It’s not good when Syria and Nicaragua are your new (and only) best friends

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The news today is full of speculation that faux-President Donald J. Trump plans to withdraw from the Paris Agreement on Climate Change. This would make the United States one of just three countries worldwide who are not signatories to the historic pact to reduce planet-warming emissions.

The other two are widely recognized for their global leadership, independence and scientific achievement – Syria and Nicaragua. Are you kidding me? The 194 best nations around the world are signed on to this climate change agreement – including Russia and China – and we want to be aligned on the other side of the issue with a war-torn dictatorship like Syria and Nicaragua, the second poorest country in the Western Hemisphere? That would make a great SNL skit if it wasn’t so sadly true.

Trump pledged during his campaign to “cancel” the Paris deal – which, of course, he can’t really do since he has not yet been named King of the Universe, but those in his administration who oppose the agreement have apparently convinced him to abandon our participation in it ― despite few political advantages and harsh economic and diplomatic consequences, according to the Huffington Post.

“Under the terms of the deal, the U.S. cannot officially withdraw until November 2019,” HuffPo reported, “but even an announcement that the country is looking to leave the deal shows that the White House has no plans to meet earlier targets for slashing greenhouse gas emissions.”

There is much more to this story and I encourage you to read up on it as the news unfolds. Meanwhile, I want to repeat something I wrote late last year and which is even more significant now.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is a scientific body under the auspices of the United Nations, set up in 1988 at the request of more than 120 member governments to provide an objective, scientific view of world climate change and its political and economic impacts. Key word: Scientific.

It is not a basement full of crazy leftist global warming whackadoos trying to scare us all into building windmills, as some would have you believe. You can google it for more information, but for now, just know this:

The IPCC does not carry out its own research but instead relies on thousands of scientists and other experts who volunteer without pay to write and review reports about the state of the environment. Three years ago, the IPCC warned against the dangers of continued reliance on fossil fuels. It stated that if we burn more than 30% of our known fossil fuel reserves, we will cross an environmental “red line” by the year 2040 that will result in more extreme weather events such as floods, droughts, heat waves, rising sea levels and so on.

If we burn all of our available fossil fuels, the IPCC said, humans will find large parts of the planet uninhabitable outdoors. Did you hear that? Parts of the planet would be UNINHABITABLE OUTDOORS.

When I read that it jolted me out of my chair. The year 2040 is not some unreachable date far out in the future. It's only 23 years from now. I’ll be dead by then in all probability but my children will be roughly my age now and my grandchildren will only be 29, 31, 35 and 46. Trump may be dead then, too, but his own son Barron will only be 34. You’d think he would care about the boy, who might be able to catch fish from the roof of Trump Tower by then if the oceans continue to rise.

The HuffPo points out that the economic effects of leaving the Paris Agreement “would likely be devastating. The U.S. is poised to lose access to fast-growing clean energy markets as Europe, India and China gain major footholds in an industry estimated to be worth $6 trillion by 2030. Countries that tax emissions could now put a tariff on American-made imports, complicating Trump’s plans to reclaim the U.S. mantle as a top manufacturing hub.”

Therefore I can’t imagine what motivates a man like Trump to purposely tear down everything good about this country unless (1) he is still trying to erase Barack Obama from history, or (2) there is money for him in it somehow, so I’m guessing that he has fossil fuel stocks and other investments in coal, oil and gas production that will help carry him financially during his declining years.

And speaking of declining years, I think this will be the year that Trump experiences the full force of covfefe. Turn on your red strobe lights, Mr. Faux President, and let’s get down and boogie.

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