| Submit your comments on this article |
| Science & Technology |
| Obama Raced Clock, Chaos, Comedy For Climate Deal |
| 2009-12-20 |
| H/T Lucianne.com The Ending: It was almost unthinkable. The president of the United States walked into a meeting of fellow world leaders and there wasn't a chair for him, a sure sign he was not expected, maybe not even wanted. Barack Obama didn't pause, however. "I'm going to sit by my friend Lula," he said, moving toward Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. A Brazilian aide gave the U.S. president his chair, and Obama spent the next 80 minutes helping craft new requirements for disclosing efforts to fight global warming. Along with India, South Africa and Brazil, the key member in the room was China, which recently surpassed the U.S. as the world's top emitter of heat-trapping gasses. At the table this time for China was Premier Wen Jiabao, not an underling as before. Obama was bent on striking a deal before flying home to snowbound Washington. How it Happened: Obama's 15-hour, seat-of-the-pants dash through Copenhagen was marked by doggedness, confusion and semi-comedy. Constrained by partisan politics at home, and quarrels between rich and poor nations abroad, he was determined to come home with a victory, no matter how imperfect. All his "victories" are becoming imperfect Obama was thrown off schedule almost from the moment he landed Friday morning in Copenhagen, where the summit's final-day talks seemed to be collapsing. Instead of attending a planned meeting with Denmark's prime minister, he plunged into an emergency session of about 20 nations, big and small, wealthy and poor. Right away there was a troubling sign. China was the only nation to send a second-tier official: vice foreign minister He Yafei instead of Premier Wen, who was in the building. The snub baffled and annoyed delegates. For months, Obama had been pressing China to put into writing its promises to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Obama later seemed unusually animated when he alluded indirectly to China in a short, late-morning speech to the full conference. "I don't know how you have an international agreement where we all are not sharing information and ensuring that we are meeting our commitments," he said. "That doesn't make sense." And just how much money has China "donated" to you, and you snub them? Things then appeared to turn for the better, as Obama and Wen met privately, as scheduled, for 55 minutes. A U.S. official said they took a step forward as they discussed emissions targets, financing and transparency. The two leaders directed aides to work on mutual language, and Obama's team proposed specific wording meant to solidify China's promise to be more forthcoming about its anti-pollution efforts. A short time later, however, the U.S. team was more baffled and irked than before. At a follow-up session of the morning's big meeting, the Chinese sent an even lower-ranking envoy in Wen's place. An irritated Obama told his staff, "I don't want to mess around with this anymore, I want to just talk with Premier Wen," according to a senior administration official who spoke on background to discuss sensitive diplomatic issues. By now night had fallen, and it was clear Obama would be late getting home. He kept an appointment to discuss arms control with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev. Meanwhile he asked aides to try to set up a final one-on-one meeting with Wen, and a separate meeting with leaders of India, Brazil and South Africa. He hoped these fast-growing nations, which had been loosely aligned with China on many of the key issues, might influence the Chinese. Confusion reigned. Chinese officials said Wen was at his hotel and his staff was at the airport. The same was said of top Indian officials, but nothing was clear. South African President Jacob Zuma agreed to meet with Obama, then canceled when he heard the Indian leader was away, and Brazil would attend only if India did. The Chinese said Wen could meet with Obama at 6:15 p.m., then changed it to 7 p.m. Obama used the time to talk strategy with the leaders of France, Germany and Great Britain. Meanwhile, a four-nation negotiating team known as BASIC gathered. The modified acronym reflected its members: Brazil, South Africa, India and China. This is beginning to sound like the game Chinese Fire Drill we played as teenagers: An old game that you play while driving. Your car needs to be full of people. When you stop at a red light, you put the car in park then ALL passengers (driver included) get out of the car and quickly switch into random positions elsewhere inside the viehicle. The object is to pull this off before the light turns green...Otherwise you're screwed. Obama was unaware, however, thinking he was going to meet alone with Wen. After some confusion about who had access to the room, White House aides told the president that Wen was inside with the leaders of the three other countries, apparently working on strategy. Humm — wondering if the Secret Service had checked out the room? — some staffer knew he wasn't invited? "Good," Obama said as he walked through the door. "Mr. Premier, are you ready to see me?" he called out. "Are you ready?" Maybe he gave lessons to the White House state dinner party crashers. Seems he knows just how to "walk right in." Inside he found startled leaders and no chair to sit in. Maybe they were expecting Bush, thus no chair, but for The Won to descend into their presence unannounced? What a supremely embarrassing moment that must have been for these world leader. No chair for The One. /sarc U.S. officials denied that Obama crashed the party, saying he simply showed up for his 7 p.m. meeting with Wen and found the others there. The no chair should have been his clue. But lacking certain social skills, and wearing his Doctorate in "The Chicago Way," barge right in, he did. Whatever the meeting's original purpose, Obama used it to help strike an agreement on ways to verify developing nations' reductions of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping gases, a good U.S. ending to their talks with the Chinese. And the Chinese continue to just keep laughing as they again play the game of "Yanking Obama Around." What is the score now? Chinese 10 Obama 0? Hard to keep track of scoring in a fast moving game, and the Chinese has experience on their side. |
| Posted by:Sherry |
| #9 Come to think about it it, the Chinese may reinstate their Emperor just to see if President Obama will bow to him. |
| Posted by: Kelly 2009-12-20 22:59 |
| #8 Actually, as business goes under or moves out of the country we should have no problem meeting the President's Co2 goals. The only thing I am not sure about is if we can borrow enough money to give away to meet our obligations. |
| Posted by: Kelly 2009-12-20 22:56 |
| #7 GirlThursday, you are a snob after my own heart. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2009-12-20 22:38 |
| #6 IQ 124, decent but not off the charts. |
| Posted by: GirlThursday 2009-12-20 20:57 |
| #5 President Clown. It's a mystery to me why anyone thinks this man's intelligence is above average. I can't wait for 2012. |
| Posted by: lex 2009-12-20 20:55 |
| #4 The Chinese must be laughing their asses off at the progressively bigger insults they threw at Obama, and still he kept coming back for more. |
| Posted by: phil_b 2009-12-20 18:51 |
| #3 By CHARLES BABINGTON and JENNIFER LOVEN Associated Press Writers Ay Pee. Ms Loven is apparently married to an AGW environmental activist, and as an AP writer we can assume has been enamored with President Obama since some time in 2008. The spin is obvious, but there are tells that she is becoming uncomfortable, even in the second sentence. I mean, how could it be that The One is ever unwanted? And later, his dash through Copenhagen was marked by not only doggedness but confusion and semi-comedy -- not words that should be associated with the Prez of Cool Charm and High Intelligence. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2009-12-20 13:51 |
| #2 he was determined to come home with a victory, no matter how imperfect. The Political Special Olympics. |
| Posted by: Pappy 2009-12-20 13:24 |
| #1 he was determined to come home with a victory, no matter how imperfect. >All his "victories" are becoming imperfect. "Imperfect" is IMO charitable by orders of magnitude. This is Tango Uniform from idea to conception to birth. |
| Posted by: Free Radical 2009-12-20 12:33 |