Legion Troll
A fine upstanding poster
A landmark event begins in Paris this weekend: the 21st session of the Conference of the Parties.
COP 21 commences Nov. 30.
By Dec. 11, almost 200 countries attending -- the parties to the Kyoto Protocol, plus the European Union -- will sign on to a plan to limit the increase in global average temperatures to 2 degrees Celsius above their pre-industrial level.
French ambassador Gérard Araud has spent significant time talking to Americans about the catastrophe that unchecked climate change could wreak. What has he learned?
Most were ready to deal with the problem -- except Congress.
"When you see climate deniers, to be frank and with all due respect, it's a phenomenon which is limited in a sense to the U.S. and in a sense to the U.S. Congress. I should say, even though it's not very diplomatic, it's one more example of where the society is ahead of the politicians."
Republicans seem determined to ignore the challenge.
The 2016 GOP presidential candidates maintain that there is scientific debate about whether climate change is occurring, a claim that has been repeatedly debunked for years.
Republicans are ready to undercut the Obama administration's participation in the talks by blocking funding.
The ambassador said the U.S. seemed keen to fight climate change -- striking a clear contrast to Republicans like Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.), who brought a snowball to the Senate floor last February to "demonstrate that global warming is a lie".
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/french-ambassador-climate-change_5655c96be4b072e9d1c1490a