
Fact-checking Donald Trump's statement withdrawing from Paris climate agreement - mido22
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2017/jun/01/fact-checking-donald-trumps-statement-withdrawing-/
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oblio
> "The United States will withdraw from the Paris climate accord," Trump said
> June 1, 2017, "but begin negotiations to re-enter either the Paris accord or
> an entirely new transaction on terms that are fair to the United States."

This blows my mind. The US is the most powerful country on Earth, right now.
Almost _everybody else_ agrees with the treaty, countries ranging from really
rich and uniform ones such as the Netherlands down to poor and divided ones
such as Somalia. Direct democracies such as Switzerland or autocracies such as
Saudi Arabia. The interests involved are diverse because they basically cover
everyone and everything.

How could anyone believe that the US is on the receiving end of a bad deal?!?
Outside of some nutty conspiracy theory.

~~~
beloch
You have to realize how Trump thinks. _Everything_ is about him. If a deal
doesn't make him personally look good, it's a bad deal. The Paris climate
accord might be an objectively good thing, but signing it would make Trump
look bad because he made an election promise not to sign it. Hence, it's not
"fair" to the U.S.. However, if Trump can somehow make it look like he
personally renegotiated the accord to get the U.S. a better "deal", then he
can sign it because it'll make him look good.

The problem with the Paris climate accord is that it's vague and lacks any
kind of enforcement. Everybody's signing it because there really is no
concrete obligation attached. While some signatories may have signed it in
earnest, others likely signed it just to look good. They'll announce a plan to
meet the goals of the accord and then leave implementing that plan up to their
successors, or just forget about it if they happen to remain in office. Look
good now, don't pay later.

Given the nature of the Paris accord, there really is no better deal for Trump
to negotiate. There are no binding terms to haggle over. I suppose they could
change something in the deal just so Trump can say he did it and sign a "good
deal". That's probably the best outcome.

~~~
jahnu
There is in fact a ratchet mechanism in it. It's not a useless accord at all
and those who think they can just pretend they will follow it may be in for a
shock. Especially once enough signatories give it momentum.

[https://www.carbonbrief.org/explainer-the-ratchet-
mechanism-...](https://www.carbonbrief.org/explainer-the-ratchet-mechanism-
within-the-paris-climate-deal)

~~~
Sunset
Wow, literally five year plans and out-virtue signaling one another who will
craft more draconian regulations to warp the market.

~~~
oblio
Do you think all our problems have been solved by market forces? Especially
things which we can't afford to solve in 50-60 years?

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matt4077
Being wrong is a feature for Trump arguments, not a bug. It's easy to see if
you can, fort only a second, put yourself in the mindset of a sadist.

If you're lying, and everyone knows that you're lying, and everyone knows that
you know that they know... to then still insist, to continue lying, goes
against every social norm practiced among civilised people. For people with
conscience, it is torturous to watch. For others, it's high entertainment
worth a few island nations and a famine here or there.

Nobody believes any of the arguments Trump and his ilk make. They are
inflicting this damage on the world, their citizen, and themselves purely
because they enjoy the pain it causes the people people they hate: Obama, "the
left", scientists, etc.

The climate may actually come out of this as a winner: it's adding some
emotion to the fight against climate change, where before only the opposition
was emotionally attached.

What is lost is the idea of the US as a dependable partner for anything. There
are no mechanisms of enforcement in international law, which explains why it
sometimes seem to move at a snail's pace. Agreements were kept because they
served mutual interests. And when some specific agreement was a losing
proposition for a country, leaders and their countries felt a moral obligation
to stay true to their word. It is also a never-ending repetition of the
prisoner's dilemma, and fulfilling your obligations was necessary to prevent a
process that could unravel the foundations of international cooperation.

The US was the unchallenged winner of the post-WW2 international order. They
were and are the dominant military power, and only by actually trying to use
the might of that hardware did they ever come close to losing. The true
instrument of power was the creation of closely-knit web of international
cooperation, from getting the +1 country code, to science, trade, or security,
the US was working a winning formula of agreements that were beneficial for
both them and their partners.

Now, some barely literate psychopath is trying to rule the world with his
infantile worldview that life is nakedly a selfish struggle for money and
dominance. He may soon realise how reliant the most-connected country in the
world is on the goodwill of others. But, sometimes, something breaks and
cannot be put back together.

~~~
pizza
It's incredible how much he privileges a very small portion of the US
population - fundamentalist neoconservatives - in his decisions. He probably
just sees the people who become even more supportive of him in light of his
fairly calculated malice as valuable idiots. He wants America to return to
outmoded forms of energy production, because of "jahbs", and also wants to
reduce taxes while the ultrarich already have what is essentially universal
basic income via capital dividends, real estate, etc. For the prisoner's
dilemma, this is like having a Grudger in the WH vs tit-for-tat players
elsewhere.

Very much of his ethical system is predicated upon lying about good faith
intent for the persistent preservation of outright disenfranchisement of the
electorate. I hope that Americans will really say "I can't stand it any more"
and change what they are able to. Maybe eventually decent politicians will be
able and willing to prevent this obscene divergence of executive and popular
opinion.

------
dreamthtwasrome
Scotland already closed its last coal-fired power plant and Europe will likely
go 100% EV around 2040.

[https://thinkprogress.org/after-115-years-scotland-is-
coal-f...](https://thinkprogress.org/after-115-years-scotland-is-coal-
free-f1f6a5f4d190)

[https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/what-country-
wi...](https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/what-country-will-become-
the-first-to-ban-internal-combustion-cars)

------
audunw
Donald Trump is right that China and India shouldn't be allowed to increase
their pollution. Everyone should be cutting, and targeting the same level of
per-capita pollution.

But that implies that the US (and Australia and some others) would have to
invest trillions of dollars in order to reach the per-capita pollution levels
of other countries. But that's not on the table, because for some americans,
who currently holds power, it's not acceptable to temporarily sacrifice even a
little bit of economy or convenience for the planet.

One reason why it's not reasonable for China or India to cut more, is because
the US and others isn't willing to match them on per-capita pollution. (Well,
they are cutting, and will probably match China over time, but not at a
reasonable pace).

Imagine you're some dude in a district in India, and there's some coal, and
you want to start burning it to get some energy. Then the US comes over and
says "no, fuck you, you can't burn that, because not only have I been shitting
all over the planet for the last several decades, I want to continue shitting
over it and not make too much effort of reducing it. You can't burn that in
part because we have this cheap power plant over here that we don't want to
spend any money replacing". Does that feel fair?

If the US actually had to sacrifice something significant, it would perhaps
feel fair for people from developing countries to have to halt their economic
development by a decade or so in order to skip coal and go directly to solar
etc.

------
EGreg
Coal plants? Could have picked a better example, Donald.

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tremon
Misdirection at its finest...

 _Trump opened his speech saying his team was tracking the terrorist attack in
Manila. [That attack] came from a lone man aiming to rob gamblers._

------
marvy
I wanted something like this.

------
mpweiher
Hilarity ensues...

