Trump 'poised to quit Paris climate deal' | Hacker News Reader

Trump 'poised to quit Paris climate deal'

bbc.co.uk

130 points0xbadf00d150 comments

> The decision will put the United States in league with Syria and Nicaragua as the world’s only non-participants in the Paris Climate Agreement.

So I guess its up to private industry in the US to tackle climate change.

And just before people start complaining about Trump..

> A letter from 22 Republican senators urging Mr Trump to withdraw played a major role in the decision, Axios said.

This is an American political issue not a Trump issue.....

> Canada, the European Union, and China have said they will honor their commitments to the pact even if the United States withdraws. A source told Reuters that India had also indicated it would stick by the deal.

This is much happier news

So not even half of the Republican Senators, let alone all the Democratic ones? Hardly an 'American' issue.

34 Senators would be required to block ratification.

I wonder how that vote would turn out if Trump submitted the treaty to the Senate (as Obama should have).

40. You need 66 to ratify a treaty, but you can also pass a 'treaty implementation bill' which is basically normal legislation mirroring the language of the treaty, and you only need a majority in the house, and either a majority or a filibuster-proof majority in the senate. That's how NAFTA was passed.

Obama could have tried that with the Paris climate deal, but now it would require Trump's signature, or enough votes to override a veto (again including 67 Senators).

But both sides seem to be playing by a new rulebook here, in which the President makes international agreements without consulting Congress.

More specifically, the issue is with Republican legislators listening to fossil fuel interests and wealthy donors over public opinion.

A majority of people in the United States support climate action. Even a majority of self-identified Republicans.

How is it that the secretary of state who was a fossil fuel CEO is against quitting?

Many of the same researchers that developed the techniques that Exxon relies on to find oil also developed the arguments about anthropogenic climate change. There are certainly individuals within Exxon who acknowledge climate change. I do not envy their cognitive dissonance.

Update: Exxon stockolders too!

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-exxonmobil-climate-idUSKB...

I don't follow US politics very closely, so I don't know whom you are referring to; but if they were a fossil fuel CEO, they may no longer have a financial interest in quitting.

This particular example may not demonstrate it, but it absolutely is an American issue, not a Trump issue. Denial of climate change, its negative consequences, and the merits of fighting it have been a standard part of the Republican platform for a long time.

> So I guess its up to private industry in the US to tackle climate change.

While I'm guessing you're referring to those like the solar industry, it doesn't matter if the rest of the manufacturers don't follow along. Fat chance that under capitalism all these industries will say "maybe we should curtail our production rate and consumption of resources for the sake of the environment, even if we make less profit and aren't compelled to by the law". [0] The free market demands that Moloch must continue being fed.

[0]: http://i.imgur.com/80Az8Xx.jpg

> Canada, the European Union, and China have said they will honor their commitments to the pact even if the United States withdraws.

I'm not sure about other countries, but my understanding is that Canada is "honoring our commitments" to the Paris Climate Agreement in a way similar to how NATO members are honoring (or not, as the case may be) their financial commitments to NATO.

https://insideclimatenews.org/news/28032017/justin-trudeau-c...

But I suppose "that's different", right?

If the motivating factor behind stopping climate change is saving lives, how come no one ever gets morally outraged at non-American countries not keeping their word when it comes to military funding, which I think could be argued saves lives as well? (Although to be fair, the net number of lives saved by military funding is debatable.)

Because other people know that the mutually agreed deadline for the 2% spending target is 2024. Now is 2017.

>Although to be fair, the net number of lives saved by military funding is debatable.)

That is the 2nd, and maybe more important reason.

As others have pointed out in this thread, the 2% is merely a target and should therefore be disregarded.

Enjoy the fruits of your demeanour.

The NATO agreement reached in 2014 was:

>aim to move towards the 2% guideline within a decade with a view to meeting their NATO Capability Targets and filling NATO's capability shortfalls.

It's not 2024 yet, and note that the agreement is to 'aim' - not exactly binding.

As for the article you yourself linked to:

>The report only models policies in place up to last Nov. 1. Since then, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's administration has made a number of significant climate policy changes through the Pan-Canadian Framework on Clean Growth and Climate Change, an agreement between federal, provincial, and territorial governments to reduce emissions published on December 9.

>"I think there are a lot of reasons to believe we are actually better off than the report suggests," Flanagan said.

>More will be need to be done, however, to meet their targets, said Jake Schmidt, international program director at Natural Resources Defense Council.

http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/official_texts_112964.htm

This is an entirely separate issue. Also I don't think that military funding is an efficient way to save lives

It certainly is a separate issue, but it has many similarities such as shared responsibility, and I get the sense that a portion of the moral outrage is based on a matter of principle.

I just find the nature of some of these discussions to be a little bit dishonest/disingenuous, everyone is always eager to get mad at the US, if you ask them to look in the mirror (whether the subject is directly comparable or not), everyone isn't so eager any more. Nothing to be terribly ashamed about as it's pretty common human behavior, I'm just pointing it out in a Devil's Advocate sort of way, but on a serious note, as a voter this behavior this type of behavior certainly influences the way I vote.

I'm from Nicaragua and this is new to me. But it does not surprise me. The ruling party have made billions from Venezuelan oil. They control the import, distribution and final sale of gas to customers. It's not in their interest to change the energy sources.

Internally there's have been development in renewal energy, but these have been done by investors close to the Government and they mostly sale each watt as it was produced from bunker. This is possible because they own all the energy business in the country.

It seems Nicaragua rejected the Paris agreement as it didn't go far enough [1]:

> As world leaders gathered in the French capital in November 2015 to reach an agreement on fighting climate change, Nicaragua's lead envoy explained to reporters that the country would not support the agreed-upon plan as it hinged on voluntary pledges and would not punish those who failed to meet them. That was simply not enough, Paul Oquist argued.

That leaves Syria, which may actually have other problems these days. The US seems to be pretty much alone in this.

[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2017/05/31...

Signatories of the letter are here: https://www.yahoo.com/news/gop-senators-urge-trump-make-clea...

Wonder if any country would take a stand and sanction the USA for "not doing their fair share to save the world". Like imposing a climate tax on US imports.. That'd be interesting.

Thats what I would like to see done and seems like the most appropriate way to deal with it.

Yeah. They could say that this is to counter the price advantage that the US exports get by pulling out of environmental obligations. Not sure how this would play with the WTO. Plus it probably won't happen anyways.

It won't happen. The diplomatic way is to not escalate things and just ignore the elephant in the room until it disappears. 3,5 years is not that long.

What authority would tax the US? And why would the US even care about complying to it?

The authority in charge of imports in any given country?

Country, or trading bloc such as the EU. The US can't negotiate directly with EU member states, as Trump discovered repeatedly in a meeting with Merkel.

OP's language wasn't clear but I expect they mean additional tariffs on US goods.

And what would a "stand" look like, exactly? A "climate tariff" kind of made me laugh, as the repercussions of doing that would not be pretty.

Less pretty than the consequences of climate change?

Trump tells NATO members to pay "fair share"...

A proper "stand" could look like a BIG NO to an increase in NATO spending. Investing in a European military alliance is sufficient for the matters we are facing.

> The US is no longer a reliable ally and Europe's destiny is 'in our own hands'.

I don't hope so. It would give Trump ammunition for his next campaign. "The rest of the world is treating us very unfairly".

Also, how will the rest of the world know if the US is doing their fair share if the US stops sharing data?

Ammunition of the sort you're talking about doesn't really matter when they're willing to just lie.

If you have seen how they push lies, you should see how they push narratives that are half true.

Gee, I remember the last time a country thought it was being treated unfairly. That ended well.

Another avenue would be emissions / environmental impact limits on various categories of goods. This would incentivize US business to go around the Trump administration's back and do the right thing anyways, just so they can continue to have access to these markets.

In any event, any effective global approach to these issues will need to have some legal and/or economic force, so the US is really just shooting itself in the foot by bucking the trend. Maybe we'll have a couple hundred more coal jobs nationwide to show for it, though :s

Don't we, USA, already have some of the toughest climate laws in the world?

There isn't any legally binding cap on on climate emissions in the U.S.

There are some energy efficiency laws, but aside from that we don't really have any climate laws at all.

In the land of the blind...

you refer to for instance those US Postal service LLV's that do 10 miles to the gallon (converts to 4.3 km per liter)?

https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/3xqc4m/til_t...

Interesting (and perhaps emotionally satisfying), yes. Productive, no. Imposing tariffs is akin to shooting yourself in the foot if what you really want is innovation in clean energy.

I hope people just stop buying american products instead. That will have greater effect, both economically and politically.

Well, the first step would be to boycott this forum which is hosted in the US.

You first?

That probably wouldn't result in any noticeable damage at all. Boycotting goods and paid services has a larger direct impact and I'm all for it.

So where do you propose to start? Who's going to step up to the plate and do it?

Honestly I wouldn't know. How do movements like this get started?

I wonder how the energy usage spreads. Routers, Cloudflare caches, broadband providers, wifi modem, laptop, browser.

Perhaps we should be taking a stand and boycotting goods from China?

According to this source, China has double the emissions of USA:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_di...

If looked at on a per capita basis, Australia and quite a few other countries are worse than USA.

That would be interesting indeed. Isn't a large part of the emissions generated by China the result of producing stuff ordered/purchased by the USA?

China is cutting out coal even turning back ships from North Korea mid shipment.

And China is said to be spending $360 billion over the next three years implementing more green power sources. But has already installed a lot of solar and wind. In fact "one new wind turbine per hour in 2015" according to Greenpeace.

> China has double the emissions of USA:

No idea why my sibling commenter deanCommie was killed, but his point seems good to me: according to your own source USA's per capita emissions are more than twice as high as China's.

This is insane. That being said, we have options. Please call your representatives, please donate to environmental groups. These actions won't directly force Trump to change his mind but we need to show the government that climate change is important to us

Find your reps: https://tryvoices.com/

Citizens Climate Lobby: https://citizensclimatelobby.org/donate/

350.org: https://act.350.org/donate/build/

"A letter from 22 Republican senators urging Mr Trump to withdraw played a major role in the decision, Axios said."

This is not just Trump.

The buck stops with a letter from 22 Republican senators?

At the risk of sounding nutty... I'll say it anyway.

The Paris climate deal is a cabal for Goldman-Sachs to draw money from governments via the taxes levied for participating countries. If you read the deal itself, the language doesn't have any metrics for success... it's goals and methodologies for combatting climate change is really hoaky.

Can you elaborate? Do you mean taxes voluntarily raised by the countries to meet their goals? Why would Goldman-Sachs make money from those taxes? Or do you mean more like fines for not meeting the goals - but that doesn't make sense because you said there's no metrics for success so how do you fine someone for falling short?

It's the new Federal Reserve

Run that by us again, please. Participating countries pay taxes... to Goldman-Sachs? That is written in "the deal itself"?

> the language doesn't have any metrics for success...

That would only be useful if the deal imposed sanctions in case of missed objectives. And that was a big no-no because that would never have been ratified by the republican american congress. The deal had no teeth to begin with because of the USA (and in particular the republican party) and now they appear to be pulling out altogether.

The USA is such a weird place as seen from abroad. Ahead in so many areas and yet completely backwards in others. It's frustrating really.

You'd sound less nutty if you cited actual words from the deal to backup your claims.

> the language doesn't have any metrics for success

That's because there isn't an exact metric. If we all do our part then we should see climate change slow down and even hopefully reverse. But I expect the Trump admin had problems with the financing part of the deal [1], such as:

"Developed country Parties shall provide financial resources to assist developing country Parties with respect to both mitigation and adaptation in continuation of their existing obligations under the Convention."

As well having to spend more money:

"As part of a global effort, developed country Parties should continue to take the lead in mobilizing climate finance from a wide variety of sources"

Whereas oil companies provide a cheaper option. It doesn't help that Trump thinks climate change is a hoax too.

[1] https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/frameworks/parisagreem...

I don't see specific mention made of GS in the text of the agreement itself [1]. However, the actual agreement is vague on implementation nuts and bolts, and there are lots of references to financing and financial transfers, with no hard boundaries on what is sourced from private markets and what is sourced from taxpayers. The banking industry openly talks about its central involvement in the agreement's execution if it passes [2]. There might be concern over financialization of the carbon markets the Paris agreement encourages the development of, because that might lead to a Potemkin climate agreement; we might have all the style with frenetic trading of carbon credits and derivatives of those credits, but no actual substance and no real world reduced carbon footprints in a timeframe that avoids climate change.

These are legitimate questions and concerns, and in an open civilization are ones that are transparently addressed and disseminated. Voltaire didn't say it even though many think he did [3], but we should apply the aphorism "To learn who rules over you, simply find out who you are not allowed to criticise". Regardless of the source of the aphorism or criticism, if the content standing on its own is true, then we address it if it hasn't been addressed before. So far, I see a lot of "why are you even questioning climate change" responses to questions about the agreement, instead of pointing to resources that address the questions about the agreement.

I've tried to look into the financial industry's involvement with the agreement and its implementation based upon the GP's comment about GS, and couldn't track down the source of his claim. But I've seen enough financial interfaces described by the agreement with poorly-specified sources and sinks of funding, risk management, and quality control that it gives me pause, without finding (or being referenced) more data.

That there are no quantitative standards for accounting for carbon footprints, nor Glass-Steagall-like regulatory controls on risk management for trading carbon credits, etc., makes me wonder if I'm not missing data to properly evaluate the agreement. If you believe that climate change is an Extinction Event [4], then that is hard to reconcile with placing the global financial industry in charge of or heavily influencing measuring, monitoring, valuing, and balancing global carbon footprints via its deep involvement via the agreement, when the same industry has demonstrated its structurally-built-in penchant for taking on outsized risks unless reined in by force (whether through personal risk or other means of force, and sometimes even force is not sufficient to override emotional trading).

Climate change discussion on whether or not it exists can be entirely separate from discussion over issues with the agreement. One can believe in climate change, and legitimately not support the agreement for problems they have with the agreement. One can not believe in climate change, and legitimately support the agreement for their own self-interest; a carbon credit trader, for example.

[1] http://unfccc.int/resource/docs/2015/cop21/eng/l09r01.pdf

[2] https://www.americanbanker.com/opinion/banks-key-to-determin...

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kevin_Alfred_Strom#Misattribut...

[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extinction_event

For anyone that has 5 minutes, this BBC article is chilling...

http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20170418-how-western-civilis...

The salient point being..

'Western civilisation is not a lost cause, however. Using reason and science to guide decisions, paired with extraordinary leadership and exceptional goodwill, human society can progress to higher and higher levels of well-being and development'

We seem to be at a point in time where all of those points are lacking in US policy & leadership.

If there's one thing the last year has shown us it's how irrational we are. Perhaps it's time to let HAL do what's best for us from now on...

Getting humans to hand over the reigns and think it was their idea was HAL's plan all along.

The distressing thing about this goes way beyond whether or not climate change is human caused, or a natural cycle of the earth. I'm distressed that we would leave an agreement that would bring prosperity to future generations. Like it or not, we have to all still live here and keep this planet alive. How the hell did science ever become a political issue?

Trump thinks of the future as next week or next month, he doesnt think on a timeline longer than his own (or even that of his children).

Science has always been a political issue. Generally at odds with religion, which is also a political issue.

Both get used for political ends but I don't think either is inherently political. People enjoy using science and religion as a sort of "Open Sesame" to get political ends. I think it does neither any good.

> How the hell did science ever become a political issue?

When it interfered with corporate profits. It's beneficial in the short term for American corporations to pretend climate change doesn't exist, so they do. The Republican party represents big corporate interests, so the Republican party follows suit in pretending it isn't real.

It's not the science that's politicized. It's the response to the science. Politics is, in my opinion, all about helping your friends and hurting your enemies. If the response is one that will do the opposite then your oppose it. It might happen that the best opposition is to deny the science but that's a consequence not a cause.

"an agreement that would bring prosperity to future generations"

That seems a very optimistic interpretation.

Science is often far more equivocal than people believe. People on all sides of the spectrum want to use scientific results to bolster their case, and ignore the equivocations and stretch the evidence. There is also the tendency to cherry-pick the evidence that supports your views, and respond to countervailing studies with accusations of malfeasance.

You wrote: "Science is often far more equivocal than people believe." In the context of the very real climate disruption now ongoing, I call bullshit. Can you show us your hand?

Which makes it all the more telling that the denier side cites essentially no scientific results.

And even if you say, purely for the sake of argument, that climate change not only isn't human-caused but doesn't exist: there's still the matter of insane levels of pollution.

Dead plants and animals, destroyed ecosystems, toxic and carcinogenic particulates circulating through people's lungs every day... These are visible problems that affect many areas of the world today and will reduce the lifespans of our children and grandchildren. Why wouldn't people want to mitigate this?

While this is a setback I'm curious what real impact this will have?

The markets seem to be driving towards clean energy regardless. Coal is not competitive against Natural gas (and I appreciate gas isn't ideal). And, hopefully the US will regain it's senses in 2018 & 2020 elections.

I would like to see a tariff applied to US goods produced in the US and exported to the rest of the world as means of charging the US for not abiding by the agreement.

This is an emerging talking point, but tariffs are a shoot-yourself-in-the-foot maneuver; restricting free trade increases the barriers to innovation, and innovation is precisely what renewable energy sources need to become cost effective.

We aren't talking about a tariff on renewable energy production though are we. A Tariff on goods produced by companies/factories that are powered by coal or natural gas due for export to the rest of the world. Prove you use renewable energy and you dont pay the tariff, this would motivate companies who export to adopt greener energy. It would also make trade freer for companies who do this and more difficult for those who do not, therefore there is incentive to innovate to use renewable energy.

Doesn't matter - tariffs decrease purchasing power (these things have a tendency to affect unrelated markets because of the economy's interconnectedness), and lower purchasing power means slower economic activity, which includes investment in things like research.

Slower economic activity might not be a bad thing. Global CO2 output was definitely positively affected by the financial crisis.

This also broke the EUs climate quota system, but that's a separate discussion.

It may be fine for self-absorbed silicon valley types with plenty to eat but that sentiment condemns people on the lower rungs of the economic ladder to financial ruin and death.

I know it's unpopular in the US but higher taxes on rich people/companies and higher well fare benefits might also be a way to help people on the lower rungs of the economic ladder.

The idea of such a tariff, imposed by countries other than the US, would not be either preserving US "economic activity", nor to foster "investment in things like research" in the US.

Simplest answer: a tariff on cars and trucks. Hurt Trump's supporters directly.

What an unnecessarily cruel thing to desire

I'll support this if the US applies tariffs to European countries who don't honor their NATO spending agreements.

I don't think the two deserve comparison. One is about protecting the planet for future generations. The other is about going into countries to blow people up, for the most part, unnecessarily.

So we should disband NATO entirely and Europe can fend for itself? I could get behind that as well, it would save the US a lot of money.

Downvotes.....shall I interpret this to mean that saving lives is not a byproduct of NATO? If that's the case, what's the point of it?

To be honest the EU as an organisation has probably saved as many (if not more) lives than NATO has if we are saying that preventing wars is saving lives. I have nothing against NATO but it does seem like you don't understand the system and are taking your president at his (notoriously unreliable) word.

The two are not mutually exclusive.

It would not save the US a lot of money at all.

http://money.cnn.com/2017/03/20/news/nato-funding-explained/

>The North Atlantic alliance has its own military budget worth €1.29 billion ($1.4 billion), which is used to fund some operations and the NATO strategic command center, as well as training and research. But it is miniscule compared to overall spending on defense by NATO countries, which NATO estimates will total more than $921 billion in 2017.

To be clear the vast amount of money spent by the US on defence (or offence) is not directly spent on NATO. There is a NATO operating budget that is approx 0.33% of the US annual spending on military. So if the US withdrew from NATO they would not stop spending all that money on defence, sure they may close some bases in Europe and around the world but all that will do is further weaken their sphere of influence. And if there was a Russian or Chinese invasion of Europe then it would be in the US's interests to assist in any fight because if Russia or China managed to takeover mainland Europe that would be it for the USA in terms of any sort of world leader status/influence which is pretty much accepted because of the support of its NATO allies as it currently stands.

What you've said is largely true, but asserting that the US military presence in Europe costs literally nothing seems unlikely.

EDIT: I obviously misspoke using literally nothing, please replace with not a lot of money at all. The point that matters is: is it a non-trivial amount of money or not, and has it plausibly benefited Europe by decreasing the number of wars? The region does have a history of it after all.

This apparent sentiment that my line of thinking is 100% wrong feels a bit offensive to me, if anyone cares about such things, and believes that perhaps feelings affect real world behavior.

The placing of US military bases in Europe has not reduced the number of wars in Europe. That is directly related to the creation of the EU which was essentially set up for that specific purpose.

I'm not saying that there is no cost to US bases in Europe. They are probably expensive to maintain, but in general they are there because the US wants them there and they benefit the US more than the host nation. Same goes all over the world, Japan, the Middle East, Korea. The bases are there to give the US some influence and clout, it is force projection.

I would repeat for clarity that US bases in Europe have done nothing to prevent wars between EU nations, the credit for that goes to the EU.

> The placing of US military bases in Europe has not reduced the number of wars in Europe.

This is speculation.

> They are probably expensive to maintain, but in general they are there because the US wants them there and they benefit the US more than the host nation.

I agree the US wants them there, but who benefits more is far from clear.

> I would repeat for clarity that US bases in Europe have done nothing to prevent wars between EU nations, the credit for that goes to the EU.

Since you've stated this twice I'm going to have to ask for some evidence. Of course there's none as it would require running alternate threads of reality.

Very different situation.

Here's the full text of the Paris Agreement[0] and here[1] is Secretary of State John Kerry signing said agreement on behalf of the United States in New York on 2016-04-22.

Show me a text of this "NATO spending agreement", when and where it was signed by a Representative of the United States, and then we'll talk.

Hint: you can't, because no such treaty exists.

[0] http://unfccc.int/resource/docs/2015/cop21/eng/l09r01.pdf

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Secretary_Kerry_Holds_Gra...

Interesting. I'd think NATO would involve some sort of negotiated terms, it's hard to believe that funding would be excluded from that, but who knows. I'm no expert on it, but it seems quite odd that this point of contention is a complete figment of the imagination of American politicians for several decades and European politicians never point out that it's completely made up.

I now wonder if my perception of the military blanket of protection the US provides to Europe also a figment of people's imagination. Do they have military bases and personnel in the region, or am I imagining that also?

Please see here:

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/26/world/europe/nato-trump-s...

The gist of it is that no NATO members are in arrears for the contributions that are required to NATO. There is a NATO goal that member states should spend 2% of their GDP on their own defence each year. This is where some countries are not meeting that goal but the money certainly is not owed to the United States. Further it could be said that given that the US is home to many companies that make weapons this is a way for the US to get NATO members to spend money on US goods. (NATO members are unlikely to buy weapons systems from Russia or China).

So as I said there is a very real difference between the 2 systems and it is unfair to use them in conjunction with one another because the NATO one is a goal, a 'nice to have' if you will.

Here is the important part from your article:

>Are NATO nations violating a rule?

>No. The 2 percent standard is just a guideline, not a legally binding requirement. In 2006, even as the United States was increasing military spending because of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, European allies were shrinking their military spending. NATO defense ministers that year adopted a guideline suggesting that each spend the equivalent of 2 percent of its annual economic output on its military — but it was a target, not a rule, and not endorsed by heads of state.

So the NATO 2% spending thing is: "just a guideline", "not a legally binding requirement", "a target, not a rule, and not endorsed by heads of state".

While the Paris Agreement is a formal treaty, signed in New York by a Representative of the United States, and then ratified by the US afterwards.

I don't see how you can compare the two side-by-side in any serious discussion.

I don't think mistermann was after a serious discussion, he seems to have very little idea about NATO and just parrots Trumps (inaccurate talking points). I may be wrong and perhaps he is off reading all the linked articles but I don't hold out much hope of that.

Is it possible to disagree in principle without parroting Trump's talking points?

I wonder if know it all's on the left will ever clue in that international relations are extremely nuanced rather than a hard science. Perhaps some people's relative willingness to cooperate is influenced by the level of respect and willingness to understand differing points of view.

I would argue this is a very important aspect of human relations and negotiations, and real world events I think support this theory quite well.

This is not a left or right issue. You said that in return for a climate change tariff on US goods you wanted EU nations to meet their spending agreements for NATO. Now multiple sources have been provided to you showing that the EU NATO members are doing great what they agreed to and that claiming that they are not paying their way is inaccurate at best and downright dishonest at worst. You are not responding to those facts and instead have turned it into a left Vs right issue.

Regardless of my political affiliation I am aware that international politics is nuanced, unfortunately your president is just learning that himself. And yes you can disagree in principal but you don't seem to understand the system so it is difficult to accept that you disagree in principal when your sole argument (which has been thoroughly debunked for you) is based on claims made by donald trump. Do you have any other issues with NATO that you disagree with?

You seem to be under the impression that Donald Trump was the first person to raise the issue of Europe pulling its financial weight in NATO, which is not true.

Indeed, there is no hard explicit contract stating a dollar amount that is owed by European governments to the US, there are only "targets". And according to the general sentiment on HN, I've now learned that the word "target" is a code word for literally no compensation, full stop.

There, I can acknowledge objective reality.

In turn I'll ask you this:

Do you think it is plausible that the US military presence in Europe has contributed in a material way to peace in the region? Yes or no?

Do you think the US bears an uncompensated financial burden for this military presence in Europe? Yes or no?

No. Yes, however it is a financial burden they have placed on themselves and they understand the trade off between the cost of the presence and the influence acquired.

Does anyone share my apathy toward politics in general? My logic is that we have no, as in zero, control over the entire apparatus. In a country with two sides, there will be a natural bifurcation that will not allow for constructive... _anything_. Couple that to the beltway insider club AKA lobbying and you have a situation where only those with serious capital have a voice in the capital.

That fact that we elected Trump indicates we have incredible control. What an awful mistake.

The thing is, half or nearly half the country disagrees with you on paper. I bet its not anywhere near that in practice, as in there is a range of political spectrum. If we had more choice we wouldn't have align to the poles of a bipartisan system.

Trump got 46% of the vote. Which is normally rather far from 1/2 in election terms, ~25% of registered voters, and about 19.5% of the total US population. So, yea the guy won, but it's hard to extrapolate that to much popular support.

At best you can say this is based on the electoral collage, but Maine and Nebraska split their delegates by district making it an even odder system than generally talked about.

>but it's hard to extrapolate that to much popular support.

Actually, it's pretty easy, given the ridiculously large sample size.

You're forgetting it was a volunteer sample size, there were active disenfranchisement campaigns, and his opposition garnered millions of more votes.

It's a biased sample, but even then for every 100 people that voted for him 117 voted for someone else.

Most striking the turnout as % of the population was down significantly presumably because many people could not bring themselves to vote for either candidate. http://www.cnn.com/2016/11/11/politics/popular-vote-turnout-... So, he would have gotten crushed by Bush, McCann, or Romney adjusting for population size.

It's not even half. Only ~25% of registered voters, voted for Trump[1].

It's a problem of how to drive turn out and get people to the polls. Trump is the result of apathy toward politics in this country.

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jan/18/american-non...

As a non american I would have agreed if Sanders would have won against Shillary and then Trump.

> My logic is that we have no, as in zero, control over the entire apparatus

Did you vote?

Of course... but I didn't vote for a donkey nor an elephant. 5% or so of us did that. The rest just watch the media that supports their side and votes for the party to which they have declared allegiance. It is an absolutely brilliant system if you are an elite.

I am assuming that your sarcastic reply means you did not vote for Clinton or Trump. So essential you wasted your vote in a winner take all system.

Technically it is not wasted unless that one person's vote would have changed the outcome.

A pattern of people not voting, however, could tip the scales one way or another.

Had I voted, every candidate I would have voted for would have lost.

I do. And a growing number of people are feeling the same way.

Check out neoliberalism. It's a centrist movement, so you get to pull in the good ideas from the Democrats and the Republicans while calling out bad ideas from both. If you're a Dem, it's difficult to do that.

I'll have to check this out as I am neither D nor R; in the past I have registered as both, but they both end up sucking in the end.

It's an old movement and the election of Trump and the rise of the alt-right is a reaction to its failings.

Early roots of neoliberalism were laid in the 1970s, during the Jimmy Carter administration, with deregulation of the trucking, banking, and airline industries.[76][77][78] This trend continued into the 1980s, under the Reagan Administration, which included tax cuts, increased defense spending, financial deregulation and trade deficit expansion.[79] Likewise, concepts of supply-side economics, discussed by the Democrats in the 1970s, culminated in the 1980 Joint Economic Committee report, "Plugging in the Supply Side." This was picked up and advanced by the Reagan administration, with Congress following Reagan's basic proposal and cutting federal income taxes across the board by 25% in 1981.[80]

During the 1990s, the Clinton Administration also embraced neoliberalism[68] by supporting the passage of the North American Free Trade Agreement, continuing the deregulation of the financial sector through passage of the Commodity Futures Modernization Act and the repeal of the Glass–Steagall Act, and implementing cuts to the welfare state through passage of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act.[79][81][82] The neoliberalism of the Clinton Administration differs from that of Reagan, as the Clinton Administration purged neoliberalism of neoconservative positions on militarism, family values, opposition to multiculturalism and neglect of ecological issues.

Is there anything positive, at all, about leaving the Paris climate deal? Or is the president going to do something that helps no one (not even himself), and hurts us all? Who gains from this?

It benefits him because his base is vehemently opposed to it.

reposting from the previously flagged thread:

More details from the NYT, in which it was noted that things are not final, as President Trump is set to meet with Secretary of State Rex Tillerson this afternoon. Tillerson has been advocating on behalf of sticking to the deal: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/31/climate/trump-quits-paris....

> And Mr. Trump has proved himself willing to shift direction up until the moment of a public announcement. He is set to meet Wednesday afternoon with Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, who has advocated that the United States remain a part of the Paris accords and could continue to lobby the president to change his mind.

I'm having an ongoing facebook feud with a die-hard Trump supporter who has been parroting the 'everything with an anonymous source is fake news' line for the last weeks.

I challenged him to argue that it was likely Trump would not pull out of the Paris Accord because of the anonymous sources reporting that he intends to ... He just replied with some fake climate science and 'simple questions' that modern climate science has not answered to his satisfaction ... The blindness is insane -- and the damage really can't be overstated ...

I can't help but wonder if doubling down on fossil fuels today isn't blatantly stupid.

I mean, except for coal (that has some nasty enough local effects for most countries to quit by themselves) fossil fuels are already getting scarce. Production prices are going up and up, with just a few old fields holding them low enough for current prices. Increasing the reliance on them right now... Well, any smart player would be doing the exact opposite of it, wouldn't them?

Why bother quitting the deal? It's not like it has any teeth. Trump is dumber than I thought. He could have his cake and eat it, too.

You're looking at it the wrong way. His cake is playing to his base, while helping his investments. Pulling out of the Paris accord does both. The people who care about the climate are not the ones who voted for him.

I mean, S&P 500 index funds are down about a dollar on this news. I'd bet that any minor gain to his investments was wiped out by whatever general market exposure he has, so overall (probably) not a move for him financially.

>Why bother quitting the deal?

So he can look like he's getting something done. Almost everything Trump campaigned on was a pipe dream or he has managed to quickly derail if it was even remotely possible. So he needs something to parade around in front of his base even if it's entirely symbolic.

For another example, look at the weird attempted rebrand of existing border fencing as "bollard walls" a while back because the border wall he campaigned on is never going to happen.

You're suggesting that having his cake and eating it too should mean [1] remaining unbound by onerous treaties(because the Paris deal is not very binding and [2] winning the favour of other nations in the deal as well as voters at home who support the deal.

But there is a different cake that he likes to have and eat better: [1] remaining unbound by onerous treaties through the act of withdrawing from them altogether [2] appealing to his base at home by refusing to acknowledge GHG emissions as a problem as well as by appearing to stand up for america by declining to engage in any sort of compromise with other nations.

So he won't withdraw because of any teeth that the deal has.

If he withdraws it will be to keep up the appearance of sharing the same values and beliefs as his constituency.

Whether or not that's dumb, I can't really say.

I wonder how many know the details of what the deal actually is.

the amount of ignorance in this action is unbearable.

Im seeing the liberal bubble here.

Here is what trump supporters think(not a trump supporter).

Its only ever been a bankster fraud pushed by goldman sachs

https://quidsapio.wordpress.com/2012/06/06/how-goldman-sachs...

https://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/11/12/goldman-sachs-buy...

https://blogs.wsj.com/environmentalcapital/2008/10/27/street...

http://www.goldmansachs666.com/2009/05/al-gores-carbon-tradi...

These are the core tenents of the Paris Climate Agreement:

(a) Holding the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2 °C above pre-industrial levels and to pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5 °C above pre-industrial levels, recognizing that this would significantly reduce the risks and impacts of climate change;

(b) Increasing the ability to adapt to the adverse impacts of climate change and foster climate resilience and low greenhouse gas emissions development, in a manner that does not threaten food production;

(c) Making finance flows consistent with a pathway towards low greenhouse gas emissions and climate-resilient development.

Translation for the gullible: give us money. for vague stuff. and vague goals. and vague methods that cant accomplish goals because we never want the tax gravy train to end. Nor that even have actual metrics for success so we never have to stop taxing everyone.

plus trust china when they tell you they will also "do stuff" too. even though they lie their ass off about everything

Protip: china pollutes more than DOUBLE the usa. more than usa and europe combined. and while our emissions have declined over the last decade, theirs have exploded

Protip, look at per capita. Or accumulative. How is it fair that u blame others after u done tons of pollution in the past?

Good - renewable energy is becoming more efficient and within our lifetimes will become overtake fossil fuels as the most cost-effective forms of energy. Indeed this will happen faster in the absence of taxes and regulations that slow innovation and do relatively little to combat climate change.

Edit: Use this website to find your representative and urge them to support this decision: https://callyourrep.co/

In the short term companies will use this as a way to continue to pollute because it will be cheaper to pollute than upgrade factories to make them cleaner.

Yes and no. Many companies in industries prone to regulation have accepted that the regular see-saw of political power means that roughly half their time will be spent under more stringent regulations, and so it makes more sense to stick with certain regulations instead of changing processes (which carry their own costs and complexities) every few years to shave a few cents on the dollar.

An example: what if a Republican congress repealed legislation banning leaded gasoline? Would gas companies begin putting lead in gasoline again? Doubtful. Not only would it be a terrible PR move - since everybody accepts that lead is a dangerous neurotoxin - but as soon as government switches hands, the lead ban comes back, and all of that time and money switching to lead will have been an unjustifiable waste.

Maybe not the best example, but you get the idea.

Yes but in this situation we aren't talking about rolling back changes they have made but about not implementing new changes, they are easier to ignore or put off until there is a legal requirement to actually make those changes.

Pvnick your opinion doesn't fall in line with evangelical progressivism, so downvoting rather than engaging you directly is in order. Don't you know that politicians always and everywhere make things better, and that billions of individual actors competing and testing various ideas simultaneously is doomed to fail. Also, make sure to ignore competing voices. Science isn't about skepticism, it's who has more people on their side. To quote Einstein upon finding out that there was a book titled 100 Authors against Einstein "If I were wrong, then one [author] would have been enough!". Clearly he was an idiot. Also, ignore those who disagree with our world view like the ones listed below. They're literally Hitler.

> Tom Woods Interview with Patrick Moore: http://tomwoods.com/ep-559-greenpeace-co-founder-repudiates-...

> The 97% consensus: http://daviddfriedman.blogspot.ca/2014/02/a-climate-falsehoo...

> The Non-Expert Problem and Climate Change Science http://blog.dilbert.com/post/154082416051/the-non-expert-pro...

Hello boona, thanks for the lies in the links you provided, it is always entertaining to read bullshit rethoric. Also the appeal to a strawman like (quote) "evangelical progressivism" is a nice touch.

On a serious note, none of the people behind the links you provide have done any serious research or climate modelling, have they?

So, if you are legitimately deluded and ready to change your mind, then I recommend http://www.realclimate.org

If you are a shill, let me ask you to consider that you may be exposed one day.

I'm totally with you. Dr. Patrick Moore is a quack. I mean ya people will argue that he co-founded Greenpeace, has PhD in Ecology and a B.Sc. Forest Biology, but he believes that changes in solar activity that has a much better correlation than CO2 levels, but the sun is so far away am I right? Here's another interview where he elaborates on his quackery, and a link to a science denial website.

> Steven Crowder Interviews Patrick Moore - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDK1aCqqZkQ

> Climate Skeptic http://www.climate-skeptic.com/

I agree with you, these crazies are legitimately deluded and a bunch of shills for questioning the data and it's conclusions. I mean sure the government has poured money into this industry and demanded a certain result, but government already knows what the right results are, who are they to question them.

You've been using HN primarily for political and ideological battle. That's an abuse of the site, and we ban accounts that do it, so please stop.

It's deeply unfortunate because there is quite a bit politically related content that appears on this site, and it's often links to ideologically driven articles, and people discuss those topics without reprisal.

> "You've been using HN primarily for political and ideological battle."

The issue I take with that statement is that I don't use this site for an ideological battle, I use it as a means to voice my opinions and discuss topics. Where the "battle" comes in, is that my views are at odds with large parts of the community. I don't hate Donald Trump, I'm skeptical of catastrophic anthropomorphic climate change, I'm reluctant to hand over control of the internet to politicians i.e. net neutrality, just to name a few. This puts me at odds with left-wing coastal culture, which this site seems primarily made up of. That means that I will get into debates more than the average person, and I will be down voted because people disagree with me. But what's the point of having a comments section at all if we don't want to be exposed to different ideas? I would think that of all places news.ycombinator would welcome different perspectives and the challenging of ones beliefs.

> That's an abuse of the site, and we ban accounts that do it, so please stop.

I would ask that you stop targeting individual who have a differing opinion from that of your own. If there's any abuse, it's the bullying and intolerance I've been receiving from you, so please stop and allow members to discuss in peace.

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