Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Environmental activists have suggested the brutal terror attack in Paris has improved the chances of getting a climate deal at the COP 21 meeting.
… Craig Bennett, chief executive of Friends of the Earth in the UK, hoped that countries would be more willing to come to a deal, but that he feared this pressure might lead to a weaker accord.
“They will want to give Hollande a deal at the end of the day. But the deal may not be as good as it might have been. Countries turning up in Paris will be reluctant for Paris to be seen as a failure, but we have a deal on the table that is not enough – we would have liked to see a stronger deal, and maybe we are less likely to get that now.”
Nick Mabey, chief executive at the environmental lobby group E3G, said the terrorist attacks would “not have a huge impact on the outcome, but they will have a huge impact on the tone”.
Previous rounds of negotiations from the Copenhagen conference in 2009 – when the talks dissolved into chaos and public recrimination – have been marked by emotional outpourings, threats and public displays unusual in other forms of diplomacy. This year, such shows would be less welcome, said Nick Mabey, chief executive at the environmental lobby group E3G. “The tone will be more serious, and less festive. Activists will have to find more creative ways to show the world the impact of climate change. There will be less grandstanding, and more focus.”
He said the attacks on France would give Hollande more “moral authority”, and that delegates would feel a greater duty to show “the ability of people to cooperate and bring peace and work together. That is the core message, and it’s really important that this message gets through.” …
Read more: http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/nov/22/cop21-climate-change-deal-barack-obama-paris-attacks
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Oh!? Just how many late nights were spent trying to figure out this spin?
The attacks just demonstrated a huge weak area in Paris. The POTUS is not likely to visit Paris under such conditions, even if he doubles his secret squirrel service detachment.
Send Kerry, definitely. Will Kerry stay in Paris, maybe, maybe not.
I have a strong suspicion that most high ranking officials will find one reason or another to stay home. Merkel will likely be there and Hollande, maybe Prince Charles, after that the honor roll is cloudy.
Where I was working back in the late 1980s was scheduled for a certain bigwig who was known for terrorizing high ranking executives with actual business questions, in public and on film.
Those of us who knew the answers to many of the actual workroom floor questions spent many hours coaching our bosses, trying to bring them along.
A week before the big review and suddenly most of the bosses found travel plans that would take them away on business for the review days and we second stringers were delegated to attend.
Somehow, the bigwig found out, or guessed accurately and two days before the big review our bosses found their travel plans and vacations cancelled. Scheduled sick leave for anything less than open heart surgery was also out.
We second stringers thought we could finally get back to work. The night before the review and not only were we second stringers put back in attending so were many third stringers. Our not too stupid bosses thought they could confuse the bigwig by crowds.
The review was just as awful for our bosses as they feared. I strongly suspect this climate conference will be viewed just as unfavorably as is possible by many egomaniacs who also tend to be paranoid.
There will be many attendees, but very few empowered to commit whole countries to deep debts.
May it be snowy for all of December in Paris!
Give the illusion that the hard working comrades are doing this for the good of the world. Much like the democratic elections in N. Korea with one name on the ballot. I hope they all ride their bicycles to this conference. What am I thinking! It’s a communist meeting and the party members are only doing what the party requires and if that means private jets and limos then who’s to argue.
Anybody notice the discrepancy between the people they show allegedly suffering from climate change and the lifestyles of the people who attend these confrences? Here. Here’s a solar powered light for you. Reminds me of a rhyme. To light you to your bed.
We’ll give you all our wind turbines in exchange for all your fossil fuels. That’s the only kind of deal I’d like to see take place in Paris.
(And we’ll throw in the siantists who arrived at a consensus regarding the wisdom of switching to wind turbines, for nuthin’ ; )
I would happily swap every wind turbine for even one policeman let alone the equivalent cost. Terrorism is a real here and now proven threat that does not need the figures to be “adjusted” to prove it.
“…the BRUTAL TERROR ATTACK in Paris.”
It’s well established that controlled application of anxiety is quite effective for herding sheep and other cattle.
Among humans it also has the effect of dulling the mind – as demonstrated by statements such as the introductory phrase above. A properly functioning mind would not spew out such sillyness, being cognizant of the fact that the words “brutal” , “terror” and “attack” convey absolutely no information, and serve only to push the reader’s emotional buttons.
The simple, unadorned fact is that there were multiple homicides, enacted simultaneously in several Paris locations. Attribution is provided entirely by government sources, with no evidence of due diligence of the mass media to verify the evidence, much less to question the plausibility of the apparent failures of the intelligence community. The accused perpetrators, just as in the earlier Charlie Hebdo homicides, are all, quite regrettably, from an intelligence point of view, dead or missing.
The rather tardily reported claim of authorship by “ISIS” is also unverifiable, leaving the true skeptic with nothing but his own deductive processes to determine who organized this incident and why.
It’s disheartening to see such gullibility and lemming-like behaviour in this forum.