-fixing and other criminal conduct undertaken by Archer Daniels Midland, the agri-business giant whose name you recognize from its long-time sponsorship of The News Hour on PBS (hinting at one of the many reasons PBS offers such a corporate-friendly approach to news). Told by a New York Times reporter who clearly had amazing access to all parties involved, this book reminds us that corporate law-breaking is not as uncommon as we are usually led to believe. A great read, too.</p> <p align="left">5. <em>A Long Way Down</em>, by Nick Hornsby (Penguin) is well-timed for the holiday season. The opening chapter, set on New Year's Eve, portrays four very different individuals who find themselves, to their collective surprise, atop the same London rooftop with the same purpose in mind: jumping off and ending it all. Somehow, Hornsby manages to turn this into a brilliant, insightful, hilarious but never easy or sentimental meditation on what makes all of us tick, and how to keep going despite the despair that occasionally tempts each of us.</p> <p align="left"> Happy holidays to all and let's hope for peace and a cooler planet in 2008.</p> <p align="left">Mark Hertsgaard</p> </p> <p><a href="http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/books-and-charities-worth-supporting-this-chr">Permalink</a> </p><div class="feedflare"> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=631VTd9js18:0wK1NuTPV1A:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=631VTd9js18:0wK1NuTPV1A:F7zBnMyn0Lo"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=631VTd9js18:0wK1NuTPV1A:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=631VTd9js18:0wK1NuTPV1A:V_sGLiPBpWU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=631VTd9js18:0wK1NuTPV1A:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=631VTd9js18:0wK1NuTPV1A:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=631VTd9js18:0wK1NuTPV1A:gIN9vFwOqvQ"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=631VTd9js18:0wK1NuTPV1A:gIN9vFwOqvQ" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=631VTd9js18:0wK1NuTPV1A:I9og5sOYxJI"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=I9og5sOYxJI" border="0"></img></a> </div><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarkHertsgaardsBlog/~4/631VTd9js18" height="1" width="1"/> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/825415/mh_head.jpg http://posterous.com/people/Z2H0DdEgTWp Mark Hertsgaard mark Mark Hertsgaard Thu, 01 Nov 2007 22:10:38 -0700 http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/climate-change-at-the-chicago-humanities-fest http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/climate-change-at-the-chicago-humanities-fest <p> <p>I'm heading off on Friday to Chicago, where I'll join Bill McKibben, E. L. Doctorow, Terry Tempest Williams, Diane Ackerman, Lawrence Weschler and dozens of other leading thinkers and scientists at the annual Chicago Humanities Festival. The Festival is a city-wide event of readings, lectures, panel discussions, performances that focus on a different theme each year. This year's theme is global climate change, under the title, "Climate of Concern." (Last year's theme was the war in Iraq.) You can read all about it at <a href="http://chfestival.org/" title="the Festival's website" target="_blank">the Festival's website</a>. And if you are in or near Chicago, I invite you to come and join the conversation. I'll be moderating two panels, both on Saturday, Nov 3.</p> <p>The first panel, "<a href="http://chfestival.org/festival/index.cfm?fa=home.program&amp;id=1974&amp;sec=adult" title="When Scientists Speak" target="_blank">When Scientists Speak</a>," will feature a distinguished panel of four scientists discussing how they try to manage the sometimes conflicting demands of, on the one hand, articulating their scholarly findings in the professionally expected manner and, on the other, being true to their personal beliefs and alerting the general public to the implications of their work. Some analysts have suggested that until recently most scientists have been too careful, if not timid, in their public pronouncements about climate change, with the result that the public is only now waking up to the gravity of the problem. We'll explore that contention, and others, in a free-flowing conversation with lots of audience participation.</p> <p>The second panel, "<a href="http://chfestival.org/festival/index.cfm?fa=home.program&amp;id=2013&amp;sec=adult" title="Adaptation--The Other Half of Our Response to Global Warming" target="_blank">Adaptation--The Other Half of Our Response to Global Warming</a>," will highlight a part of the global warming fight that is often forgotten but is bound to become more and more important as time passes. I'm referring to the need for all of us to adapt to the rising temperatures and climate impacts that are now unavoidable over the next 50 years, largely because we waited too long to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. At the moment, virtually the entire focus of national and international discussion is on the need to cut the greenhouse gas emissions that are driving global warming. That focus is understandable and necessary but no longer sufficient. What hasn't sunk in to many people yet is that we can't turn global warming off, not anytime soon. The inertia of the earth's climate system insures that, even if we magically stopped all carbon dioxide emissions overnight, temperatures and impacts will still keep rising for at least 25 more years. We have to prepare for the changes that are in store for us if we hope to survive them. This panel, featuring two of the world's leading experts on adaptation to climate change, will talk about how we do it.</p> <p>These promise to be fascinating conversations. Join us, if you can. Otherwise, look here for a posting next week about what was said at the Festival, "Climate of Concern."</p> </p> <p><a href="http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/climate-change-at-the-chicago-humanities-fest">Permalink</a> </p><div class="feedflare"> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=FW7xwhV44mo:0Eq5OhoYuM8:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=FW7xwhV44mo:0Eq5OhoYuM8:F7zBnMyn0Lo"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=FW7xwhV44mo:0Eq5OhoYuM8:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=FW7xwhV44mo:0Eq5OhoYuM8:V_sGLiPBpWU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=FW7xwhV44mo:0Eq5OhoYuM8:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=FW7xwhV44mo:0Eq5OhoYuM8:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=FW7xwhV44mo:0Eq5OhoYuM8:gIN9vFwOqvQ"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=FW7xwhV44mo:0Eq5OhoYuM8:gIN9vFwOqvQ" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=FW7xwhV44mo:0Eq5OhoYuM8:I9og5sOYxJI"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=I9og5sOYxJI" border="0"></img></a> </div><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarkHertsgaardsBlog/~4/FW7xwhV44mo" height="1" width="1"/> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/825415/mh_head.jpg http://posterous.com/people/Z2H0DdEgTWp Mark Hertsgaard mark Mark Hertsgaard Wed, 24 Oct 2007 18:00:49 -0700 http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/if-gore-were-arrested http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/if-gore-were-arrested <p> <p>Fresh from winning the Nobel peace prize for his climate change evangelism, Al Gore is apparently considering an invitation from a prominent environmental group to engage in civil disobedience against the construction of new coal-fired power plants.</p> <p><a href="http://www.ran.org/" title="RAN website" target="_blank">Rainforest Action Network</a> issued the invitation to the former U.S. vice president, according to RAN executive director Michael Brune. The San Francisco-based group has a twenty year history of protesting against destructive logging practices and other causes of climate change; it specializes in targeting corporations as much as governments.</p> <p>"We came across a quote from Gore in an interview with [New York Times] columnist Nicholas Kristoff back in August, saying he didn't understand, quote, 'why there aren't rings of young people blocking bulldozers and preventing them constructing new coal-fired power plants,'" said Brune. "We thought, 'Great idea!' That's the kind of activism we do at RAN. So we decided to invite Gore to join us."</p> <p>Gore's office confirmed that the former vice president had received RAN's invitation and was considering it, though no decision has been made.</p> <p><br /> "He has not accepted any of their offers to date," Kalee Kreider, a spokeswoman for Gore, said of the RAN offer. Kreider did not deny that this phrasing leaves open the possibility of Gore saying yes down the road.<br /> RAN plans a national day of protest against coal on November 16, according to Brune.</p> <p>If Gore did end up getting arrested during a protest against coal-fired power plant, it would make front page news throughout the world and put a spotlight on what some climate scientists and activists consider the single most important priority in the fight against climate change: halting the use of coal as the world's top source of electricity production. Coal is the most carbon-intensive of the three major fossil fuels (the others are oil and natural gas) whose combustion produces most of the carbon dioxide that is helping to raise temperatures and change climatic patterns on earth.</p> <p>NASA scientist James Hansen, the man who first warned during testimony before the U.S. Senate in 1988 that man-made greenhouse gas emissions were warming the planet, has called for a complete ban on new coal-fired power plants "until we have the technology to capture and sequester the CO2." That technology, Hansen estimates, is "probably five or ten years away." Any plants built without that technology "are going to have to be bulldozed," argues Hansen, if the earth is to avoid "dramatic climate changes that produce what I would call a different planet."</p> <p>John McCain, the Arizona senator and Republican presidential candidate, <a href="http://www.alternet.org/environment/65957/" title="Alternet report" target="_blank">reportedly told a crowd in New Hampshire this week</a> that he would consider supporting a ban on new coal-fired power plants if he could be shown possible alternatives. McCain was responding to a question from activists with <a href="http://www.stepitup2007.org/" title="Step It Up" target="_blank">Step It Up</a>, a grassroots organization pushing for bolder federal action against climate change, including a total ban on coal. Step It Up plans a national day of demonstrations on november 3, exactly one year before the 2008 presidential election.</p> <p>The state of Kansas recently denied a permit for construction of a coal-fired power plant due to concern over the plant's CO2 emissions. "I believe it would be irresponsible to ignore emerging information about the contribution of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to climate change and the potential harm to our environment if we do nothing," said Roderick Bremby, the secretary of the Kansas Department of Health and the Environment, in explaining his rejection of the permit for the Sunflower Electric Power company.</p> <p>In neighboring Iowa, Hansen is offering expert testimony in a lawsuit aiming to halt construction of the Sutherland Generating Station Unit 4 coal-fired plant. "Coal will determine whether we continue to increase climate change or slow the human impact," Hansen testified.</p> <p>A native of Iowa, Hansen contended that a decision by his state to reject coal-fired power plants could be an important tipping point that would trigger broader shifts in public opinion and institutional behavior. "If the public begins to stand up in a few places and successfully oppose the construction of power plants that burn coal without capturing the CO2, this may begin to have a snowballing effect, helping utilities and politicians to realize that the public prefers a different path, one that respects all life on the planet."</p> <p>Asked why he is focusing on Iowa when China is building many more coal-fired power plants, Hansen replied that China and other developing nations "must be part of the solution to global warming, and surely they will be, if developed nations take the appropriate first steps." The United States, Hansen noted, is responsible for three times as much of the excess CO2 in the atmosphere as any other nation.</p> <p>True enough. But if China keeps building new coal plants at a rate of one every ten days, it won't much matter if U.S. companies turn away from coal. The campaign against coal must be global if it is to succeed.</p> <p>Al Gore could launch this campaign with a bang if he joined activists in facing down the bulldozers. But a word of advice, Mr. Gore: make a US power plant your first target, but don't leave out China and the rest of the world. Carbon is a climate killer, wherever it originates.</p> </p> <p><a href="http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/if-gore-were-arrested">Permalink</a> </p><div class="feedflare"> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=JqUV9Iqhdz0:olA7iEdJGx8:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=JqUV9Iqhdz0:olA7iEdJGx8:F7zBnMyn0Lo"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=JqUV9Iqhdz0:olA7iEdJGx8:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=JqUV9Iqhdz0:olA7iEdJGx8:V_sGLiPBpWU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=JqUV9Iqhdz0:olA7iEdJGx8:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=JqUV9Iqhdz0:olA7iEdJGx8:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=JqUV9Iqhdz0:olA7iEdJGx8:gIN9vFwOqvQ"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=JqUV9Iqhdz0:olA7iEdJGx8:gIN9vFwOqvQ" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=JqUV9Iqhdz0:olA7iEdJGx8:I9og5sOYxJI"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=I9og5sOYxJI" border="0"></img></a> </div><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarkHertsgaardsBlog/~4/JqUV9Iqhdz0" height="1" width="1"/> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/825415/mh_head.jpg http://posterous.com/people/Z2H0DdEgTWp Mark Hertsgaard mark Mark Hertsgaard Fri, 12 Oct 2007 10:19:30 -0700 http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/which-climate-bill-on-capitol-hill http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/which-climate-bill-on-capitol-hill <p> <p> Now that Al Gore and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change have won the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize, will the US Congress take the IPCC's scientific advice on how to fight global warming? The IPCC holds that the world must reduce greenhouse gas emissions at least 80 percent by the year 2050. Few in Congress seem prepared to go that far, however. And judging from the discussion at a closed-door meeting on Capitol Hill last week, even lawmakers who personally embrace the "gold standard" of 80 percent reductions are prepared to endorse a weaker measure in the name of getting some form of climate legislation moving in Congress.</p> <p>"Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good." So goes one of the oldest sayings in politics, generally invoked by reformers who think that half a loaf of progress is better than none. Often the reformers agree privately with more ambitious colleagues who want the entire loaf, but they argue that pushing too hard and too soon may end up yielding no progress at all.</p> <p>There are times when this is sound strategic advice. Is the current battle over global warming legislation one of those times?</p> <p>The terrain of the battlefield has changed considerably over the past year. For a variety of reasons--including the Democratic takeover of Congress in 2006, the alarming series of reports the IPCC has issued in 2007 and the news pouring in from the front lines of climate change (scientists recently projected that Arctic summers will be ice-free by 2030, thirty years earlier than their previous "worst-case" projection)--global warming legislation finally is getting a hearing on Capitol Hill. There is even a decent chance that Congress might pass a bill, though President Bush seems certain to veto anything that goes beyond his repeatedly stated insistence on purely voluntary measures.</p> <p>The question is, what bill will reformers get behind? How ambitious will they be? Will they demand what the scientific community says is the minimum necessary to enable our civilization to (perhaps) avoid the worst future scenarios of global warming: deep cuts in emissions by 2020 on the way to 80-90 percent cuts by 2050? Or, in the name of not letting the perfect be the enemy of the good, will they favor a more modest and gradual approach?</p> <p>The latter, incrementalist strategy has the upper hand at the moment. The vehicle is a bill that will be sponsored by Senators Joseph Lieberman, Independent of Connecticut, and John Warner, Republican of Virginia. The bill is still taking final shape, but its key provisions reportedly include a 10 percent mandatory reduction in emissions by 2020 and 70 percent by 2050.</p> <p>Not only do these provisions fall short of the scientific standard; there is even less here than meets the eye. The bill, as described in briefings and press accounts, contains a number of loopholes, including provisions that (1) will give rather than sell greenhouse-gas-emissions permits to polluters, thus violating the "polluter pays" principle of environmental accounting, and (2) count so-called carbon offsets--that is, paying someone else to reduce emissions while continuing to emit oneself--as genuine reductions.</p> <p>An alternative approach, sponsored by Senators Barbara Boxer, Democrat of California, and Bernie Sanders, Independent of Vermont, comes much closer to the scientific consensus. The Boxer-Sanders bill (like a similar measure sponsored in the House by California Democrat Henry Waxman) calls for mandatory 80 percent reductions by 2050 and stipulates that they be real reductions; i.e., not just carbon offsets. The Boxer-Sanders bill also would uphold the "polluter pays" principle by selling emissions permits rather than giving them away.</p> <p>[For a description of these and other pending global warming bills, see the World Resources Institute's analysis <a href="http://www.wri.org/climate/pubs_description.cfm?PubID=4343">here.</a>]</p> <p>Guess which bill is getting traction and support on Capitol Hill?</p> <p>According to sources speaking on background because of the confidential nature of the discussions, most Senate Democrats and many environmental and other public interest groups are preparing to support the Lieberman-Warner bill, despite misgivings about its shortcomings. At a closed-door meeting on Capitol Hill last week attended by more than a dozen key Democratic senators and scores of leaders from the environmental and larger public-interest community, participants were urged to fall into line behind the Lieberman-Warner bill because it was the most likely to secure bipartisan support and perhaps pass. Activists who pointed out the flaws in the bill were told by a number of senators, allegedly including Boxer herself, to work to improve the bill as it moved through the legislative process, rather than oppose it.</p> <p>In other words, don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.</p> <p>Asked to comment about her role at the meeting, Senator Boxer told <em>The Nation</em>, "I believe it is critically important that we get started now on legislation that will prevent dangerous climate change. And I will continue to work on this issue until that goal is achieved."</p> <p>Activists who feel otherwise fear that the Lieberman-Warner bill will become the defining benchmark for future federal action on climate change. Author and journalist Bill McKibben, who did not attend the Capitol Hill meeting, was quoted to this effect in <a href="http://www.markhertsgaard.com/articles/215" title=" The Making of a Climate Movement" target="_blank">this <em>Nation</em> report</a> two weeks ago:</p> <p>"We are really playing for the opening months of 2009 here," said McKibben, adding that it would be better for the current Congress to pass nothing than to approve a weak bill, because a weak bill would lower the bar for the next Congress and President and deflate pressure for reform by giving people the impression that the problem has been solved: "Since Bush is going to veto it anyway, there is no reason to make [a bill] less ambitious than what science requires. Climate change isn't like other issues. It doesn't do any good to split the difference to reach a deal everyone can live with. Climate change is about the laws of physics and chemistry, and they don't give."</p> <p>Commenting for this article, a senior aide to Senator Boxer said that both sides of the good versus perfect divide "want to get to the same place." And this was possible, the aide further argued, if proponents focused less on the specific target of 80 percent cuts and more on ensuring that federal action always be guided by the best science available. "Global warming legislation needs to require that the best science be reviewed regularly to ensure that the emissions targets in the bill are sufficiently strict to prevent dangerous climate change," said the aide. Senator Boxer has publicly urged that the legislation include what she calls "look-backs," requirements that federal agencies continue to monitor scientific developments on climate change, then "look back" and tighten federal standards, if necessary.</p> <p>If such a bill does pass Congress, it would confront the White House with a difficult choice. President Bush is now on record saying that climate change is a serious problem, humans are causing it and action must be taken. Meanwhile, global warming is shaping up as one of the top-tier issues in the 2008 campaign. Bush presumably will not want to sign a bill that would lead to mandatory emissions reductions, which both the "perfect" and the "good" approaches outlined above would certainly do. At the same time, a presidential veto of a scientifically sound global warming bill carries risks for fellow Republicans, especially once they leave their party's primaries behind for the general election campaign. Given Bush's record--his recent veto of health insurance for kids and his general bull-headedness on Iraq--a veto seems the most likely outcome. But only if Congress puts a bill on his desk in the first place.</p> <p>[Cross-posted at <a href="http://www.thenation.com/doc/20071029/hertsgaard" title="Which Climate Bill on Capital Hill?" target="_blank">TheNation.com</a>]</p> <p> <img name="s_i_tnatthenation" class="posterous_download_image" src="http://metrics.thenation.com/b/ss/tnatthenation/1/H.7-pdv-2/s18637746448567?%5BAQB%5D&amp;ndh=1&amp;t=13/9/2007%200%3A9%3A11%206%20-120&amp;ns=thenation&amp;pageName=20071029%3A%20Which%20Climate%20Bill%20on%20Capitol%20Hill%3F%20%28print%29&amp;g=http%3A//www.thenation.com/docprint.mhtml%3Fi%3D20071029%26s%3Dhertsgaard&amp;r=http%3A//www.thenation.com/doc/20071029/hertsgaard&amp;cc=USD&amp;ch=Articles&amp;server=www.thenation.com&amp;c1=20071029&amp;h1=Content%2CArticles%2C20071029%2Chertsgaard&amp;v2=www.thenation.com&amp;h2=All%20Keywords%2CUS%20Politics%20%26%20Government%2CCongress&amp;c3=20071012&amp;c4=Mark%20Hertsgaard&amp;c5=Which%20Climate%20Bill%20on%20Capitol%20Hill%3F&amp;c6=www.thenation.com&amp;c7=web&amp;c8=Congress&amp;c9=article&amp;c12=NoRole&amp;pid=20071029%3A%20Which%20Climate%20Bill%20on%20Capitol%20Hill%3F%20%281%29&amp;pidt=1&amp;oid=http%3A//www.thenation.com/docprint.mhtml%3Fi%3D20071029%26s%3Dhertsgaard&amp;ot=A&amp;s=1280x1024&amp;c=24&amp;j=1.3&amp;v=Y&amp;k=Y&amp;bw=913&amp;bh=697&amp;p=Shockwave%20Flash%3BTotem%20Web%20Browser%20Plugin%202.18.1%3BWindows%20Media%20Player%20Plug-in%2010%20%28compatible%3B%20Totem%29%3BDivX%C2%AE%20Web%20Player%3BQuickTime%20Plug-in%207.1.3%3BVLC%20Multimedia%20Plugin%3BHelix%20DNA%20Plugin%3A%20RealPlayer%20G2%20Plug-In%20Compatible%3BEpiphany%20Desktop%20File%20Plugin%3B&amp;%5BAQE%5D" border="0" height="1" width="1" /></p> </p> <p><a href="http://blog.markhertsgaard.com/which-climate-bill-on-capitol-hill">Permalink</a> </p><div class="feedflare"> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=QQ6ywMCyWn4:x3oaaKqGRlk:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=QQ6ywMCyWn4:x3oaaKqGRlk:F7zBnMyn0Lo"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=QQ6ywMCyWn4:x3oaaKqGRlk:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=QQ6ywMCyWn4:x3oaaKqGRlk:V_sGLiPBpWU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=QQ6ywMCyWn4:x3oaaKqGRlk:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=QQ6ywMCyWn4:x3oaaKqGRlk:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=QQ6ywMCyWn4:x3oaaKqGRlk:gIN9vFwOqvQ"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?i=QQ6ywMCyWn4:x3oaaKqGRlk:gIN9vFwOqvQ" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?a=QQ6ywMCyWn4:x3oaaKqGRlk:I9og5sOYxJI"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/MarkHertsgaardsBlog?d=I9og5sOYxJI" border="0"></img></a> </div><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarkHertsgaardsBlog/~4/QQ6ywMCyWn4" height="1" width="1"/> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/825415/mh_head.jpg http://posterous.com/people/Z2H0DdEgTWp Mark Hertsgaard mark Mark Hertsgaard