December 15, 2007

Bali Climate Talks - Global Warming - New York Times

How should I reconcile these two statements? They are both true, but the spin by the NY Times gives me indigestion. If the Times is reporting news and doing so with credibility, the statement that includes George W. Bush should also include William J. Clinton.

"The overall agreement, if completed by 2009, would also ensure continuity for parties to the Kyoto Protocol, which took effect in 2005 and is the only existing addendum to the original climate treaty. The Kyoto pact limits emissions by three dozen industrialized countries but has been rejected by the United States under President George W. Bush."


From Wikipedia:

On July 25, 1997, before the Kyoto Protocol was finalized (although it had been fully negotiated, and a penultimate draft was finished), the U.S. Senate unanimously passed by a 95–0 vote the Byrd-Hagel Resolution (S. Res. 98),[66][67] which stated the sense of the Senate was that the United States should not be a signatory to any protocol that did not include binding targets and timetables for developing as well as industrialized nations or "would result in serious harm to the economy of the United States". On November 12, 1998, Vice President Al Gore symbolically signed the protocol. Both Gore and Senator Joseph Lieberman indicated that the protocol would not be acted upon in the Senate until there was participation by the developing nations.[68] The Clinton Administration never submitted the protocol to the Senate for ratification. (my emphasis added)

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