Overwhelmed by all the mainstream news coverage of the COP conference in Katowice, Poland? I thought not. It’s possible that the international climate negotiations in Poland have been covered in passing by the evening news shows, etc., but I haven’t seen a single mention of them on the various talk shows, most notably on MSNBC, which is purported to be the centrist-liberal network. Their constant obsession is the Mueller probe, and while I can understand the temptation to follow such a strongly narrative-driven story, to do so to the exclusion of all other news is craven on the part of any organization that lays claim the mantle of investigative journalism.
Probably the best source on what’s happening at Katowice is DemocracyNow! – Amy Goodman and her crew have been broadcasting from Poland all week, covering the activities of the American delegation. Yes, there is an official U.S. delegation, even though our lord emperor Trump the first has chosen to withdraw from the weak as dishwater (but better than nothing) Paris Accord. The delegation is headed by former Priebus aide Wells Griffith, who ran a failed campaign for congress in Alabama recently. Goodman chased Griffith around the hall at one point, asking him to comment on the administration’s hallucinogenic policies on climate change – he refused, walked faster, practically ran to get away from them. (Worth a look.)
What are they doing there? Same thing the conference is doing in Poland – making every effort to legitimize coal as a usable energy source. Recall that Trump’s EPA administrator is a coal industry lobbyist (I would add “former” to that title, but honestly, he still is). Poland’s government, too, is a big promoter of coal – that’s why they are hosting COP 24 in a building designed to look like the inside of a coal mine. Not too subtle. Though it has announced its intention to leave the Paris Accord, the U.S. government is doing all it can to steer the negotiations away from any serious effort at attacking this problem, teaming up with other bad global actors and hawking its extractive industries. It’s not all that different from Obama’s ridiculous “all of the above” policy, except that Trump’s all of the above doesn’t include renewables.
Mind you, this meeting has been going on for 24 years and we are still waiting for serious action on the greatest threat to confront us in the history of humankind. That’s why the corporate media pays no attention – they no the intention is to do nothing while looking like you’re doing something. Unacceptable.
Not Too Soon. I think Greg Grandin did a great job of remembering George H.W. Bush in all of his patrician glory in last week’s Nation. Check it out.
luv u,
jp
Talk about ungrateful. I heard a story this week on NPR about a loan the government of Cambodia owes to the United States, in the amount of about $500 million. There were a couple of remarkable points about this story. For one, the piece actually acknowledges that some scholars think the massive bombing of Cambodia may have contributed to the rise to power of the Khmer Rouge. That’s a pretty big step forward for mainstream media, which usually follows the line that Cambodia was a peaceful, happy country before the arrival of Pol Pot. They also mention the bombing itself – another practical miracle. What they leave out is that the loan in question was made to a coup regime installed with the full support of the United States. Slight omission there, right?