I'm still pissed, so I'm going to vent.
It's so damn annoying to say you care about this issue, but some damn jackass comes at you and insinuates that because you aren't Ed Bagley Jr., Ubering people around in a rickshaw while drinking collected rainwater in a recycled plastic bottle, that you are some poser. I drive ULEV vehicles. I buy Energy Star everything. When I had to replace my HVAC and water heater, I spent ungodly amounts of money on a high efficiency paired system and a ultra high efficiency water heater. Did I have to? No. Will it save me money in the long run? Maybe not. But that's my contribution. I sleep better at night.
Do I think the agreement is the end all be all? No. It's non-binding for Christ's sake. But what does it say that we don't even give enough of a crap to join a non-binding agreement that LITERALLY the rest of the world is a part of? Well, except Nicaragua, who wanted an even more strict agreement, and Syria, which is less of a country and more of a parking lot these days.
What this means is that our "President", and the goddamn oil and coal lobby that we call the Republican members of Congress, feel like it's a good idea to tell the rest of the world to screw off because they are so desperate to look like they're actually accomplishing something. They can't ban Muslims, the can't reform health care, and the OMB apparently can't even use a calculator, so, hey, eff Paris.
On top of that, even the staunchest Trump supporter has to admit that at least some of this has to do with the fact that his European trip was a disaster, and he was essentially laughed out of the continent. It's no small coincidence that he probably took a beating behind closed doors when he met with the G7, and promptly came home and gave them the middle finger. He's a rough ridin' child that is willing to basically give the entire green energy future to the Chinese because Angela Merkel probably treated him like an idiot all week (because he is) and Marcon gave him a firm handshake.
And this short sighted "Dealmaker" thinks that giving money to developing nations is a bad investment? I mean maybe, just maybe, this business "guru" could have seen an opportunity to sell green tech, developed, engineered, and manufactured in America to these countries WITH THE MONEY WE GAVE THEM. But, no, let's sell off half of the strategic petroleum reserves to a global market that is already heavy on the supply side. Because making a few quick bucks there and selling off our fuel reserves doesn't mean a damn thing when you can just rip up Yellowstone and put up a few rigs. Hell, let's find some Indian reservations and strip mine them for clean, CLEAN coal. Real CLEEEEAN coal. But when these countries actually decide to buy green tech, I'm sure the Chinese will be thrilled to sell them all of the solar panels and wind turbines they need.
A fraction of this is about the environment. We've already hit the CPP goals for carbon reduction due to our rapid move to natural gas and the private sector quickly moving towards renewables. All this is going to do is make people even more likely to buy an electric car and a high efficiency dishwasher because they want to stick it to Trump. But what this is really about is continually ceding ground to the Chinese and Europe. It's giving a win to those dumbass nationalist assholes who think we can stem the tide of globalization, automation, and international cooperation for some mythical past where everything is a zero sum battle for world domination and supremacy. It's about some Creationist in the Bible Belt who thinks Republican Jesus is going to use the cosmic Hoover to suck the carbon right out of the sky...
Now, more than any time in the last five months, we see pure idiocy. Not just incompetence and disorganization, but pure, unyielding evidence that this entire cadre of door humping retards can't even get on board with a non-binding treaty, that has goals so low we can shuffle over them, and provides great global PR and a drivers seat to dictate the market for what will be the most lucrative industry in the 21st century.
I'm not worried about the planet. We'll figure that out. I'm worried that we're actually going to have to spend literal decades cleaning up amazingly avoidable bullshit.
