Problems with Kyoto:
The former president omitted to mention that many American economists advised US leader to not sign a global warming agreement that either hurt the US economically or that exempted developing nations – like China, India and Brazil, the fastest growing sources of greenhouse gas emissions – from emission cuts. As President Bush noted when he rejected the treaty early in his administration, Kyoto violated both of these provisions and thus would not garner Senate ratification and did not merit his support. Senator John Kerry who ran against Bush in 2004 cited the same reasons for rejecting Kyoto.
While Clinton indulged in his usual rhetorical denigration of Bush and his policies, he neglected to mention the fact that Russia's president also opposed Kyoto.
"The Kyoto protocol places significant limitations on the economic growth of Russia," said Andrei Illarionov, who advises President Vladimir Putin on economic issues. "Of course, in its current form, this protocol cannot be ratified,"
Clinton also failed to tell his audience of UN delegates and internationalists that his own Democrat Party opposed Kyoto when the Dems joined the GOP Senators and voted against the protocol by a resounding 95-0. The US Senate told Clinton, "[We} could not support any global warming pact that did not bind developing countries along with developed countries."
No US Senate will ever implement a protocol that so unfairly forces the US to reduce production and energy consumption while allowing polluters like Brazil, India, and particularly China to carry on relatively unaffected.
Not surprising is the fact that some US Senators understood Clinton was acting more out of self-interest than out of concern for the environment and so felt little guilt in opposing the Clinton Administration on Kyoto.
According to the November 1992 edition of the Enron corporate newsletter, "To The Point," the company looked forward to dealing with the incoming Clinton administration. The newsletter noted, "Senator [Al] Gore has been an avid proponent of a strong global warming policy that would lower greenhouse gas emissions."
And the Enron communiqué noted that Clinton and Gore's support of restrictions on carbon dioxide emissions "should provide a real opportunity for natural gas."
Enron stood to benefit from any government restrictions on greenhouse gas emissions because the company had ownership or financial stake in numerous natural gas and wind power technologies, which produce little or no greenhouse gas emissions.
While the Democrats have had success with linking President Bush to Enron, it was Clinton whom Enron had in its pocket. And Enron wanted Kyoto. In fact, Clinton's statement's on December 9, 2005 is a paraphrase of Enron executive Jeff Keeler's 2001 statement in the Amicus Journal, "You can do something meaningful on carbon without collapsing the economy or causing an energy crisis. We believed that before the Bush announcement [to not sign Kyoto]. We believe it now."
Even Clinton's friend British Prime Minister Tony Blair knew something was rotten in Denmark when Bill kept pushing Kyoto. Announcing that he would be "brutally honest" on the subject of the Kyoto Protocol and its future, Blair stated, "My thinking has changed in the past three or four years ... No country is going to cut its growth." Nations like China and India, picked to be this century's superpowers and notably not covered by the protocol, were "not going to start negotiating another treaty like Kyoto."
And his last paragraph is dead on:
As with most of today's liberals, Bill Clinton cares more for the goals of internationalists and less about the goals of his own country. He also displays a clear penchant for building himself up by tearing others down, a sure sign of immaturity. Like so many of his ilk today, while in other countries, he has no shame in criticizing -- even lying about -- his own country. But then again, Bill Clinton never had shame about anything.
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