Democrats [are] in an awkward position. If they were to follow the lead of the Nobel committee, which commended Gore for recognizing “the measures that need to be adopted” to remedy the problem, they would commit instant political suicide.
Gore advocates drastic, immediate measures to end global warming. As he wrote in an op-ed on the eve of this past summer’s Live Earth concerts, if we do not act “within 10 years,” we are likely to reach a “tipping point” making it impossible “to avoid irretrievable damage to the planet’s habitability for human civilization.” In response to this dire situation, he would have the United States “join an international treaty within the next two years that cuts global-warming pollution by 90 percent in developed countries and by more than half worldwide.”
The pitter-patter you hear, behind the earnest applause for Gore’s Nobel Prize, is the sound of Democrats in flight, running from such ideas as fast as their feet can carry them. A radical shift to clean energy is on the agenda of no mainstream politician, least of all those now on the stump in Iowa and New Hampshire. For all the talk of a growing consensus about climate change, the only point that commands general assent is that the planet is growing warmer and that human activity is responsible in some measure. All agreement disappears when it comes to how seriously to take the problem and, especially, how to deal with it.
Tomorrow’s New York Times has a helpful and comprehensive summary of goings-on during day one of the 17th Communist Party Congress in Beijing. Among the highlights of Hu Jintao’s two and a half hour speech:
He called the international situation favorable to China, saying a “trend toward a multipolar world is irreversible.” He offered to hold peace talks with Taiwan, the self-governing island China claims as its territory, as long as the island’s leadership sets aside independence goals.
In defining “scientific development,” Mr. Hu discussed the growing gap between rich and poor. He said the economy relies too much on investment and not enough on consumption, and that the leadership should do more to protect the environment.
“We must adopt an enlightened approach to development that results in expanded production, a better life and sound ecological and environmental conditions,” he said.
Mr. Hu repeatedly used the word democracy and said the party should become more responsive to the public. He also called for “intra-party democracy,” or allowing more party officials to participate in decision making.
Corruption, he said, poses a threat to the party’s survival, a particularly resonant issue after the leadership purged the former Shanghai Party boss, Chen Liangyu, in one of the highest-level corruption scandals in its history.
Ah, how those YouTube vids can come back to haunt you. Here, courtesy of Gregory at Belgravia Dispatch via ForeignPolicy.com, is GW taking a question from a prescient young student about the legal framework governing private military companies.
