https://socialistaction.org/2019/12/29/bullshit-at-madrid-cop25-climate-conference/
“Bullshit!” at Madrid COP25 climate conference
Socialist Action
/
3 days ago
By JEFF MACKLER
Socialist Action’s 2020 candidate for the U.S. presidency
Some 500,000 climate activists mobilized in Madrid by a broad array of
NGO’s around the world demanded that the United Nations-sponsored COP 25
(Conference
of Parties) agree on a series of critical measures to halt the world’s
march to planet catastrophe. After eleven days of “negotiations” ending
on December
15 the result was zero. No significant agreements on any issue emerged
from this 25th annual UN climate conference where representatives from
200 capitalist
countries and fossil fuel energy lobbyists from the world’s leading
polluters once again ensured that whatever “accords” were reached were
worthless in
terms of preventing the near-term projected deadly increase of 1.5 – 2.0
degrees celsius in the earth’s temperature. The December 16 New York
Times front-page
headline bluntly read, “Climate Talks End With U.S. Ceding Nothing.” Lip
service verbiage aside, not a single one of the world’s leading powers
could agree
on any concrete measures to fundamentally reign in their dependence on
fossil fuels and the monopoly super profits derived from their continued
and expanded
use.
The COP25 demand from representatives of the poorest nations on earth,
including those threatened with inundation from sea water and massive
ocean pollution,
for compensation and aid was similarly met with contempt, if not counter
demands for guarantees that the world’s greatest polluters could not be
held liable
in future law suits!
“Bullshit!” was the term applied in 2015 to the non-binding COP21 Paris
Accords by leading climate theoretician James Hansen, former head of
NASA’s Goddard
Institute for Space Studies and more recently head of Columbia
University’s Earth Institute Program on Climate Science, Awareness and
Solutions. The same
Bullshit! definition was applied by leading climate experts around the
world regarding the final proclamation drafted at COP25. Indeed, some
300 participant
activists entered the Madrid conference hall and demonstratively
deposited sacks of manure to illustrate their contempt for the proceedings.
What most disturbed these climate activists was the near total
indifference of the world’s great economic powers. The Trump
administration’s decision to
withdraw entirely later next year from the UN COP process was matched in
contempt for the earth’s future by a loophole-filled proclamation of the
European
Union. China and Russia too joined those who opposed any serious
restrictions on the world’s dependence on fossil fuel. Trump’s
representatives attended
with the sole objective of insuring that no limits were placed on U.S.
corporations’ optimizing profits. The present U.S. election cycle circus
notwithstanding,
the Democrats’ opposition to any serious challenge to the corporate
polluters and to the associated and never-ending U.S. oil wars matched
Trump’s policies
to a T.
The leading spokespersons from the NGO’s could only denounce the COP25
results while expressing hope for the future election of more climate
friendly officials
and governments that they might influence at next year’s Glasgow COP26
conference.
Greta Thunberg
Swedish teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg’s stinging indictment of
the world’s politicians and all governments’ deadly blindness to the
consequences
of ignoring an impending climate Armageddon and her leading role in
rousing some 7.6 million worldwide in the recent worldwide Student
Climate Strike notwithstanding,
the future success of any serious fight against global warming must in
time take on an independent working class character directly in
opposition to the
capitalist system and all its advocates. The critical demand, “System
Change Not Climate Change!” must find expression among the only forces
in society
capable of challenging capitalism’s march to doomsday. Corporate funded
NGO’s, usually beholden to their sponsors, are simply incapable of
exercising the
class power required to win this historic battle.
Share:
list of 3 items
Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
Click to email this to a friend (Opens in new window)
list end
December 29, 2019
in Uncategorized.
article end
Related posts
article
11/nov-2017-germany-coal
Bonn talks underway; scientists see grim future for climate
article end
article
10/oct.-2019-climate-johannesburg-cnn
Millions say: Change the system, not the climate!
article end
article
climate-movement-across-movements
Climate movement across movements
article end
navigation region
Post navigation
← British Election: A Victory for the Far Right. A Crisis for the Left
Workers Shut Down France to Defend Pensions! →
navigation region end
main region end
Search for articles
Search
Get Involved!
list of 3 items
Donate to help support our work
Get email updates
Join Socialist Action
list end
Social Media
list of 2 items
View socialistactionusa’s profile on Facebook
View SocialistActUS’s profile on Twitter
list end
Subscribe to Our Newspaper
04/paper
Newspaper Archives
Newspaper Archives
Select Month
Upcoming Events
No upcoming events
Create a website or blog at WordPress.com
list of 1 items
Follow
list end
:)
--
___
Carl Sagan
“Who is more humble? The scientist who looks at the universe with an open mind
and accepts whatever the universe has to teach us, or somebody who says
everything in this book must be considered the literal truth and never mind the
fallibility of all the human beings involved?”
― Carl Sagan
