Bali Talks Held Up As U.S. Blocks Setting Global Warming Targets

Talks at the Bali conference on global warming are coming towards their end, locked in a stalemate between the United States on one side and on the other side, delegations from many developing nations, the EU and UN delegates, who all favor hard targets to reduce greenhouse gases by 2020. The US Administration continues to oppose numerical goals, saying that as long as China and India will not submit to concrete limits, neither will they.

So the global rush to oblivion continues, as the US Administration blocks agreement among industrialized nations to lead the fight against climate change. The New York Times reports that officials from the United Nations have “offered a draft plan for talks over the next two years, including a statement that dangerous warming can be avoided only if industrialized countries cut emissions by 2020 to levels 25 to 40 percent below those of 1990.”

The UN draft plan, supported by the EU and a number of developing nations, responds to scientific evidence that the global warming problem is rapidly growing into an environmental crisis. Delegates supporting the draft argue that agreeing to the need for rapid reductions in emissions would set a worldwide agenda, would allow for continuing talks, and would raise the clmate discussion to a more primary level in world diplomacy.

Meanwhile, the coming US election continues to feature major candidates who aren’t even sure whether climate change is a serious issue. The surging Republican candidate, Mike Huckabee, isn’t sure whether “scientifically,” global warming is “overblown.” Democratic candidates, while viewing the problem as real and imminent, seem averse to making it a centerpiece of their campaigns. US voters don’t appear to put climate issues high on their list of policy priorities in the coming electoral debate.

Meanwhile, as the United States dithers, the largest single block of polar ice, the Ward Hunt Ice Shelf, solid for 3,000 years before beginning to crack in 2000. has split all the way through and is now breaking into pieces. If that isn’t a contemporary warning sign about a warming trend, it’s hard to imagine one that will convince those in denial.

Memeorandum on coverage of similar stories: See Think Progress, Crooks and Liars, Washington Monthly, and Gristmill.