Kyoto Protocol

[Dead Man Flying]

Originally posted by Thrawn:
edit:Just looked this up - "He shall have power, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, to make treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur;..."

Presidents still have the power to enter de facto treaties via executive agreements that effectively sidestep the legislative process.  However, it would be political suicide to go over the Senate's head on this one, and even if Bush succeeded, he would have blown all of his political capital in one fell swoop.

The fact is that I doubt even Al Gore would have succeeded in pushing this one through, though perhaps he would have handled it with more international tact.

-- Todd/DMF

[leonid]

That it would harm the US economy is about as arrogant and selfish a response as it gets.  What makes us so different from every other signatory nation in the protocol?  What?  Marlboro Reds?  What?  Also, saying that we won't sign because it would harm our economy is like being surrounded by a forest fire, and saying you won't help make a fire break, because it'll harm the trees...

[Vulcan]

At least the yanks aren't trying to bribe smaller countries to stay out of it with "economic aid".

Kinda ironic, don't ya think, the US getting berated for not signing up by some of the 'green' countries. While some of those 'green' countries voted against the Whale Sanctuary in the Southern oceans.

[Wotan]

Wotan, I said 'agreed to', not ratified.  

agreed to?
We can agree on alot of things but what difference does that make then.

 

But I'll be damned if I'll sit and watch the US have an economic advantage while the rest of the world works together to do something to reduce carbon emissions.  

Then tell your government not to accept the condition of the agreement. Don't tell us that because your government accepts it that we should because we wont. What else you gonna do?

unilateral boycott by yourself?

 

Also, saying that we won't sign because it would harm our economy is like being surrounded by a forest fire, and saying you won't help make a fire break, because it'll harm the trees...  

cute little post if it related to what is being discussed. Go read Ding_Hao original post.

First prove to the world the "forest is on fire" using real undebatable science. Simply stating it so does not equate to proving it so.

[Yoj]

"First prove to the world the "forest is on fire" using real undebatable science. Simply stating it so does not equate to proving it so."

In other words, do the impossible.  There is no such thing as "undebatable science" - that's not how science works, and never has. There are only a handful of absolute scientific laws, and if you look hard you'll still finde scientists who will debate those. Everything else is theory - i.e., a model that fits the facts as known.  By definition, no model can be the only one.  

Fact - the current concensus of scientific assessment is that global warming is real.  You want to wait until it has been proven and there are no dissenters before starting to take any action, when by the very model being debated that is FAR too late to do anything about it.  

Is it better to be Chicken Little or an Ostrich with head in sand?  

- Yoj

[Krusher]

yoj wrote:
No doubt - but as the guest I couldn't think of letting you buy the first one  Wish we had a few more of the old crowd coming.

----------------------------------------
yea it is sad that so many of the old timers will miss this one, but the RATS have 5 guys and thier wives coming so we will start a new tradition   cya in a few weeks !

[miko2d]

Kyoto based the emission levels on the levels produced 10 years ago.
 It also gives credit to countries with small populations and a lot of forests.
 Also some countries that were in decline for the last 10 years (like Russia) will have huge excess of allowed pollution.
 Those countries will be allowed to sell their extra allotment to polluting countries.

 So Russia will suddenly have $10 billion a year just because it chose to live with communism for the previous 70 years and wreck it's economy.

 Would russians care so much about polution that they forgo that $10 bil a year and let it expire rather then sell it to the same polluting USA business? Will Canada or Japain refuse that money?

 Will India refuse to expand their production and miss the chance to exploit US companies reducing their production due to pollution restrictions?

 If you believe that, why don't you believe that US consumers and US businesses will reduce polution by themselves out of care to the environment? Why do we need any treaties then?

 miko

[Dowding]

The EU is nothing more then an Economic Union much like say Airbus is. A collection of countries coming together to protect and develope economic interest.

You're mistaking the EEC for the EU. The EEC was the economic agreement reached back in the 70's. The EU is a political union involving the standardisation of certain laws on certain issues (human rights and now environmental accords). It also includes a basis for more a more integrated European military.

Airbus is a bad example. That is a private partnership between leading engineering companies - they are not government agencies.

The new environmental standards also look at waste (in all its vearious guises) - the reduction of which should be a target for every developed country on the planet.

[DingHao2]

 

Don't worry soon some smart minded capitalist will realize there's money in alternate fuel sourses and will figure out a good cheap and abundant alternative than carbon, maybe this time those evil old oil companies won't buy the pattent...

HELLO???!!!  cheap, abundant, efficient energy alternative=NUCLEAR POWER!!  where have u been in the last 50 years??

Well, france gets all their energy from nuclear power, and when's the last time u heard about an accident there??

[Yoj]

Yeah, last I heard they could still LIVE in France.  Of course, they're French, so nothing could possibly go wrong, go wrong, go wrong, go wrong.....

[DingHao2]

And u live where??  the good ole clean USA  OMG!!!!

[Yoj]

Sorry - was being overly subtle.  My point was just that the one problem with fission power is that, as unlikely as it might be to have a major accident, or a terrorist incident, IF it were to happen the consequences are enormous.  So, if we go that route those are things that have to be considered.  Its not simply a matter of go out and build more plants and live happily ever after - unless you really believe that engineers and security systems are infallible  

- Yoj