Cop Out

Barack Obama should not be allowed to go to Copenhagen. The last time he went there, Chicago came last in the voting for hosting the 2016 Olympics, even though it was one of the two favourites. This time, he was responsible for the failure of a critical summit that held the future of human life in the balance.

Is it because the rest of the world doesn't like him a lot? No, he's one of the most popular US Presidents of all time. And it's not because he goes around invading countries whenever he's bored. I think it's mostly because his mantra of inspiring hope, with dollops of human interest stories, which works wonders in the US, seems to fade with the lack of substance in his global efforts. Not at a time when the world is facing down the barrel of the disastrous consequences of global warming.

In all fairness, Obama came to the doomed conference with his hands tied. His energy bill hasn't been passed by the Senate, which means that he doesn't know to what extent he can commit to curbing emissions. Less than a year before a congressional elections the Democrats are expected to fare badly in, he was in no position to be make major concessions. The weak House version of the bill promises a 17% reduction in emissions by 2020 on 2005 levels, which is a paltry 4% down from 1990 levels. Obama's solution, a cynical ploy at making Copenhagen a non-binding feel good "first step", didn't go down too well, and he ended up alienating not just the rest of the world, but also votes on the left in his own country.

So what happens now? Obama will be hoping to extract some mileage from the imminent passage of his healthcare bill to maybe take a stand on climate change. But it seems unlikely in a mid-term year. Also, the intertwined nature of the economies of the US and China, the two greatest emittors of greenhouse gases in the world, makes it in neither's interest for the other to be limited by forced emission cuts. China is the US' factory and bank, while the US is China's primary market, which means that it's the two of them against the world. India is unlikely to do anything unless the Chinese do more. And the rest of the world is pissed off at the US, China, Brazil, India and South Africa for privately reaching a deal without them, compromising the very identity of the conference.

Copenhagen started out as a summit that would save the world. Somehow, it degenerated into a free for all, and finally ended as a face-saving first step at combatting climate change. Of course, this ignores the previous steps taken in 1992 in Kyoto, a good treaty that has been implicitly been allowed to die. The summit's sent a message that the people who are in a position to do something about climate change, and are primarily responsible for global warming in the first place, are unwilling to do anything about it.

The world is doomed, and our leaders are taking up fiddling. Time to get our affairs in order.