Guest essay by Christopher C. Horner
President Trump should keep his campaign promise and rescind or otherwise withdraw the United States from President Obama’s purported commitment to the Paris climate pact, made in September 2016 on his way out the door. There are several ways of doing so, but the plainly superior option is to extricate the United States from the UN-orchestrated world of climate diplomacy entirely. The dishonest, unconstitutional process in which the Paris agreement has been advanced demonstrates why.
First of all, no reasonable negotiating party should have credited the legitimacy of the last-minute acceptance of Paris in the first place. President Obama moved forward with the agreement despite an unprecedented Supreme Court stay of the rules, known as the Clean Power Plan, that were to serve as the U.S.’s principal means of compliance. As all parties were aware, the stay in West Virginia, et al. v. EPA showed that the rules faced a substantial likelihood of being struck down as unlawful.
Other factors arguing against the Paris agreement’s legitimacy include the express objective of its advocates to deliberately circumvent Congress by simply claiming that it isn’t a treaty. This despite the fact that all parties were aware that the Constitution’s Article II, Section 2, Clause 2 “advise and consent” requirement covers all international commitments meeting certain tests, developed over two centuries of custom and practice. The Paris agreement is clearly a treaty by any reasonable definition, and was ratified as such by most parties. The White House even went so far as to call it “the most ambitious climate change agreement in history.” Surely an agreement that is more ambitious than any preceding climate treaty (e.g., the Kyoto Protocol) is itself serious enough to be considered a treaty.
Allowing the executive branch to usurp the Senate’s shared role in our constitutional treaty process for treaties that cannot survive that deliberately rigorous test sets a dangerous precedent. That any such pending deal cannot pass muster under our ratification process is not an argument to ignore that process, as Obama’s Secretary of State implied, but to vigilantly protect it.
Add to this the costs of Paris’s enormous wealth transfers and economic cost from imposing less efficient, more expensive energy, and it is clear why the Obama administration and its negotiating partners resolved to keep the peoples’ elected representatives out of the equation. That does not mean they are entitled to the final word.
Initiatives pursued by any White House through a unilateral “pen-and-phone” strategy are subject to reversal by a subsequent president using the same techniques. Thus, for President Trump to effectively extricate the U.S. from the expectations of implementing the Paris treaty, the only real option is to withdraw the United States as a party to the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
The Framework Convention is a voluntary agreement that purported only to cover emissions through the end of the 1990s. The Paris agreement now seeks, implausibly, to extend those expectations with mandatory pledges of more stringent cuts, increased every five years in perpetuity, not once requiring Senate approval.
This brazenly defies the express instructions the Senate gave when it ratified the UNFCCC, and the deal struck with President George H. W. Bush in order to join, both of which were meant to ensure that the Framework Convention would not become the blank check for avoiding a lack of political support it has now become. With the parties to the UNFCCC having walked away from whatever remained of the terms agreed to twenty-five years ago, the U.S. must formalize this abandonment by withdrawing.
Since Obama signed it Ultra Vires (without legal powers to do so) it is merely a worthless piece of paper and all Trump has to do is tell the UN that
Not true. Common skeptical misconception. I researched this legally at the time. See comment posted below.
A treaty only exists if all the necessary requirements have been fulfilled. And if they have not, then it is not a treaty.
Or to put it another way, the reason the treaty needs to be agreed by congress is to protect those like the UN from being misled by a rogue president who had no power to sign the treaty.
It essence, it is rather like going to a neighbour’s kid and offering them some sweets if they will sign a bit of paper which happens to be the sale of their house. If they signed, you might be able to claim that the house is yours – but unless you actually got an agreement from those empowered to agree to such a document, the bit of paper is worthless.
If you did genuine legal research, ristvan, you would have many cites to cases and statutory authority to share…..
Janice, but not in a brief comment. I thought Tom Jfferson’s definition of a treaty sufficed. I learned con law from Larry Tribe himself at Harvard, and have been licensed since 1976. Please be nice.
You can research all this stuff yourself in less than half an hour, and note your own favorite citations. Three googles, because I gave all the keywords. 1. Legal definition of a US treaty. 2. Legal definition of a US congressional Pact. 3. Legal definitions (plural) of US executive agreements. The world of US constitutional law will open before you. Regards.
Not impressed by Tribe. He just makes it up as he goes along. Not impressed by Harvard law either. i have had to fire Harvard grads because they were blithering idiots. The best lawyers I ever hired were from the University of Toledo.
It was not ratified by the United States of America.
It is, thus, null and void vis a vis the U.S.A. — ALREADY.
No action is needed.
A public statement by President Trump for clarity would be the “superior option.” It will waste none of the U.S. citizen’s hired representatives’ time*, time spent on what they actually need to be doing.
*Yes, it would waste time — as if the U.S. Senate Democrats would let pass this golden opportunity to prance across the stage, bellowing hour after hour, yet AGAIN.
JM, simply incorrect. Please see my very precise yet succint explanation below. I double checked my con law on this.
ristvan:
1. Your “brief” is devoid of any cite to authority (except yourself). It is simply a collection of conclusory statements, some of which are, no doubt, true, but with NO cites to case or statutory law, your argument fails UTTERLY of being persuasive.
2. Taking as a GIVEN (not proven by you in the least below) that the U.S. was bound by the former POTUS to honor the Paris deal (for lack of a better term),
the answer remains the same (see my above comment https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/03/07/trump-should-keep-promise-withdraw-u-s-from-paris-climate-treaty/#comment-2444781 ). The only option is for the envirostalinists to sue for enforcement of their alleged quasi-contract for which the burden of proving it is NOT null and void is on them. Till then: ignore them.
IOW: Don’t voluntarily fight battles which may never come to you. Let the enemy force the issue. There is NOTHING to be gained by a pre-emptive strike, here — only lost time and human resource hours (for the enemy may very well not choose to fight that battle at all and we can always muster the resources when that time comes). You would have us spend time/effort that may never have been needed.
JM, I don’t have to persuade you. You can persuade yourself in less than half an hour. Far better you teach yourself with three simple Google searches. I already provided all the google key words. You pick the references, cause there will be many and I do not mean Wiki. Cornell Law usually pops up pretty high.
1. Legal definition of a US treaty.
2. Legal definition of a US congressional Pact.
3. Legal definitions (plural, cause there are 3 subtypes) of US Executive Agreements.
I omit the interesting and complicated but for these purposes irrelevant complications of international law definition entanglements.
721.1 Determination of Type of Agreement
The following considerations will be taken into account along with other relevant factors in determining whether an international agreement shall be dealt with by the United States as a treaty to be brought into force with the advice and consent of the Senate or as an agreement to be brought into force on some other constitutional basis.
721.2 Constitutional Requirements
There are two procedures under the Constitution through which the United States becomes a party to international agreement. Those procedures and the constitutional parameters of each are:
a. Treaties
International agreements (regardless of their title, designation, or form) whose entry into force with respect to the United States takes place only after the Senate has given its advice and consent are “treaties.” The President, with the advice and consent of two-thirds of the Senators present, may enter into an international agreement on any subject genuinely of concern in foreign relations, so long as the agreement does not contravene the United States Constitution; and
b. International Agreements Other Than Treaties
International agreements brought into force with respect to the United States on a constitutional basis other than with the advice and consent of the Senate are “international agreements other than treaties.” (The term “executive agreement” is appropriately reserved for agreements made solely on the basis of the constitutional authority of the President.) There are three constitutional bases for international agreements other than treaties as set forth below. An international agreement may be concluded pursuant to one or more of these constitutional bases:
(1) Agreements Pursuant to Treaty
The President may conclude an international agreement pursuant to a treaty brought into force with the advice and consent of the Senate, the provisions of which constitute authorization for the agreement by the Executive without subsequent action by the Congress;
(2) Agreements Pursuant to Legislation
The President may conclude an international agreement on the basis of existing legislation or subject to legislation to be enacted by the Congress; and
(3) Agreements Pursuant to the Constitutional Authority of the President
The President may conclude an international agreement on any subject within his constitutional authority so long as the agreement is not inconsistent with legislation enacted by the Congress in the exercise of its constitutional authority. The constitutional sources of authority for the President to conclude international agreements include:
(a) The President’s authority as Chief Executive to represent the nation in foreign affairs;
(b) The President’s authority to receive ambassadors and other public ministers;
(c) The President’s authority as “Commander-in-Chief”; and
(d) The President’s authority to “take care that the laws be faithfully executed.”
https://www.state.gov/e/oes/rls/rpts/175/1319.htm
This is what I found, from the State Department.
CONGRESSIONAL-EXECUTIVE AGREEMENT
An accord made by joint authority of the Congress and the president covering areas ofinternational lawthat are not within the ambit of treaties.
A congressional-executive agreement comes about in different ways. Congress may authorize the president to conclude a particular agreement already negotiated, as when a multilateral agreement establishes an international organization such as the international monetary fund. Congress sometimes has approved presidential agreements by legislation or appropriation of funds to carry out its obligations.
It is now widely accepted that a congressional-executive agreement is a complete alternative to a treaty: the president can seek approval of any agreement by joint resolution of both Houses of Congress instead of by a two-thirds vote of the Senate alone. Like a treaty, such an agreement is the law of the land, superseding inconsistent state laws as well as inconsistent provisions in earlier treaties, other international agreements, or acts of Congress.
http://www.encyclopedia.com/law/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/congressional-executive-agreement
Also found this.
https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/RL32528.pdf
This is interesting…
What is a Treaty?
Treaties are a serious legal undertaking both in international and domestic law. Internationally, once in force, treaties are binding on the parties and become part of international law. Domestically, treaties to which the United States is a party are equivalent in status to Federal legislation, forming part of what the Constitution calls “the supreme Law of the Land.” However, the word treaty does not have the same meaning in the United States and in international law. Under international law, a “treaty” is any legally binding agreement between nations. In the United States, the word treaty is reserved for an agreement that is made “by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate” (Article II, Section 2, Clause 2 of the Constitution). International agreements not submitted to the Senate are known as “executive agreements” in the United States, but they are considered treaties and therefore binding under international law.
https://www.loc.gov/rr/main/govdocsguide/TreatyDefinition.html
SMC, that it very helpful. But defines the treaty idea after the fact, not before. Which is the sole issue here. So is legally fatally flawed. A treaty as drafted is immutable but by mutual consent BEFORE being submitted to the Senate for 2/3 ratification. Not after. See the subtle difference?
Never the less, thanks for this comment. Not only provides useful context, proves how you CANNOT trust .gov websites for any semblance of legal truth.
Ristvan,
I think I understand the difference, I don’t think I agree with you though.
It strikes me that a lot of the difference depends on whether you are using the international law definition of a treaty or the US definition. Per the US definition, the Paris accord is not a treaty but an executive agreement as far as the USA is concerned. Per the international law definition, the Paris accord is indeed a treaty, regardless of what the USA thinks of it.
If we are going to call it an executive agreement, then its legality is determined by whether or not it falls under the presidents powers per the constitution. Something I think is highly questionable based on the examples I’ve seen.
As for being immutable before Senate ratification, now that I’ve had a couple of minutes to think, I disagree. The Senate can issue RUDS to any treaty submitted to it.
SMC, that is why for those here, i explicilty skipped International treaty definitions. As a general rule, those try to impose on the US previoualy internationally agreed definitions to whichnwe did not agree. This constitutes possible legal agression. Far beyond the simple US legal explications of this simple US post. Whose only purpose was to straighten out skeptics on the simole US Constitutional definition of a Treaty. My gosh, Thomas Jefferson is no more good enough? Personally IMO , objections here constitute stupid blind skepticism. Bring smart, not stupid.
SMC, you are making the very complicated argument that under previous US treaties. Paris is a binding treaty. Got news for you. That failed long before the Paris wording was changed from binding to optional. Nice try. No banana. Go to a major law school, study international law (mostly a joke in re tuna, whales, currency manipulations , and such), then get back.
ristvan,
I am not arguing Paris is a binding treaty. Per US definitions, it isn’t a treaty. I don’t give a damn about international law. I’m just trying to understand this crap, based on your comment, ristvan March 7, 2017 at 2:34 pm. As for going to law school, my opinion of lawyers is very marginally better than my opinion of politicians. Take your snobbery and shove it.
I realise this will make every lawyer here cringe with a sharp intake of breath but what is wrong with Trump just saying “go away, we’re not interested, now what are you going to do about it”?
I know that I’ll get a tsunami of “well without the rule of law we have nothing” etc but in a pure sense that just isn’t true.
We should just make a new law and as long as there’s the ultimate power (I think Mao had it spot on) to back it up then so what?
We are getting to that point in my view..
jones: Far from it. MANY U. S. attorneys would applaud and stand up and shout, “Yes!” in response to your paragraph 1 suggestion to President Trump. GREAT IDEA 🙂
— There is NO treaty, here.
— Even if there were, the U.S. Senate has not ratified it and there is NO good reason to put before them.
— There is no legislation authorizing this Paris deal — the Clean Air Act (nor any other legislation) gives no explicit (and it must be, it cannot merely “flow” from it in some sort of penumbra-like ooze) authority for it.
— the Paris deal does not fall under the stated Constitutional authority of the President to represent the U.S. in foreign affairs.
Game over.
(Like the voidable contracts of minor, made by one without the legal capacity to do so, the Paris deal is voidable. By not honoring it, the U.S. by its actions repudiates it. Actions speak. Loudly.)
The former POTUS was ultra vires, a dictator in his own mind.
*****************************
Re: ristvan — if he had anything to cite (cases or legislation), he would.
President Trump would do well to follow the example of HRH Elizabeth II:
ignore the words so fatuously uttered by B. Hussein in Europe… .
(youtube — former POTUS using “God Save the Queen” as background music for speech)
Then, step on the gas…
(youtube)
and cry with a grin,
Go, internal combustion engine!!!
GO, BIG OIL!!!
Am I making myself clear?
Heh.
Make — America — great — again.
Janice Moore says :
Heh.
Make — America — great — again.
I’ve always been rather puzzled by this. I have always thought the US to be splendid country, a great one if you will.
But patently many US Conservative people do not agree with me. So when was it great, and when did it stop being great?
And is it still in that sad state despite the election of Trump?
“””””Janice Moore March 7, 2017 at 8:36 pm
Then, step on the gas…
EAT DIRT, ENVIROSTALINISTS!
Go, internal combustion engine!!!””””
Oh, Janice, such memories surface because of your post.
just a sec, I need to go hug both of my Cutlass, Okay, ready.Go !!
Memory – very first time I rode in the ’72, he thought he’d impress me with hitting the pedal, did not impress me. When my head literally pressed the back of the head rest, inertia kept it there. I fully informed him to never do that to me again unless it was on a drag strip.
during this time, came this……..
I used to have a ’83 Cutlass Supreme for a family car……….
Now, it’s my car…….. gear ratio…373 for those that know those type of specs.
Gareth Phillips March 8, 2017 at 12:01 am
Janice Moore says :
Heh.
Make — America — great — again.
“””But patently many US Conservative people do not agree with me. So when was it great, and when did it stop being great?””””
Gareth, in 1988, during a discussion about the American Dream, I told people there was no such thing as the American Dream anymore……… I knew then, that nothing would ever be as great as it was previously.
President Trump has brought back to the surface, the possibilities of real Americans being able to achieve the American Dream once again.
I accept Ristvan’s legal assessment but regardless I feel this is properly a political issue and an excellent place to start the dismantling of the climate mafia of Eco-Socialists who have utterly owned this message platform since this crock of crap pseudo -science was created-literally out of thin air.
The correct political procedure would be to assemble a blue ribbon scientific panel to investigate the practices and results from 40 years of concocted science with collaboration from pal reviewed paers published in pretend journals of higher learning. Justify this by calling out Mann and his hockey team, Hansen, Trenberth and the IPCC while highlighting the colossal cost that has been incurred for actual negative value as in reduced GDP and lost industry.
It is a well known political practice for governments to go to war with “outside enemies” in order to unite the nation behind a common threat. Here we have a real, economic threat being carried out against the Western economic system by people engaged in a pathological anti-scientific crusade against economic progress. This is a war that is true and just and will save lives, not cost them.
John, I totally agree, but I would like to see Trump just nixt the “Treaty” and stop any funding requested by it. They can sort out the legality afterward. It would take decades and we would not be getting “screwed” in the mean time.
From what I could find online, if Trump decided to ignore or declare the Paris Accord void, he would be setting policy or law that has not really come up yet. Just how an executive agreement binds a different President who wants to remove it would set legal precedent, apparently. If Trump wished to continue the policy, the law is fairly clear that he can, but if he does not?
itjohn harmsworth:
I am not an American so I lack both ability and right to assess the legality of President Obama’s signing of the UN ‘Paris Agreement’. I write to make a practical suggestion based on the reality of actions following President Trump attempting to impose immigration restrictions to the US.
It can be expected that President Trump’s would be challenged in Court of Law if he were to publicly rescind adherence of the USA to the UN ‘Paris Agreement’. Then, either (a) the Court would confirm that President Trump has the right to conduct that action or (b) the Court would declare what would be required to rescind US adherence to the Treaty. This would provide the most rapid possible resolution of the matter.
Richard
Right on!
The US reduced climate change emissions by more than any other state without a top-down policy intervention. Fracking and the Dash for Gas did that.
Therefore, President Trump can keep his election promise without in anyway affecting his country’s actual impact on the climate (not even if Greenpeace were right).
So he should.
All benefit and no possibility of a downside.
The fraud of climate policy has to be eradicated. The emission claims are preposterous but the image of the Paris agreement shouldn’t be allowed to survive. It will get credit for reductions that technology itself has provided.
That’s how the EPA was preserved and enhanced in the 70’s as well. Pollution was going down no matter what due to de-industrialization and better technology. EPA took credit when it mostly benefited lawyers and political hacks.
Paris has no statistical impact on climate. It’s a fraud.
Right!
M courtney about the pollution standards, this is on BBC today (As if this hasn’t happened for decades) http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-39115829
and some screeching about “hottest ever” http://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-39175668
It was not a treaty. Congress didn’t ratify it.
Think in terms of World Government. They are. They think World Government takes precedence, and are proceeding as if it does.
That is the way Dictators do it, indeed.
And the rest of the SDG Framework for which CAGW is just the excuse to shift all of us globally toward a managed society grounded on data to ensure equitable outcomes. The UN calls it Dignity for All by 2030 campaign, but it is simply a restatement of what Marx called his Human Development Society. Once technology and capitalism created a certain level of wealth, all human needs supposedly can be met.
http://www.greengrowthknowledge.org/sites/default/files/downloads/resource/UNEP_consuming_sustainably_Behavioral_Insights.pdf is am example of the broader agenda still coming at us even if we withdraw from the supposed reason for all this dirigiste management of people and places and what we can aspire to be without government permission.
UNEP is holding a webinar on that vision to use the behavioral insights to manage us in the name of CAGW and sustainability this week.
“The UN was not created to take mankind to heaven, but to save humanity from hell.”
— Dag Hammarskjöld, Secretary-General from 1953 to 1961
War is hell.
“It can’t happen here” is always wrong: a dictatorship can happen anywhere.”
― Karl Popper, Unended Quest: An Intellectual Autobiography
It seems to be happening right in front of our eyes:
http://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/SDG_logo_with_UN_emblem.png
Instrumentalized by a huge organization of unelected bureaucrats.
Thanks, Christopher, well written. You say:
Actually we are REQUIRED to withdraw because the UNFCCC admitted Palestine as a full member. See here for details.
Best regards,
w.
W. A small clarification. The 1990s laws require defunding. That is a step short of withdrawing from the Pact. However, your point provides lots of additional political cover.
Then follow the law and defund the UNFCCC. Then don’t attend any of their meetings. That’s pretty much the same as withdrawing – right?
We do not need political cover. President Trump/the U.S. should withdraw from the proven-corrupt, anti-science, UNFCCC simply because it is the right thing to do.
100+ Janice.
Exactly. It’s why Trump was elected among other issues.
Well spoken!
Walking away from the UNFCCC sounds so simple … and sometimes the simplest solutions are the best.
“Walking away from the UNFCCC sounds so simple”
The UNFCCC was indeed a treaty ratified by the USA. It was sent to the Senate by Pres Bush, and approved by the requisite majority.
NS, it is NOT a treaty in the Constitutional sense of Article 2 section 2.2. It is a congressional Pact. UNFCCC gives the US a unilateral 1 year notice opt out.
So what do we have here?
Bush senior, who can be found on youtube in 2 or 3 different videos calling for the US to become a nation-state under UN global rule.
The UNFCCC text says nations should pursue “economic development to proceed in a sustainable manner.”
But Sustainable Development came from the Gro Harlem Bruntland report. She is a VP in socialistinternational.org.
After George W. Bush removed Saddam, Iraq elected Jalal Talabani, a VP in socialistinternational.org. (A little side fact…). Bet all those patriotic men and women who gave their lives or who have permanent war scars for Iraq wouldn’t have gone to war had they known their efforts would help advance the cause of socialism (communism lite).
The Socialist International was brought back to life after WWII by communists. After a few years, they ‘denounced’ communism and embraced socialism (communism lite). This switch was done around the same time as the McCarthy hearings which is interesting, timing wise.
The UN was backed by FDR whose admin as infested with communists according to the NSA Venona files.
Rockefeller money helped create the UN. They gave them the land in New York to build its’ HQ on.
Rockefeller money also funded the IPR (Institute of Pacific Relations) which was exposed as a communist front organization.
Rockefeller (and Ford) money helped create the International Press Institute of which at one point, they had over 1000 editors from around the world under it. It is now funded in part by Soros money. As of around 2012, the NYTimes, LATimes, Reuters, AP, WashPost, and other major news sources were under it.
It is absolutely clear that we need to ignore this treaty, stop funding the UN, and get the hell out of socialism while we still can. They have their tentacles fairly planted in our lives (via electronic surveillance and monitoring) but we still have freedoms that we can leverage to stop them.
kramer:
It would be helpful if you right-wingers would agree on the misinformation you want to promote.
On another WUWT thread a group of fasc1sts are claiming socialism is fasc1sm.
On this WUWT thread you are claiming socialism is “communism -light”.
Both assertions cannot be true because fasc1sm is the extreme right and communism is the extreme left.
In reality, of course, socialism is neither which is why both fasc1sts and communists oppose it.
Richard
richardscourtney,
You are the one spreading misinformation. You state the communists oppose socialism which is flat out wrong.
From a 1972 UPI article titled “Soviets mark 55th anniversary”
“The soviet army is the army of brotherhood and friendship of the multinational family of peoples of our state,” he said. “Its soldiers are infinitely devoted to their homeland and the cause of communism.
“The armed forces of the U.S.S.R. in single formation with the armies of the Warsaw Treaty member countries are in constant reediness to defend the great gains of socialism.”
Link:
https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=799&dat=19721107&id=mbJPAAAAIBAJ&sjid=clIDAAAAIBAJ&pg=634,2800349
(excerpt starts from the middle column. And make sure there are no spaces in the link when you copy it.)
There you have it, the communists in USSR on record stating they are ready to defend the great gains of socialism.
Now Richard, the question is, did you learn anything today?
Anyone who recognizes the fact that fascism is a form of socialism is a fascist themselves.
Interesting method of argumentation there. In other words, you can’t refute the point so you are just going to insult those who disagree with you.
BTW, the Baathist party of whom Saddam Hussein and Syria’s Assad were members is also a socialist party.
MarkW,
You said “Anyone who recognizes the fact that fascism is a form of socialism is a fascist themselves.” What is this in regards to?
And how specifically did I “insult” somebody?
“BTW, the Baathist party of whom Saddam Hussein and Syria’s Assad were members is also a socialist party.”
Correct and which are two more reasons to end socialism.
Kramer, Pick up a history or philosophy book sometime, you might learn something.
Fascism grew from Hegel’s veneration of the State – or more precisely – the power of the State. Whereas Marx transformed Hegel’s dialectic idealism into dialectic materialism. Per Marx, “With him [Hegel] it [the dialectic] is standing on its head. It must be turned right side up again, if you would discover the rational kernel within the mystical shell.”
Marx substituted the “collective” for the “state”. Nothing more.
Communism and Fascism are just opposite sides of the same fraudulent coin.
My apologies Kramer! I see that I should have referenced richardscourtney.
kramer:
You ask me
I answer,
Yes, one of the things I learned today is
there is an anonymous troll using the moniker of ‘kramer’ who has infested WUWT with the intent of attempting to cause disruption by posting fallacious, irrelevant and offensive disinformation.
Propaganda from the defunct USSR does not negate the fact that communists oppose socialists as demonstrated by the USSR putting socialists in gulags.
Importantly, your quotation of USSR propaganda is not relevant to my post to you. My post was a request for you right-wingers to agree on which disinformation to promote when you are the one of them who is ‘out of step’.
I remind that my request was addressed to you and it said.
Richard
RSC, as a small “l” libertarian, I could be defined as “right wing”, or not, it depends on which definitions one uses. The Soviets claimed that they were striving towards true socialism, when the state would wither away. Mussolini started out as a socialist. With a bit of research, I could come up with more.
The fundamentally silly thing is trying to separate political/economic inclinations and models into a single linear dimension. One provocative two dimensional grouping was laid out by Jerry Pournelle, a science fiction writer with a PhD in PoliSci, which is available on Wikipedia in one of the times they report fairly accurately.
jmarshs:
I suggest that you would better in your attempts to spread disinformation if you were to avoid saying things that proclaim you are spouting nonsense.
Communism and Fascism are at opposite ends of the political spectrum by definition. They always have been and everybody knows it.
In other words, any unbiased person reading your comments discounts everything you say when you make your laughably untrue assertion that “Communism and Fascism are just opposite sides of the same fraudulent coin”.
Richard
Tom Halla:
I am grateful that you have tried to introduce some sanity into this issue, but I write to say I am purposely not addressing your point because it distracts from the objection I am trying to make.
There is a group of right-wing contributors who make fallacious, irrelevant and abusive comments about socialists on many WUWT threads. This drives away people who would wish to support the real matters presented by the articles the threads are intended to discuss.
This thread is a clear example. It is about whether President Trump should withdraw the US from the ‘Paris Agreement’ in accordance with an election promise he made. The anti-socialist rant of the troll posting as ‘kramer’ is totally irrelevant to that, and can only deter socialists from stating support for the withdrawal. Indeed, it has to be suspected that such inhibition of public support for the withdrawal was kramer’s intention: why else would he/she/it post such fallacious, irrelevant and offensive twaddle?
Richard
Thank you. I think “socialism” can be a description of some governmental activities, some of them necessary for a functioning society, as opposed to “socialism” as Marxism lite. Both definitions are current, and very much confuse the issue. By the first usage, Bismarck was a socialist.
richardscourtney
You said I am here to post “fallacious, irrelevant and offensive disinformation.” Specifically list ALL the information that I have posted in this thread that is fallacious. Please list them out for me to respond to one by one.
Also what have I said that’s offended you? Didn’t mean to.
Regarding the communists putting socialists in gulags, that may be true. Doesn’t change the fact that the communist leaders of the USSR were in favor of socialism which is what I backed with a credible link. And since they backed socialism, it is in a way, communism-lite (which is my view). Do you think they would back socialism if socialism was about free markets and capitalism? No. They backed it because its closer to their political system.
And your request addressed to me where you stated that communists opposed socialism is still incorrrect. I already showed you a link quoting the glorious communist motherland leaders saying their armies are willing to die for socialism.
And here’s an excerpt and link where communist leaders say that a communist leader who died dedicated his life to strengthening the “socialist” state. In short, these communists are calling their country socialist:
USSR lead dies
The Morning Record, Apr 27, 1976
“An obituary statement signed by communist party chief Leonid I. Brezhnev, Premier Alexei N. Kosygin, President Kikolai V. Podgorny and other political and military leaders said Grechki “dedicated all his life to the strengthening of the defense might and to the defense of the socialist state.””
https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=2512&dat=19760427&id=HQZIAAAAIBAJ&sjid=QAANAAAAIBAJ&pg=1201,3982615
And your comment that my quotation of USSR quotes is not relevant to your reply to me is wrong. It IS relevant because people like me do NOT want to live under a global socialist heavily monitored, surveilled, and controlled green hell. AGW is being leveraged for this purpose (and others that I have not mentioned here).
If you think these socialists don’t want anything other than total world government, you are mistaken.
Kramer said: “And your request addressed to me where you stated that communists opposed socialism is still incorrrect. I already showed you a link quoting the glorious communist motherland leaders saying their armies are willing to die for socialism.”
Kramer, I realize this is largely off-topic, but socialism, per Marx’s Historical Determinism, was an intermediate stage in the transition to a communist society in which “the state would wither way.”
capitalism => socialism => communism
This arose from Marx’s belief in a historical, dialectic determinism in which, under capitalism, revolution would occur as a resolution to the opposition between the owners of the tools of production and the workers (i.e. the bourgeoisie vs. the proletariat). His conception of history was influenced heavily by Hegel.
Also, the German Government under Hitler was National Socialism (National Socialist German Workers Party). The U.S.S.R was based on International Socialism.
Both were socialist.
kramer and jmarshs:
You ultra-right-wing trolls are incorrigible!
Your fallacious and crazy propaganda promoting your vile political views is a (deliberate?) distraction from the subject of this thread.
jmarshs, socialism predated Marx by decades and he provided his description of it: he did not define it. Clearly, your interest is promotion of disinformation, but any onlookers wanting to know the true origin of socialism can read it here
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/08/06/skeptcial-science-takes-creepy-to-a-whole-new-level/#comment-1385725
Richard
And more juvenile ad hominems. Debate the facts and leave the infantile insults to the alarmists.
richard.
I asked you to specifically list which statements of mine are fallacious and you have not responded. Why?
Also, I asked you what I said that offended you but you didn’t answer. Why?
Do you think being called a crazy troll with vile views is offensive? Did I refer to you as such?
Regarding this comment of yours:
“Your fallacious and crazy propaganda promoting your vile political views is a (deliberate?) distraction from the subject of this thread.”
Again, what is fallacious about what I’ve said. Make it easy, list every statement I’ve said that you think is a lie so I can defend them. If you don’t, then I can only conclude that you are afraid of the answers and the painful enlightenment that comes from facts.
🙂
Clear off, trolls. Your advocacy of fascism is too reprehensible to be worthy of further effort refuting. You are only impressing other fascists.
No one is advocating Fascism, not even you. The closest however is you since fascism is a form of Socialism. Note, that while fascism is a form of socialism, logic does state that not all socialists are fascists.
You should think about that for a bit.
Richard said:
“Clear off, trolls. Your advocacy of fascism is too reprehensible to be worthy of further effort refuting. You are only impressing other fascists.”
What an ‘eloquent and intelligent’ (lots of sarc) reply Richard. You dodged my questions and appear frightened and are running away like a big baby. Not what I would expect from someone from the morally superior and intellectually superior left.
Why you are frightened to answer my questions? Does the thought of learning something that goes against your political beliefs discomfort you?
Or could it be that you’re a warmest climate scientist? I say this because you’re acting like one who is dodging a debate with a skeptic.
And now I’m an advocate of fascism? List the steps in your superior leftist ‘deductive reasoning’ that led you to this conclusion.
Step 1 – You disagreed with him
Step 2 – See step 1
Walking away from the UNFCCC sounds so simple … and sometimes the simplest solutions are the best … brings down the whole house of cards.
Two separate observations. First, I agree concerning Paris. But there is a four year window. The fastest way is to withdraw from UNFCCC, under which Paris is a subsidiary agreement. The window is 1 year. And by US law passed in the early 1990s, the US is already required to cease any UNFCCC funding because it chose to recognize the Palestinians as full treaty members. That provides sufficient additional political cover. The second $500 million Green Climate fund tranche was illegal formthis reason alone.
But your are legally just wrong about the Paris Accord being a Treaty requiring 2/3 Senate ratification under Constitution Article 2 section 2.2. That sort of treaty was long ago defined by Thomas Jefferson as ‘immutable save by mutual consent’. Paris is mutable because (a) voluntary and (b) containing a unilateral opt out, the thing you advocate using.
There are actually 3 classes of international agreements under the constitution, as recognized by long standing SCOTUS precedent. 1. Treaties, as just defined. 2. Pacts, which contain an opt out but require enabling simple majority Congressional approval. NAFTA is and TPP would have been trade Pacts. 3. Executive agreements made by the President without any congressional input. These exist in three narrow and specific areas in Article 2: 1. Some foreign policy, such as recognizing countries or ambassadors, 2. As Commander in Chief (e.g. sending Gitmo prisoners to foreign countries who agree to accept them), 3. Under Article 2 section 3 ‘shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed’. The US Paris Commitment was essentially CPP. Obama argued he can make that nonbinding committment because CPP flows from the Clean Air Act and hemis just volunteering to faithfully uphold pre-existing US law.
Let’s hope the new Administration actually upholds the law. Obama administration was great on upholding hope, spending money, and increasing the national debt.
Trump seems to be trying. Both WOTUS and CPP are almost certainly unconstitutional, whereas the new immigration EO is almost certainly constitutional. The second $500 million Obama sent GCC is clearly illegal. Obama thought he had two signature achievements, Obamacare and withdrawal from Iraq. Both have ended badly.
It is a little unfair to put an Iraq withdrawal on Obama. George W Bush negotiated it. Obama merely did nothing to change it when a catastrophe loomed. That laid the groundwork for the rise of ISIS.
“. . . upholding hope, sending money, increasing national debt . . . ”
This coven of thieves and liars has to be the poster children of how the Marxist UN stays in business.
https://youtu.be/PTHe_rn0dEU
CG, that is not true. Obama withdrew the troops when he failed to negotiate a new status of troops agreement with the Iraqi government.
Ristvan, the president is able to act unilaterally in their job running the executive, but they are not empowered to enter international accords which would bind a future president. For example, Theodore Roosevelt explained:
The Constitution did not explicitly give me power to bring about the necessary agreement with Santo Domingo. But the Constitution did not forbid my doing what I did. I put the agreement into effect, and I continued its execution for two years before the Senate acted; and I would have continued it until the end of my term, if necessary, without any action by Congress. But it was far preferable that there should be action by Congress, so that we might be proceeding under a treaty which was the law of the land and not merely by a direction of the Chief Executive which would lapse when that particular executive left office. I therefore did my best to get the Senate to ratify what I had done.
“The Constitution did not explicitly give me power to bring about the necessary agreement … But the Constitution did not forbid my doing what I did.” In the words of a Communist official deciding what to do about an application for a rock concert in Prague: Of course I won’t forbid it. On the other hand, I can’t permit it.
SS, WUWT is probably not the appropriate forum to discuss the intricacies of US Constitutional law with US citizens, let alone those less familiar.
Your TR quote is a classic example of grey area involving an undeclared war in 1904 in Santo Domingo. Nothing to do with Paris climate accord. TR’s ‘speak softly but carry a big stick’ policy led indirectly to Korea (a UN police action, not a war), Vietnam, Iraq, Afganistan, and now Yemen. The Constitutional definition of a declaration of war last having been constitutionally fulfilled on the day after Pearl Harbor.
For the purposes of this blog post, it imperfectly illustrates why most of the commenters taking offense with my precise summary of a narrow constitutional point really should research more and comment less. I always do my homework before appearing here or elsewhere. Always.
Regards.
It is all but impossible to understand your argument unless one know what the term CPP is/consists of.
It is always sensible to define abbreviations especially when many readers of this site are not American, so are unlikely to be familiar with all common US abbreviations.
I think CPP is Cyrillic for the Communist party of Russia.
A very fair criticism. Mea Culpa. I assumed commenters were keeping up.
CPP stands for the Obama era EPA Clean Power Plan, promulgated under the last year of Obama EPA supposedly pursuant to the Clean Air Act, which mandates states to individually reduce CO2 emissions in their electricity generation. There are two fundamental US constitutuonal issues: nothing in CAA gives EPA authority to regulate instate electricity generating mix (it does for interstate emissions like sulfur dioxide), and, it does not give EPA aurhority to order closure of existing then legal generating plants. The latter is a violation of the 4th amendment.
Richard, Clean Power Plan. A plan drawn up by the US Environmental Protection Agency to regulate carbon dioxide as a pollutant. It effectively would shut down all coal powered generating plants in the US, and possibly shut down other uses of coal that release carbon dioxide.
Jefferson did not have the root password to the constitution.
“Trump Should Withdraw U.S. from Paris Climate Treaty”
Totally agree. Unfortunately the Secretary of State Tillerson, who is in theory in charge of whether we stay in the retarded treaty, disagree. From Oct of last year:
Tillerson single-handily dragged Exxon left on climate change. Indeed, at Tillerson’s confirmation hearing a couple months ago Tillerson confirmed that his leftist views on AGW are his own, not Exxon’s.
From the NY Times a couple of days ago:
Stephen Bannon, Mr. Trump’s senior adviser, is pressing the president to officially pull the United States from the landmark [Paris] accord, but he is clashing with the Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and the president’s daughter Ivanka Trump [a climate loon].
I believe that a major part of Tillerson’s position involves his practical belief that it’s best to have a chair at the table because occupying that chair does not require us to take any action. However, Tillerson is wrong. As Rudd points out, above, the U.S. is required to withdraw from the UNFCCC due to the Palestine issue.
This is another one of those “learning on the job problems” with many of Trump’s appointees, it’s one thing to make a decision that would be prudent in a private setting, and it’s another to adhere to the oath that requires one to faithfully defend the Constitution and execute the laws of the United States, even when you believe there might be a better option.
As for Ivanka and Jared, Bannon will get them out of the way, he’s smarter than all of them put together.
“From the NY Times a couple of days ago”
There’s the problem.
Ivanka seems to have moved on to paid family leave as a “signature issue”. Probably appalling but not in the climate wheelhouse where I reside. Hopefully dad paid her off and she’s done with climate.
Times mined the story from the Daily Telegraph and it was the usual crap sourced article there.
What has happened in the past year, is that while I still read the YSM, I do not believe them until I can independently verify the story on a non YSM source. They basically are now the Wikipedia of information. (and Wiki is even lower).
Tillerson was the weakest cabinet appointment. The climate cabal is a make work job for the State Department as well. Delingpole/Morano vouched for him and said not to worry but I wanted to throw food at my screen when he talked mucho stupid at the confirmation hearings. “Global climate framework” which is BS first order.
Tillerson supported carbon tax rubbish at Exxon as well, there’s a selfish Exxon reason that works for them as opposed to other BS climate policies but that’s another conversation. I don’t want climate in the incubator while Trump scales it back, I want it destroyed as global control system which is what it is.
Tillerson should “grow” or head for the exit, no grand climate renegotiation or spin. Carthage must be destroyed!
“Carthage must be destroyed!”, and the ground salted.
Where’s my refund…..from the UN?
Actually, your share of a refund of $500,000,000.00 from the UN would be about $1.60. You should demand your share of a refund from Obama in the amount of about $15,000.00 for the increased national debt.
Deduct that last $500M from the amount we normally give to the U.N.
The UN needs the US a lot more than the US needs the UN.
We should just leave the whole thing.
You mean every year is not supposed to be a stimulus year as in free health care, free education, waived student debt, waived mortgage debt, bloated State Dept. budget, and redistribution of wealth in the tax code?
Watch the YouTube video documentary of the Six Day War to see how indispensable the UN is.
As far as I know, the only reason to send the Paris Accord to the Senate would be to formally kill it, rather than just ignoring it. A formal Senate vote would give the opposition a free chance to pontificate on the unmitigated evil of the Trump administration, so that would not be a good idea (although nothing would stop the Democrats from pontificating on general causes).
TH, that is an incorrect analysis. And, you send it to the Senate you run into the 60 vote Cloture problem (filibuster). Don’t go there.
I am not sure that Treaties are subject to filibuster. Be that as it may, Harry Reid proved that the filibuster rule could be amended by a simple majority. If the Republicans let a filibuster get in their way, they are the gutless swine that I think they are
A Senate vote is risky. There are some RINO Republican senators who believe in a carbon tax, etc.
It’s not so much that they believe in a carbon tax, it’s more that they welcome additional revenue that they can use to buy votes with.
Trump has nothing to do. Obama entered into the agreement, not the USA. Constitutionally, they ONLY way the USA can enter into such an agreement is for the Senate to ratify it. It was never put before the Senate to ratify. Ergo, the USA is not a party to it.
Let’s put our hands in our pockets and wait for the UN to return $500,000,000.
CG, that we can do. The second $500 million tranche Obama sent the GCC under UNFCCC was clearly illegal under US statutory law from 1991 and/ or 1994. The first tranche unfortunately was sent just days BEFORE UNFCCC recognized Palestine; don’t think there is anything that can be done.
Sure we can do it. It would be a long wait.
CG, just saw your reply. I misread/misunderstood your original comment. The second $500 million illegal tranche can be quite easily clawed back. The total 2016 US UN contribution was $2.957 billion. I just looked it up. Simply subtract $500 million from 2017, attaching a very short note saying what Obama did was illegal and we are taking it back. The only ‘question is whether to add interest.
Rud, should you decide to trade hurricanes for earthquakes, you are welcome at my place.
CG, thanks but no thanks. Hurricanes we know are coming (and even sort of where and when) so we have two choices. Batten the hatches or get out. And we have two choices of what get out means: fly to my Chicago townhome early if looks real bad, or drive to her north Georgia cabin if it looked ok and then turned real bad. 11 hours, mostly north bound interstate; first tank of gas is 400 miles north 6 hours later. Cat 1-2, we stay put for sure on the beach in Fort Lauderdale. We have always a 4-7 day supply of food and water (the old bathtub plus Duct Tape trick. We stayed put for marginal Cat 3 Wilma. Was interesting, but not dangerous, even though the complex took a near direct eyewall hit and took a year to rebuild the grounds. We did not evacuate Matthew last year because too far off shore. Was pissed off that did execute the bathtub trick and then had to clean up the duct tape mess with Goo-Gone. (For preppers, bathtubs hold a lot of water. But the usual bathtub plunger seal actually leaks a lot. So you have to seal it down with multiple layers of Duct Tape if you want to have water a couple of days later. And two bathtubs.
Earthquakes just happen. No choices. I remember being jolted literally out of bed onto the floor at a swanky California resort by a ‘minor’ earthquake. Once was enough. But highest regards.
AH! But you can say you literally had the earth move under your feet! 😉
for the record, we get both. But the earthquakes are only in the 4-5 range, so just fun to watch others crap their pants.
A 1906 earthquake story: A San Francisco couple sent their boy to stay in Chicago while their house was being rebuilt. In two weeks they got a telegram: Sending the boy back stop send earthquake stop.
I thought you were going to say that while the boy was in Chicago, it burned down.
PJ, nope. Please see above legal explanation. The general skeptical meme on this is legally incorrect. Get it right, please. It isn’t complicated.
Sorry Ristvan – I disagree. The Constitution is very specific on these matters. They do not even have to be “interpreted” from the “intent” of the founders.
Legal opinions vary widely. If that weren’t true, we in the US would not need the Supreme Court.
Frankly I don’t like the suspense Trump puts us through on this issue. It should have been the easiest one to have dealt with among the ‘orders’ he’s already signed. Perhaps he has to wait until he gets all his cabinet and deputies through the gauntlet in the house, though. I wish there were some skeptics that had his ear more directly on this.
This is not even a matter for skepticism. The intent of this Nouveau Monde stuff by Champaign soshulist elites isnt even being kept a secret. Kill it and save the whole world. Actually maybe take the cash away from these elites and give it to the poor. They must owe something for the trillions this cynical scheme has caused.
AFAIK, since Inauguration Day, President Trump has been silent about The Paris Agreement and Climate Change in general. members of his family and entourage are Believers. He could have a nasty surprise in store for climate realists.
Equally, climate realists could have a nasty surprise in store for Trump if he betrays them. They are his most reliable support base.
AFAIK, Trump could go either way considering his former Globalist ties…
“Not only has Trump funded open borders politicians like Schumer, Durbin, McCain, Graham and Menendez, but he’s also been bailed out by George Soros.
Trump actually spent Christmas Eve with George Soros in 2009, according to the New York Post. But hey, billionaires gotta stick together, you know? Nevermind that Soros is for a One World Order, an anti-Zionist and an anti-constitutional funder of all things unholy.”
https://www.conservativereview.com/commentary/2016/02/trump-pals-around-with-george-soros
“members of his family and entourage are Believers.”
Does anyone have any actual quotes from Ivanka and Jared, or any of the other so-called believers around Trump, where they have publicly stated their position on climate change, pro or con?
I’m not talking about the MSM insinuating that Ivanka and Jared are promoting human-caused climate change. Those are not quotes, they are interpretations done by leftwing reporters. Actual words, are quotes.
Anyone have any? I’ve never even seen one, so far. Only MSM interpretations, and we should all know how inaccurate they usually are. You can’t ever take their interpretations at face value.
Nope… no quotes.
The DiCaprio and Gore visits to Trump Tower are a bit problematic as were the visits of Ivanka and Jared to key Democrat Obama supporter David Geffen’s yacht in August of 2016..
http://people.com/celebrity/ivanka-trump-and-jared-kushner-vacation-on-democrat-david-geffens-yacht/
Nice pic’s… but yes no quotes.
He needs to do nothing and thereby spend nothing. I’d rather see him stopping the “green” industry from spending another penny on the renewable energy industry and related bureaucracy. Instantaneous savings of billions accompanied, unfortunately, by temporary increase in unemployment.
Lincoln said it best at the emergence of the war boom economy and the inability to satisfy his supporters, “The pig doesn’t have enough teats”.
It’s the opposite but worse when ramping down the green industry. You’re ripping the little piglets from the government troth. I’d rather the intellectual heart of the climate propaganda framework be completely destroyed first. Science fraud network, educational wing, political arms defunded. It leads to the whole academic fraud funding system as well. This is larger then current climate scam funding alone by a significant multiple. 1.6 Trillion in student debt that can’t be put through bankruptcy as just one symptom. Millions of dysfunctional political radicals in the academic system who think they are managing the society costs far more in the long run. Climate “science” is just the tip of the iceberg.
If the idiot green “climate” rationalization was changed to So2 (or something more rationally green), energy self-sufficiency and reduced in scale that’s something I’m ok that Trump can deal on. Ethanol for example isn’t going to get the heave ho that it most certainly deserves. What I can’t take are global EU/UN/pinhead academics, cultural Marxists and the framing of “climate” that exists today. Paris is symbolic of their success, it has to be destroyed ASAP.
Horner is spot on when he says “the only real option is to withdraw the United States as a party to the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).”
Furthermore there is no danger from anthropogenic global warming. The EPA should revisit and reverse its endangerment finding.Climate is controlled by natural cycles. We are just past the 2004 peak of a millennial cycle. See my EAE paper at http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0958305X16686488
and earlier accessible blog version at http://climatesense-norpag.blogspot.com/
Here is the abstract for convenience :
“ABSTRACT
This paper argues that the methods used by the establishment climate science community are not fit for purpose and that a new forecasting paradigm should be adopted. Earth’s climate is the result of resonances and beats between various quasi-cyclic processes of varying wavelengths. It is not possible to forecast the future unless we have a good understanding of where the earth is in time in relation to the current phases of those different interacting natural quasi periodicities. Evidence is presented specifying the timing and amplitude of the natural 60+/- year and, more importantly, 1,000 year periodicities (observed emergent behaviors) that are so obvious in the temperature record. Data related to the solar climate driver is discussed and the solar cycle 22 low in the neutron count (high solar activity) in 1991 is identified as a solar activity millennial peak and correlated with the millennial peak -inversion point – in the RSS temperature trend in about 2004. The cyclic trends are projected forward and predict a probable general temperature decline in the coming decades and centuries. Estimates of the timing and amplitude of the coming cooling are made. If the real climate outcomes follow a trend which approaches the near term forecasts of this working hypothesis, the divergence between the IPCC forecasts and those projected by this paper will be so large by 2021 as to make the current, supposedly actionable, level of confidence in the IPCC forecasts untenable.”
Redoing the endangerment finding using the process described by CAA will take 18 months to 2 years, and then will be subject to court challenge. A long game. Revising the CAA definitions IF the 2018 by election falls Trumps way is quicker and cleaner. Both paths can be followed. But CAA revision would be more permanent.
Actually, the President could simply direct the EPA to withdraw the Clean Power Plan and the endangerment finding because the process did not comply with the federal law requirements for scientific data used for policy and rulemaking. The scientific evidence that the EPA cited, basically the IPCC executive summaries, was not science and does meet the legal standard. Information Quality Act directs the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to issue government-wide guidelines that “provide policy and procedural guidance to Federal agencies for ensuring and maximizing the quality, objectivity, utility, and integrity of information (including statistical information) disseminated by Federal agencies”.
That is a possible line of attack. See also the new proposed legislation HONEST 2017.
There is a major problem with google news censorship or filtering of news against TRUMP but its Ok because the people are now noticing this. Google will kill itself eventually if it does not change course just like AGW!!! LOL
There’s a high standard of comments on this thread, for a political subject.
But there really needs to be some referenced, legal expertise to discuss the constitutional matters.
Phony, delusion non-skeptic skeptic example #1. Exactly why Greenshirts have prospered.
M Courtney, see my reply to Janice Moore above comcerning 3+ simple googles. I do not propose to take the evening to write out a legal brief for you all. Besides, then you could still say I was biased, because a good lawyer can convincingly argue either side of any case. As happens with every single SCOTUS case. That is what we are taught, and it is how most lawyers make a living, arguing just their clients side of the case.
This you can do yourself. It will be educational, simple, and convincing. I provided the legal summary that many here doubt because they did not check before for themselves, as skeptical ALWAYS should. Now do so. You have all the legal guidance and keywords necessary to easily check the rest. Just choose your sources wisely. Meaning probably not Wikipedia. Alrhough in this case, their articles are not bad IMO. Regards.
“A good lawyer can convincingly argue either side of any case.” Sums up the U.S. legal system nicely. A better lawyer wins, truth be damned.
“A good lawyer can convincingly argue either side of any case.”
I wouldn’t say that. Let’s see a good lawyer make the case for human-caused global warming/climate change. He wouldn’t be any more successful than anyone else at making this case because the facts are not on the side of that argument. A good lawyer is limited by what he has to work with.
TA, is after dinner and The Voice starts. So consider me slightly impsired. But:
if a good lawyer has the facts, he pounds the facts. (My daughter is a very good lawyer, and does that). If a good lawyer has weak facts but stong law, pounds the law. If neither, just pound the table. So, stop pounding the irrelevant but noisy table.
It is good advice ristvan, but also advice that in my experience people will completely ignore. It seems that people will rarely carry out a Lit.search for evidence that they are wrong, or even a cursory check that what they is saying is remotely true.
In my experience, if Breitbart or Alex Jones make a claim, regardless of how outrageous or unlikely the claim actually is, it will be believed and recycled. There are many who do not want such claims to be false, so would rather fool themselves with some odd form of cognitive dissonance, than actually check out the validity of any info. Pizza parlours in Washington and phone tapping spring to mind
Link to the claims of phone tapping. Before you make a fool of yourself, note that “wiretapping” is NOT Phone tapping (it actually encompasses a lot more).
Then refer to the January 19, 2017 (the day before Trump took office) NY Times article: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/19/us/politics/trump-russia-associates-investigation.html
So your claim is that when Breitbart (or Alex Jones) refers to a NY Times article it is automatically fake news? In that you may have made the first truthful statement in your entire tenure here.
“if a good lawyer has the facts, he pounds the facts. (My daughter is a very good lawyer, and does that). If a good lawyer has weak facts but stong law, pounds the law. If neither, just pound the table. So, stop pounding the irrelevant but noisy table.”
My only point in replying to the claim that a lawyer can win arguing either side of the argument is that I see a lot of smart lawyers every day who have clients who go to jail. So it’s not a given that a smart lawyer can hide the truth from the court with his rhetoric, as was the claim.
And I’m not sure what “irrelevant but noisy table” you think I’m pounding.
“It is good advice ristvan, but also advice that in my experience people will completely ignore. It seems that people will rarely carry out a Lit.search for evidence that they are wrong, or even a cursory check that what they is saying is remotely true.”
Gareth, you are describing yourself. You claimed Ben Carson made an outrageous comment about African slaves, but you didn’t take the time to find out that President Obama said almost exactly the same thing about African slaves back in 2015. See the “Disgraced” post, where you attempted to smear Carson, for more information.
You ought to be checking with Brietbart a little, Gareth. You do want the truth don’t you?
“But there really needs to be some referenced, legal expertise to discuss the constitutional matters.”
I can’t believe you said that.
Discuss the constitutional issues with Rud. He can tell you all about it.
Yup. If they will be explicit, I volunterr the free retirement time to explicitly (and per now JM) respond to most legally citatiioned briefs.
“ristvan, I would expect a lawyer to correctly spell “volunteer””
That’s the best you can do?
I wouldn’t. I married into the profession and can say they are some of the WORST spellers!
“TA, I respect ristvan enough not to start with “lawyer jokes.” ”
Well, to tell you the truth, it didn’t sound like a very respectful reply to me. If you say you have respect for Rud, then I’ll accept your word for it.
Trump should submit it to the Senate for ratification, with a recommendation they not do so. That way, the problem goes away for good.
NOT a smart move legally. Facile for general skeptics, but wrong. See above. And please learn to be more knowing and precise.
From Rud Istvan above:
“The fastest way is to withdraw from UNFCCC, under which Paris is a subsidiary agreement. The window is 1 year. And by US law passed in the early 1990s, the US is already required to cease any UNFCCC funding because it chose to recognize the Palestinians as full treaty members. That provides sufficient additional political cover. The second $500 million Green Climate fund tranche was illegal formthis reason alone.”
So where’s the on-line petition to do just that: withdraw from the UNFCCC already!
Let’s stop pontificating with a like-minded audience and start forcing a return to sanity!
Actually I would relish the prospect of Climate Believers lobbying the Palestinian Authority to “postpone” full membership in the UNFCCC “for technical reasons”.
The agreement should be terminated, it’s part of the many reasons Trump was elected.
It’s globalism, totalitarian and anti-American as a start. Sent to the Senate it could never find the votes but we should be spared that theater.
Of course there is a massive paid propaganda machine on top of all the others for the agreement. The large piss ant skeptic wing is obvious as well. Worse then the RINOs in Congress. If you support Paris you’re not a skeptic you’re a troll.
This is only one part of burying the climate scam once and for all. It shouldn’t require much discussion at all. The crony rent seeking science lobby needs the populist public swamp drain and then the industry subside gravy train along with it.
Trump does not have to do anything.
As long as his countrymen do not complain about life in America has become intolerable, everything is OK on this planet.
If other countries have problems their doing something wrong.
i look to the reported actions by Ebell and Pruitt at EPA and Zinke
at Interior and Steve Bannon hammering Trump to keep his campaign
promises for guidance on the actions I expect.
Also, we should try to use fewer acronyms. Not everyone reads this blog
daily.
The talk on Tillerson is he’s pompous of his own mind, not that uncommon in the CEO space. The carbon tax thing is indication of full smarmy. The confirmation was border line withdrawal for many supporters of Trump.
I heard Ebell reviewing things, I wish he were in the actual government but there is way too much talk about “gradual” when in fact there just may not be the political capital down the line. Climate political infrastructure, it’s 90% political afterall, has to be gutted or it will survive in incubation mode. The EPA cuts should be deeper then proposed for example.
There’s not one Trump convert to be had in the Greenshirt base, he could double green subsidies and funding. He could become a climate alarmist. GW Bush gave the education agenda away, he never saw a vote from that establishment.
Now is the near-term moment to destroy the climate establishment. Not just on funding but intellectually as well.
From the Wall Street Journal’s Kimberley Strassel:
“Don’t Wimp Out on Climate
If Trump doesn’t dump the Paris accord, his economic agenda is in jeopardy.”
https://www.wsj.com/articles/dont-wimp-out-on-climate-1487290672
Spot on.
Sooner or later Trump will try to triangulate. If he tries on climate he’s a one term losers.
America hates the greenshirts, you might never know this hanging around middle road luke warm Dr. Curry admiring skeptical sites but I think Trump has it figured correctly. He’s not going to trigger 400k monthly green layoffs for a six month in a row. He has to destroy the academic cartel, the U.N. global wing and then let the free economy grow and replace the scam industries. Solar City, Tesla poster children of the abuse.
The British Government has been playing the “rename” game for years
Much of the cynicism in Britain over the whole EU project derives from Tony Blair’s promise to hold an EU referendum on the EU Constitution, only to see it renamed the Lisbon Treaty and pushed through without one. This was the second time Blair had promised a referendum then broke his promise. No doubt if Blair had made another promise to hold a referendum on an EU Treaty, he would have changed the name again to an EU Protocol and thus denied us a referendum again.
The Lisbon Treaty took powers from national parliaments and gave them to the EU institutions, furthering the British public’s alienation with the EU in the process.
Soon after he became Prime Minister it became apparent that Tony Blair is an incorrigible liar and hypocrite. Lucky for us, though, that he can do nothing now to stop us from leaving.
We’ve known for some time that – notwithstanding all the hyping, crying and wailing from far too many quarters – climate change aka global warming is far from being the greatest threat to the future of the planet. The UN’s very own surveys have repeatedly told them so, with the exception of one hastily convened 24-hour blitz, the results of which they conveniently substituted in lieu of keeping a promise.
See: UN survey participants: one-day 10,000 trumps two-year 8 million plus
Yes, the NYT has reported that Trump was persuaded by Ivanka and Jared to exclude any mention of the treaty. This may – or, considering the ever-increasing unreliability of the NYT, may not – be the case.
But, even if true we should not lose sight of the fact that silence – which, in fact, is all we’re seeing at this point – does not equal acquiescence.
If POTUS were to ask my opinion, I would say … Look, your ambitious legislative plate is quite full and the increasingly desperate Democrats will do their best to construct a path that will be far from smooth.
So we need to stick to priorities. This particular UN agreement has absolutely no teeth, notwithstanding its customary self-aggrandizing “historic” nature. Let’s deal with stuff that Americans have told us are important priorities, then we can fight with the blighted, but self-important, lesser lights and their magnificent obsession with CO2 emissions.
Unlike Canada, which has apparently chosen not to, we may need to examine more closely the experiences of Australia, the UK and other EU countries with this purported panacea.
In short, for all we know, something along these lines may well have been the actual advice – if any – proffered by Ivanka and/or Jared. No doubt, time will tell … although, considering its performances of late, I have my doubts regarding the “telling” from the NYT and its MSM allies;-)
P.S. On the UN’s “recycle the scares and absorb the lingo via bureaucratic fog of jargon” front, some readers might be interested in the latest and greatest from the IPCC’s younger sibling, the IPBES (Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services). An excerpt:
Source: http://enb.iisd.org/vol31/enb3131e.html
“If POTUS were to ask my opinion, I would say … Look, your ambitious legislative plate is quite full and the increasingly desperate Democrats will do their best to construct a path that will be far from smooth.
So we need to stick to priorities. This particular UN agreement has absolutely no teeth, notwithstanding its customary self-aggrandizing “historic” nature. Let’s deal with stuff that Americans have told us are important priorities, then we can fight with the blighted, but self-important, lesser lights and their magnificent obsession with CO2 emissions.”
I think that is some good advice.
Considering the amount of insanity the Left is currently demonstrating about Trump, if might not hurt to put off formally killing the climate change agenda. Not that I am recommending that but it is something to think about.
Another school of thought would be let’s blow it up now because the insanity of the Left and the MSM can’t get any worse, and will be drowned out in the noise.
Steve Bannon supposedly has every one of Trump’s campaign promises written on his office wall at the White House and he marks them off as Trump accomplishes them. Steve Bannon wants to kill the Paris Agreement and says that is one of Trump’s campaign promises.
On the other side, we have a few MSM reporters throwing doubt on this scenario.
What appears to be the more likely course?
Hilary Ostrov:
That is my reading also (see here), although I cannot claim ristvan’s legal background or expertise.
This US is “Invited” to submit its Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDC), which was done just under two years ago. The only other thing we agreed to was item 20:
I browsed through a couple of the submitted INDCs on file, and they appear to me to be masterpieces of noble-sounding non-commitment. The US submission was admirably brief by comparison, and stated:
As I noted in the earlier comment, this is merely a statement of intention. What I did not take the time to determine is whether the intended reduction is absolute, or per unit of GDP (as China’s appears to be).
To summarize, the US has already completed the one concrete thing we were “invited” to do and the only thing left is the “facilitative dialog”. Oh good, the earth is saved. New slogan for the environmental movement: “Think globally; have facilitative dialogs in glamorous locations with luxury hotels”.
Not surprisingly, Alan, I do not disagree with your assessment. Perhaps our resident typo-plagued and link-aversive legal-beagle could take the time to step down from his high-horse and peruse the work of another lawyer, the UK’s Robin Guenier.
A few years ago, Guenier quite elegantly (9-page pdf) put the UK/UN/EU’s favoured advocate of the day, Phillipe Sands, in his place.
Who knows …Perhaps the relevant members of Team-Trump might have familiarized themselves with Guenier’s opinion and are choosing to set their priorities and act accordingly.
“Déjà vu all over again”
August 25th, 2009 at 4:39 pm
http://www.impactlab.net/2009/08/25/head-of-greenpeace-admits-climate-change-exaggeration/
Treaty speaty. Trump can and should give notice that we are withdrawing from Paris and all of the UN climate gobbledygook. Not surprised to hear that beloved Poppy Bush made a bad deal getting us into all this. He made several bad deals one of which probably cost him re-election. The Clintons are also part of his legacy.
Reagan handed Bush a winning hand. Bush a terrible instincts. He just wanted to be everyone’s Poppy. That isn’t leadership George.
Independent candidate Ross Perot cost Poppy Bush the election.
Concur.
Not off topic, if you get my Griff t.
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/445522/russian-election-hacking-fbi-not-investigating-trump-campaign
It is a mark of the current Alice-In-Wonderland world of climatism that we need to to withdraw from a non-treaty. Does withdrawing from a non-treaty elevate it to treaty status? No. It sends a message though.
“”Trump Should Keep Promise, Withdraw U.S. from Paris Climate Treaty”
Trump can do what he likes.
He is a politician and saying politicians should keep promises displays great naivety.
Instead of telling people what they should do, which makes them do the complete opposite in many occasions it would be better to say nothing ar ask politely if and when.
Even if he takes no action as long as he does not actually support the UN with money the effect will be the same even if the intent seems neglected.All he has to do is copy India and China.
No flak, and no money.
Sorry all.. Ivanka- Jarrett (the analogue of Nancy Reagan) just won’t let Daddy Donald pull the plug on Paris… what would the rest of the Beautiful People say?
After seeing how many hands were in the Obamacare till I’m afraid our politicians are not going to like getting rid of these cash cows.
And there’s no need at all for Trump to ‘proof’ Obama administration did attack his election efforts. When almost everyone in the electronic world can trap every other then –
sure some people of Obama administration read Trump’s phone and made their wanted ‘news’ of it.
German Chancellor Merkels phone was hacked ‘among friends’. That’s the job of secret services – they are paid for.
And that’s the job of hackers, search the Internet for security gaps and buy the how ever expensive needed tools.
The comments here are remarkably like the arguments Britain is having/has had over Brexit.
They can be summarised as follows.
(a) we are (still) part of the EU, and therefore the exit process is totally dominated by what the EU legally allows us to do. And it legally can charge us what it likes for the privilege of existing.
(b) We never were part of the EU because in fact the treaties signed to take us in were ultra vires of the UK constitution and if we wanted to we could simply repeal the various Acts that took us in and by British law we would no longer be in.
In other words, its a catch 22 situation, a glorious muddle of legal issues reminiscent of the nest philosophical paradoxes.
If we are in, we dont have the legal power to leave because we are no longer a separate entity.
OTOH if we have the power and always had the power, we were never a member in the first place.
Leo Smith:
Your attempt to ‘muddy the waters’ could not be more wrong.
Brexit has no relevance to the subject of this thread, and everybody agrees the UK can leave EU and intends to leave the EU by invoking Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty.
The only complexity was that the PM attempted to act without authority of Parliament (which was contrary to our constitution and would have created a dangerous precedent) but that attempt is no longer a problem because it was foiled by the Supreme Court.
Richard
I just checked “The American Constitution, Its Origins and Development”, by Alfred H. Kelly & Winfred A. Harbison, copyright 1970, a text that was used in Wayne State’s Law School.
In Chapter 30, “The Constitution and World War II”, the executive agreement stems from the President’s authority granted by the Constitution. In “The Declaration of Panama”, establishing a neutrality zone around the western hemisphere, President FDR had the authority as commander in chief of the armed forces to order the “neutrality patrols”. The “Atlantic Charter”, agreed on by President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill, was basically a propaganda document requiring no legislation.
The authors argue that President Roosevelt overstepped his authority on the “Destroyer Base Deal”, where FDR transferred “50 overage destroyers” for a 99 year lease on 7 British naval bases, which went against a June 1940 statute authorized by congress which allowed the President to dispose of naval materials only when the chief of
naval operations “shall first certify that such material is not essential to the defense of the United States”.
So executive agreements are enforceable, but are based on the powers inherent in the Presidency, which could be used with or without congressional approval.
Does the President have the authority to regulate the amount of CO2 emissions in the U.S. without the approval of congress? Obviously not.
As a non-US citizen I would suggest that if Trump unilaterally decided not to comply with a treaty for technical reasons. that would affect future negotiations on subsequent treaties. Acting in such a way may promote a reputation of being a government that could not be trusted to carry out treaty obligations and one that would weasel out of them as soon as it suited it’s own political agenda.
In reality, I would imagine that Trump has some pretty good constitutional lawyers at his disposal, and that if the treaty was not valid he would have acted before now.
You’re probably right. We should care that that some folks out there wouldn’t trust us to keep bad deals questionably entered into for transient political reasons. Then again being an optimist maybe others will see this assign of good leadership.
Before we get all tangled up about upsetting certain people we might ask if we care. Sometimes (like here) upsetting the right people is a sign that you are doing the right thing.
Trump (nor any president) has the luxury of deciding what treaties to honor and which ones not to. However, the laws of the country are very specific in what IS a treaty. And it is not some secret that is known only to Americans. Anyone relying on a “pen and a phone” as a treaty deserves whatever they get for being the fools they are and not doing their homework.
Yes, and this Paris Agreement has NO support in Congress or with the people of the U.S., and the opposition to it has been very public over all this time so noone should be surprised that the U.S. is not going to adhere to the agreement after Trump was elected.
I would love to see all future US treaty talks on “Glow BULL Mann-made Catastrophic Climate Change” met with a large degree of skepticism.
We (the US) should get out of all future international talks on said subject. ‘Nuff said.
The Un should be advised in writing that Obama did not have the legal authority to
ratify the Paris Agreement or its commitments . He purposely bi-passed elected members of Congress knowing full well it had no chance of being approved .The USA should instruct the UN that they will receive NO funding of any kind or for any purpose until the UN returns the $ Billion plus dollars Obama authorized .
Then put the Paris Agreement to a vote which will not pass and the matter is closed . Leaving it open or pretending it has gone into hibernation is naïve and short sighted . Many countries will be relieved and pleased the scam is over. Scary global warming will be gone as soon as the money tap gets shut off .
This will be the easiest $Trillion dollars President Trump will ever save the USA .
+ Many.
I like your idea, another way the US could recoup their $ is to deduct UN annual dues from monies owed, US may not have to pay UN annual dues for decades.
+100
Oh shucks just tell them to stick it where the sun don’t shine, bring back sanity. Hope you are reading this Sir, Mr President.
I do hope this does not end up as a bargaining chip during negotiations on tax cuts, ACA changes, and infrastructure. This is too important to be left sitting around and possibly revived some day when there is even less evidence of global warming, like when it’s away from any large El Nino years or other short term excuses of the Griff genre.
“ binding under international law.”
This reminds me of the taunt, “you and whose army”.
If you are not willing to spill blood, it does not matter.
It does not matter.
When our founding fathers required treaty ratification it was in the context of marching armies spilling a lot of blood. WWII started long before the United States officially started shedding blood. FDR was constrained by a powerful isolationist beliefs.
After Americans shed blood at Pearl Harbor, isolationism went out the window. The world also learned on 9/11 that we can not be protected from terrorists based isolationist policies.
I understand old school street fighting and engineering which is a lot more useful than a Harvard law degree. For street fighting, two important principles. The Greeks understood, divide and conquer. Second, the bigger they are the harder they fall.
For an over the top example, the football team is terrorizing the smallest kid school. The little kid first gets in a position so only one much bigger jock can attack at a time. You do not have to be very big to break a nose or a knee cap. That is self defense. Then the little kid points to the idiot on the ground, stating ‘he will never play football again’. Pointing to the next biggest, the little kids says ‘you will be eating from a straw and your momma will be changing your diapers for the rest of your life’.
From my perspective, engineering is about meeting society’s needs without violence. Nuclear power is a proven example of meeting energy needs.
However, from what I observe, world leaders have no interest reducing ghg. Just the appearance of doing so.
CAGW is the perfect political problem. No one bleeds. A legacy can be claimed for complete failure.
It is just an opinion, Trump is in a win-win-win. First, he can do nothing because it does not matter. Second he can gut CAGW because he is already hated by that crowd. Third he can change mind on CAGW. We will still love him because it does not matter.
Deposit this piece of rubbish where it belongs, in the recycling bin. Just another Soros backed attempt at wealth distribution. Can we move on from this leftie kerfluffle now?
When is Earth Day again?