Originally posted by Q5echo
Bush didn't back off Kyoto you idiot, the 105th Congress did in 1998.
Uhh...
Which one of these pulled out of Kyoto?
quote:
105th United States Congress
* August 5, 1997 — Balanced Budget Act of 1997, Pub.L. 105-33, 111 Stat. 251
* August 5, 1997 — Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997, Pub.L. 105-34, 111 Stat. 788
* June 9, 1998 — Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century, Pub.L. 105-178, 112 Stat. 107
* July 22, 1998 — Taxpayer Bill of Rights III, Pub.L. 105-206, title III, 112 Stat. 726
* August 7, 1998 — Workforce Investment Act, Pub.L. 105-220, 112 Stat. 936
* October 21, 1998 — Child Online Privacy Protection Act, Pub.L. 105-277, div. C, title XIV, 112 Stat. 2681
* October 27, 1998 — Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act, Pub.L. 105-298, title I, 112 Stat. 2827
* October 28, 1998 — Digital Millennium Copyright Act (including the Online Copyright Infringement Liability Limitation Act), Pub.L. 105-304, 112 Stat. 2860
* October 31, 1998 — Iraq Liberation Act, Pub.L. 105-338, 112 Stat. 3178
Q5echo
quote:
Originally posted by Krypton
osama bin laden can NEVER take away our freedoms.
he can take your life...and he would...he has. not yours specifically but many like yours around the world. he takes pride in it. he recruits thousands of others to do the same and that was before Iraq. and using your own logic he would be justified.
if you can't see the irony in that then youre stupid.
Originally posted by Q5echo
he can take your life...and he would...he has. not yours specifically but many like yours around the world. he takes pride in it. he recruits thousands of others to do the same. and using your own logic he would be justified.
Then why is he still alive?why is your government going after Iran instead?
Krypton
quote:
Originally posted by Q5echo
he can take your life...and he would...he has. not yours specifically but many like yours around the world. he takes pride in it. he recruits thousands of others to do the same. and using your own logic he would be justified.
if you can't see the irony in that then youre stupid.
I like how you love taking me out of context. Let me correct you...
My comment, "OBL can NEVER take away our freedoms." is a response to the argument that OBL seeks to destroy us because we live as western liberal capitalist infidels. That he hates America simply because he is a dirty terrorist who hates freedom. As I've stated numerous times, OBL seeks to force us out of Muslim lands. You make it seem like his goal in life is to kill kill kill for no reason but for the sheer joy of it. He kills for a reason, and that reason is foreign interventionism.
Scare tactics don't work anymore dude, so stop using them.
If you don't get the satire of this one, I'de like to throw that word "stupid" right back at you:whip:
Q5echo
quote:
Originally posted by Krypton
As I've stated numerous times, OBL seeks to force us out of Muslim lands.
oh so you finally come around to that. good.
quote:
You make it seem like his goal in life is to kill kill kill for no reason but for the sheer joy of it.
no i'm not, i'm just letting you know how irrational his motives are. you're the one rationalizing what he does and why he does it and apologizing for it.
if these "Muslim lands" want nothing to do with us then why don't you let them speak for themselves, Krypton? why do you need to invoke the words of a convicted murderer to get your point across?where is all this righteous indignation of yours claiming respect of "soveriegnty" above all other logic?
quote:
I'de like to through that word "stupid" right back at you:whip:
you mean "throw" right? you were saying, genius?:haha:
Krypton
Bush put the nail in the coffin on the entire treaty. Just said, we don't want any part of it. What the 1997 decision did was make mention that the US should not be a signatory unless developing nations also were liable for pollution limits. Never said we don't want any part of the treaty. Bush pulled completely out, meaning negociation was no longer possible with the US to make it compliant to the kyoto agreement.
corpwatch
quote:
USA: Bush Pulls Out of Kyoto Protocol
Environment News Service
March 28th, 2001
WASHINGTON, DC -- Christie Todd Whitman, head of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, confirmed today that the country will not implement the Kyoto Protocol. "We have no interest in implementing that treaty," Whitman told reporters.
Whitman's comments come two days after the European Union wrote to U.S. President George W. Bush, seeking his commitment to the climate change treaty and calling on him to find political courgage.
The news has been greeted with anger and disappointment from some quarters in the U.S. and overseas.
Greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel burning in electricity generation and from agriculture and transportation are thought by many scientists to have reached levels that require precautionary and prompt action.
Under the Protocol, agreed in Kyoto, Japan in 1997, 39 industrialized nations must cut emissions of six greenhouse gases to an average of 5.2 percent below 1990 levels by the period 2008-2012.
But the Protocol will not take effect until it is ratified by 55 percent of the nations emitting at least 55 percent of the greenhouse gases - carbon dioxide (CO2), methane, nitrous oxide, hydrofluorocarbons, perfluorocarbons and sulphur hexafluoride.
That has yet to happen because countries disagree on how they should be allowed to meet their targets, which while modest, are deemed an important first step toward reversing global warming and climate change.
Under the Protocol, the U.S. is supposed to cut its greenhouse gas emissions by seven percent. With four percent of the world's population, the country accounts for about 25 percent of the Earth's greenhouse gas emissions.
Bush, a former oilman, has questioned the science behind climate change forecasts and hinted recently that the U.S. no longer supports the Kyoto Protocol or intends living up to the targets the country agreed upon four years ago.
On March 13, Bush reversed a pledge to legislate limits on C02 emissions from U.S. power plants, saying such a rule would be too costly, in light of rising energy prices. In a speech last September, Bush vowed to require limits on C02 emissions, along with other power plant pollutants including sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides and mercury.
Whitman's statement today is the clearest indication yet that U.S. involvement in United Nations organized climate change talks is all but over.
"If there's a general agreement that we need to be addressing the global climate change issue, how do we do it in a way that allows us to make some progress, instead of spending time committed to something that isn't going to go?" said Whitman.
"We are not the only ones who have problems with it," said Whitman, adding that the U.S. would remain "engaged" with the issue.
Talks in The Hague, Netherlands last November were supposed to finalize agreement on how Kyoto's targets could be met. Those talks, officially known as the sixth Conference of Parties (COP 6) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), finished without agreement.
Officials from more than 160 governments will meet in Bonn, Germany, from July 16 to 27, to reconvene COP 6. European Commission President Romano Prodi and Swedish Prime Minister Goran Persson wrote to Bush this week, seeking talks with the U.S. prior to the resumption of COP 6 to narrow differences between the European Union and the U.S. on how targets should be met.
"To the European Union, an agreement at the resumed session on the basis of the Kyoto Protocol and leading to real reductions in greenhouse gas emissions is of the utmost importance," said the letter.
European Environment Commissioner Margot Wallstrm responded to Whitman's announcement.
"It is very worrying if it is true that the U.S. intends to pull out of the Kyoto Protocol. The European Union is willing to discuss details and problems - but not to scrap the whole protocol," said Wallstrm.
United Kingdom based environmental group Friends of the Earth reacted angrily to today's news and called for the rest of the world to continue climate change talks without the U.S.
"George Bush's decision to rat on the Kyoto treaty is grim news," said Friends of the Earth director Charles Secrett.
"When the Hague talks collapsed last year because of U.S. intransigence, Friends of the Earth warned that the world would pay the price in tears. Millions of people - in the U.S. as well as in other countries - face the loss of their homes, their jobs and even their lives because of climate change.
"But this ignorant, short sighted and selfish politician, long since firmly jammed into the pockets of the oil lobby, clearly couldn't care less. The talks in Bonn in July must now concentrate on world action independent of the U.S."
The Brussels based think tank, Centre for European Policy Studies said the European Union must "put aside its internal squabbles," "summon up the courage of its convictions" and ratify the protocol unilaterally.
U.S. groups were equally critical. The New York based environmental advocacy group Environmental Defense said the country's image was suffering.
"The Bush Administration's approach of explore for oil and ignore the science on global warming leaves the U.S. increasingly isolated from the rest of the world," said Environmental Defense executive director Fred Krupp.
"It is bad for America's interests for the United States to be seen as the rogue nation of greenhouse gas pollution."
"By simply opposing the Kyoto Protocol rather than seeking to improve it, the administration would have effectively blocked the only binding international agreement for fighting global warming, while offering no alternative path to protect the planet," said Krupp.
"This move would have the potential to slow international action on climate change for many years. As the world's last remaining superpower, and the world's largest producer of greenhouse gases, the U.S. has a special obligation to lead on this issue.
"The international community and forward thinking elements of the business community are already taking this problem on; it's time for the new administration to face its responsibilities on global warming as well."
The Washington, DC based Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) said Bush had capitulated to the oil and coal industries.
"This is the most anti-environmental act by an American president in modern history," said Alden Meyer, UCS director of government relations.
"In one fell swoop, the President has embraced the do nothing mantra of polluters and elevated their short term self interests above public health and the environment. With this action, President Bush is declaring that on the environment, the U.S. is a rogue nation.
"It is a grave error in judgment, one that will tarnish his credibility around the globe and be judged harshly by historians and future generations.
"World leaders must condemn this brazen act and forge ahead on ratification and implementation of the Kyoto Protocol - with or without the U.S."
Not everyone was so disappointed though. Glenn Kelly, executive director of the Washington, DC based Global Climate Coalition, welcomed Bush's and Whitman's opposition to what he called the "irreparably flawed Kyoto Protocol."
"It is common knowledge that the Kyoto Protocol will only continue leading us down a dead end street," said Kelly.
"Devoting additional efforts to 'fixing' the fundamentally flawed treaty would simply be a waste of valuable resources that are critically needed in other areas to develop far more promising approaches to effectively address the important climate issue."
The Global Climate Coalition represents more than six million businesses, companies and corporations in the international policy debate on global climate change. The group favors a technology based approach to climate policy, rather than emissions cuts.
"The Administration appears to have signaled an intent to pursue technology based solutions that will meet America's energy needs while at the same time addressing important climate concerns that will be far more effective than any thing that has been proposed to date, including the Protocol," Kelly said.
"This is a prudent step, and clearly the right thing to do."
Pressure at home
Bush has been under increasing pressure from environmental groups alarmed by reversals of environmental protections within the U.S. One of the country's oldest and largest environmental groups, the Sierra Club launched a series of radio ads criticizing the President today.
Running in nine states, the ads focus on Bush's decision against reducing cancer causing arsenic in Americans' drinking water and his about face on a campaign pledge to cut the C02 pollution that causes global warming.
"The public cares about clean air and clean water and they need to know that President Bush is making irresponsible choices that put their families' health at risk," said Carl Pope, executive director of the Sierra Club.
"President Bush is ignoring sound science and the public's demand to keep drinking water safe and reduce the carbon dioxide pollution that causes global warming. No one wants to drink arsenic when they turn on their tap, but President Bush caved to the mining industry and halted an effort to make our drinking water safer," said Pope.
Last week the Bush administration announced a roll back of new rules that would have reduced the amount of arsenic allowed in American drinking water.
According to the National Academy of Sciences, long term exposure to low concentrations of arsenic in drinking water can lead to skin, bladder, lung, and prostate cancer. Non-cancer effects of ingesting arsenic at low levels include cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and anemia, as well as reproductive and developmental, immunological, and neurological effects.
Today, House Democratic Leader Richard Gephardt, Representative from Missouri, weighed in to Bush with more examples of what he called environmental flip flops. These included the roll back of arsenic rules, the about turn on CO2 emissions and Bush's wish to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling.
"There's a mentality that says you can't explore and protect land," Bush said at a media roundtable last week. "We're going to change that attitude."
Gephardt said Bush's roll backs are just the beginning.
"In just two short months, the President has launched a blistering attack on environmental regulations that affect the lives of millions of people in our country," said Gephardt.
"Unfortunately, we have good reason to believe that the actions of this administration are just the beginning. We think the Administration is teeing up more rules to role back.
"They are reviewing environmental standards, looking for ways to undo progress, putting together a budget that cuts $2.3 billion from programs to protect natural resources."
Q5echo
quote:
Originally posted by Krypton
Bush put the nail in the coffin on the entire treaty. Just said, we don't want any part of it. What the 1997 decision did was make mention that the US should not be a signatory unless developing nations also were liable for pollution limits. Never said we don't want any part of the treaty. Bush pulled completely out, meaning negociation was no longer possible with the US to make it compliant to the kyoto agreement.
corpwatch
right because the President alone can ratify a treaty:rolleyes:
read the frikken Constitution moron
Krypton
quote:
Originally posted by Q5echo
oh so you finally come around to that. good.
no i'm not, i'm just letting you know how irrational his motives are. you're the one rationalizing what he does and why he does it and apologizing for it.
You want to talk about rationality? What the are we doing in Iraq!? How am I apologizing for OBL's actions? Do you think he is acting alone? There are millions of muslims who feels exactly as he does and actually support bin laden. You keep wanting to dumb down bin laden to that of a mindless terrorist.
quote:
if these "Muslim lands" want nothing to do with us then why don't you let them speak for themselves, Krypton? why do you need to invoke the words of a convicted murderer to get your point across?where is all this righteous indignation of yours claiming respect of "soveriegnty" above all other logic?
:stongue:
Let them speak for themselves? What the hell was the Iranian Revolution? Were they just having a good ole time? NO. They have been letting us know plainly their greivances to the west. Have we listened? Hmm, look at the situation today, and tell me that we have
:haha:. When we don't listen, what choice to these poor people have? Do you think their western backed dictorial regimes are going to voice their concerns to the UN? I don't think so. They took up arms against us to get us out of the muslim lands. Why do you find this so difficult to understand? If we leave, OBL has no purpose any longer. This argument that the terrorists will be encouraged if we leave is nothing more than to say "we will not leave because our honor will be tarnished." So in essence, they just want to save face.
I also would like to know how you can perceive a terrorist free world? Much like the notion that a drug free American is nothing more than a utopian ideal, how is invading muslim countrys going to stop islamic terrorism?
quote:
you mean "throw" right? you were saying, genius?:haha:
You got the message, mispelling or not, genius...
Krypton
quote:
Originally posted by Q5echo
right because the President alone can ratify a treaty:rolleyes:
read the frikken Constitution moron
IMPLEMENT IMPLEMENT IMPLEMENT. I'm not talking about ratifying it douchebag! Bush will not implement the treaty. Being a signatory does not mean mandatory implementation. Bush was the one who said, we will under any circumstances implement the treaty, when he had stated before during his campaign that he would negotiate how to implement the treaty.
CHRles
quote:
Originally posted by Krypton
If we leave, OBL has no purpose any longer. This argument that the terrorists will be encouraged if we leave is nothing more than to say "we will not leave because our honor will be tarnished." So in essence, they just want to save face.
Bull once again. What countries in the ME was America in during 9/11? And yet Osama did launch an attack on us.
Prior to that he attacked American bases in Africa and the Gulf coast.
Why did we have a presence in the gulf coast?
Well, I distinctly remember both Saudi Arabia and Kuwait seeking the United States assistance in the first Gulf War.
Has it ever occured to you Saudi Arabia and Kuwait were seeking America's assistance AGAIN this time around?? Maybe they were amongst those supplying the US with some of the information it received about Iraq and Sadam.
Now let me remind you that at the end of the first Gulf War we didn't take over Saudi Arabia or Kuwait after fighting Iraq. We also, sadly, didn't decide to stay in Iraq, which is why Sadam was able to build himself back up.
This time around America decided to take care of Sadam once and for all. The problem is that Iraq is a very complicated country where both Sunnis and Shiites are afraid of each other, detest each other, and each seek to rule the country. Furthermore, the kurds in the north, who should have been given their own country long ago, are also part of the eqaution.
But Osama would like you to believe that everything is America's fault. Not surprisngly terrorist lovers such as Krypton will glad back up Osama Bin Laden.
Krypton
quote:
Originally posted by CHRles
Bull once again. What countries in the ME was America in during 9/11? And yet Osama did launch an attack on us.
Prior to that he attacked American bases in Africa and the Gulf coast.
Why did we have a presence in the gulf coast?
Well, I distinctly remember both Saudi Arabia and Kuwait seeking the United States assistance in the first Gulf War.
Has it ever occured to you Saudi Arabia and Kuwait were seeking America's assistance AGAIN this time around?? Maybe they were amongst those supplying the US with some of the information it received about Iraq and Sadam.
Now let me remind you that at the end of the first Gulf War we didn't take over Saudi Arabia or Kuwait after fighting Iraq. We also, sadly, didn't decide to stay in Iraq, which is why Sadam was able to build himself back up.
This time around America decided to take care of Sadam once and for all. The problem is that Iraq is a very complicated country where both Sunnis and Shiites are afraid of each other, detest each other, and each seek to rule the country. Furthermore, the kurds in the north, who should have been given their own country long ago, are also part of the eqaution.
But Osama would like you to believe that everything is America's fault. Not surprisngly terrorist lovers such as Krypton will glad back up Osama Bin Laden.
Um, muslims view Israel and the US as one entity. You couldn't have Israel without the USA. As you hopefully know, muslims view the Palestinian refugee crisis as oppression from Israel for taking their land and by default the USA for being the backbone behind Israeli power since the Eisenhower admin. Don't tell me 911 attack was made simply because OBL just wants to rack up his "americans killed" tally...:rolleyes:
