Obama not going to Copenhagen

[James aka adap2k]

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President Obama won’t talk climate change in Copenhagen

Giles Whittell, Washington

President Obama will almost certainly not travel to the Copenhagen climate change summit in December and may instead use his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech to set out US environmental goals, The Times has learnt.

With healthcare reform clogging his domestic agenda and no prospect of a comprehensive climate treaty in Copenhagen, Mr Obama may disappoint campaigners and foreign leaders, including Gordon Brown and Ed Miliband, who have urged him to attend to boost the hopes of a breakthrough.

The White House would not comment on Mr Obama’s travel plans yesterday, but administration officials have said privately that “Oslo is plenty close” — a reference to the Nobel ceremony that falls on December 10, two days into the Copenhagen meeting.

The White House confirmed that the President would be in Oslo to accept the prize, but a source close to the Administration said it was “hard to see the benefit” of his going to Copenhagen if there was no comprehensive deal for him to close or sign. Another expert, who did not want to be named, said he would be “really, really shocked” if Mr Obama went to Copenhagen, adding that European hopes about the power of his Administration to transform the climate change debate in a matter of months bore little relation to reality. The comprehensive climate change treaty that for years has been the goal of the Copenhagen conference was now an “unrealistic” prospect, Yvo de Boer, the UN official guiding the process, said last week.

Chinese and Indian resistance to mandatory carbon emission limits has so far proved an insurmountable obstacle to crafting a successor to the Kyoto Protocol that is acceptable to the US. America has also slowed the process through its reluctance to accept climate change science or the carbon cap-and-trade mechanism to combat global warming.

Only 57 per cent of Americans believe that there is strong evidence that the world has grown warmer in recent decades, down from 71 per cent a year ago, according to a new poll. Partly as a result, the White House is having to wage a vote-by-vote battle in Congress for a climate change Bill that would embrace cap-and-trade. The Bill will not be signed into law until next year at the earliest but is considered essential for any global deal.

Mr Obama flew to Boston yesterday to make the case for a wholesale American switch to clean energy, and to launch a six-week drive to persuade the world that the US is at last serious about joining international efforts to combat climate change.

He will have his work cut out. As a presidential candidate, he held out the hope of signing a cap-and-trade Bill in time for Copenhagen. Since then, a deep recession and months of delays on healthcare reform have pushed climate change into third place on the domestic US agenda, after financial regulatory reform. That reform is seen as essential for cap-and-trade because of the need to rebuild trust in complex financial instruments after “an incredible nativist backlash against new markets” caused by the banking crisis, according to Paul Bledsoe, a former White House official at the National Commission on Energy Policy.

For Mr Obama to travel to Copenhagen would be “completely out of keeping” with the American political climate and with precedent, Mr Bledsoe said. The most senior White House official to attend a past UN climate conference was Vice-President Al Gore in 1997. He signed the Kyoto Protocol, but the failure by Congress to ratify it since has been a defining theme of a decade of climate change talks.

In Mr Obama’s absence, the US delegation will be led by Todd Stern, the Administration’s special envoy on climate change. Analysts believe Hillary Clinton, the Secretary of State, could fly in at the last moment, but as one analyst said of both Mrs Clinton and Vice-President Joe Biden: “They only want to be associated with success, not failure.”

The gap between hopes of what Mr Obama can do and reality was on show this week when another Nobel Peace Prize winner, Rajendra Pachauri of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, said he thought the President should be doing more. Instead, the Obama Administration is seeking to lower expectations before Copenhagen by drawing attention to its short tenure in office, the long years of US foot-dragging on climate change under his predecessor and recent progress on domestic climate change legislation.

[Thalox]

"he wants to be associated with success, not failure"? Ya right. Success in what?

Finally he disappoints others besides the American people.

Though, I doubt he will be doing much more for the American people here.

[Keisha]

Does this mean he isnt planning on signing it? or just perhaps sign it latter? of course him saying that hes not going to be there probably means he realy IS going to be there.

[Greg aka Sonatadude]

You were right Keisha. Obama saying that hes not going to be there probably means he really IS going to be there. He sure was.

[Greg aka Sonatadude]

Obama is a liar.

[Rachel]

In following this issue, I think the Copenhagen treaty would be more dangerous than this story admits. I am not so sure that this won't come back to haunt us. The website, Atlas Shrugs, did a great piece recently on the Copenhagen treaty. Pamela Geller does an excellent job of trying to inform people on what's really going on. For now I remain skeptical that he has dropped all plans. Remember, he is a puppet. He is doing what THEY want. And if THEY want it, he will do it, or they will simply have him eliminated. Despite his inflated ego, I think he is aware of the repercussions. I hope I am wrong. I have prayed a lot over this issue and our country in general. So have scores of patriots. God is definitely in control, and this could be playing out God's way. Time will tell.

[Freedomrox]

Do not be so certain ObamaRama will not make a brief stop in Copenhagen to cede all US sovereighnty to the NWO. If you will check the proposed Copenhagen Treaty, you will find the creation of a one world government written in it's pages, and of course, that is ObamaRama's employer. If it is derailed, then it would be a major setback for the Globalists. But only for this year.

[Patriot Rose]

I think this has to do with the backlash in this country against Obama and his Czars. His popularity is plummeting and he hasn't even been in a year. HHHMMMMMM!!!!!!!!!! I think the NWO is wondering if they picked the right guy. This country is bordering on revolting with the unconstitutional practices of this administration. We are finally figuring it out! They are trying to use our tax dollars for UN initiatives and goals. What a revelation!

[eci onci]

What good is all of this, when he is going to be impeached and removed in
January 2010?

[Nag Hamadi]

The Banksters at the top are split down the middle. At a stalemate. Divide and conquer has backfired, by the looks of it. Now we have to conquer.

[Greg aka Sonatadude]

As much as it would be nice to be able to be optimistic about him being honest and having integrity; I'm prepared to have him let us down on this issue also.
Keisha said:

Does this mean he isnt planning on signing it? or just perhaps sign it latter? of course him saying that hes not going to be there probably means he realy IS going to be there.

[Jeff]

Impeached, are you playing with a full deck? That's not even a remote possibility.

eci onci said:

What good is all of this, when he is going to be impeached and removed in
January 2010?

[Jeff]

The treaty, from a US perspective, and from a global corporate perspective is unneeded and unwanted. The focus is on Cap & Trade, which will surely pass and just as surely cost each of us 1000s of dollars yearly.