Axios: Trump intends to leave Paris climate accord

[SoLongAtlas]

"I was elected to serve the people of PITTSBURGH, not Paris." He doesn't know Pittsburgh is a tech area now, not a coal town.

[Middle-aged Europe]

I'm still a bit confused as to whether Trump intends to abide to or violate Article 28 of the Paris Agreement:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Which means that the United States could leave the Agreement no earlier than November 4, 2020. The New York Times reports that his administration will abide to that stipulation, Trump's speech implies that it won't. Then again, time has shown that you can't take Trump always literally when he's chest-thumping.

[Gass3268]

Trump doing a good job on this. This agreement doesn't address climate, it just shifts coal jobs around the world.

Coal needs to die.

[Gass3268]

You must be logged in to read this quote.

[heatcharger]

Trump saying he'll "renegotiate" a voluntary, non-binding pact is complete BS and more of his deranged obsession with trying to destroy Obama's legacy.

But I hope Jill Stein and Susan Sarandon are enthused.

[Grumpier Than Uncle Joe]

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Good riddance, cupcake.

[Gass3268]

California and New York have announced that they will uphold the standards regardless.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

[Figueira]

Thanks, Jill Stein voters

Anyone who still supports Trump at this point is a traitor to humanity.

"I was elected to serve the people of PITTSBURGH, not Paris." He doesn't know Pittsburgh is a tech area now, not a coal town.

Not to mention Pittsburgh voted overwhelmingly for Clinton.

[The_Doctor]

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Good riddance, cupcake.

Just out of curiosity, what's your position on climate change? That line sounds like "if it makes liberals angry, I'm for it," which doesn't really sound like you have a definite ideology, Grumps, beyond making Democrats angry.

I mean this seriously, but you seem the type of guy to watch Fox news a lot rather than being an objective reader of news.

[Figueira]

California and New York have announced that they will uphold the standards regardless.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Good for them. Massachusetts should do the same.

[Figueira]

We out.

I hope you enjoy your new home underwater.

[Gass3268]

Pittsburgh will uphold the agreement:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

There's a 4 year waiting period, so he can't leave unless Democrats blow another election.

Even if he can't technically "leave" for a while, he can definitely compel congress to change US law to purposely break the rules.

While Congress can do that on their own - and Trump can sign the law, if he remembers - count me among the very skeptical when it comes to Trump's ability to compel Congress to do anything. (Short of declaring a Make American Great Cultural Revolution and having his redhats round them up.)

[Figueira]

Pittsburgh will uphold the agreement:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Come on, Trump. Serve the people of Pittsburgh like you were elected to do.

[The_Doctor]

As I said, this is not unexpected. We saw this coming months ago. Trump's political base is reliant on coal and old economy jobs. Not the new economy, which overwhelmingly voted against him. Why did we expect him to try to cater to voters who would vote against him no matter what and donors who are going to donate to his opposition, no matter what?

Is it right? No. But we should understand, again, why Trump did this. The vast majority of GOP Congressmen and political leadership are situated in areas that are, again, Old Economy type areas and overwhelmingly white, not exactly educated types. (Of course, I'm generalizing but). The GOP ideology is situated in winning blue collar white areas as the bulk of their political support.

GOP money comes from Texas and the oil industry and the South, not California, not Silicon Valley, or renewable energy, either, which is important. There was no money in support of staying in the deal.

This is what it boiled down to, no matter what. Trump sees no political upside to staying in Paris, and he's a politician. The system doesn't reward long term strategy that has you damaging the people that you voted for. That's not our Constitutional system.

One key mistake that Democrats have made here is that they never bothered to help these areas make the transition to clean energy and high tech areas and relied on people from San Francisco and New York to make the climate deal. That really shrunk the base of support of people who would aggressively push for us staying in the deal on the GOP side. It was a very partisan deal, in that analytical sense.

Why do you ask blue collar white voters to put their (shrinking but still there) jobs at risk with no support to transition to new jobs and towns to try to make a bold leap without economic support? They voted in fear against the deal in a couple of areas.  

[Comrade Funk]

How many hurricanes, droughts, floods, et al does it take?

The consequences of decades of railing against science as 'elitism'.

[lordroel]

Well the US can now be happy that it join Syria and Nicaragua as the only countries who are not members of the pact, even Palestine and North Korea signed it.

[Grumpier Than Uncle Joe]

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Good riddance, cupcake.

Just out of curiosity, what's your position on climate change? That line sounds like "if it makes liberals angry, I'm for it," which doesn't really sound like you have a definite ideology, Grumps, beyond making Democrats angry.

I mean this seriously, but you seem the type of guy to watch Fox news a lot rather than being an objective reader of news.

Oh I believe some of the climate change is man made, and some naturally occurring.  You can read studies that fits both far-end viewpoints.  The U.S. is getting "cleaner" if you will, but is it a good deal really for American industry?  I don't mind us re-negotiating the accord at all if we can do our part and improve our country and economy at the same time.  I don't think we're  OMGZ land, that's all.

Oh and I don't watch TV news....especially Fux News.  I might put on the PBS News Hour, but I read NBC, CNN, USA Today and Fox's news feeds.

[Orthogonian Society Treasurer]

We will no longer surrender this country or its people to the false song of globalism.

[Grumpier Than Uncle Joe]

Oh God, now Obama weighs in.

[GeorgiaModerate]

Well the US can now be happy that it join Syria and Nicaragua as the only countries who are not members of the pact, even Palestine and North Korea signed it.

Nicaragua didn't join because they thought the accord didn't go far enough.  They have a goal to be 90% renewable energy by 2020.

[Gass3268]

The one positive point is that the next President can sign the United States right back up. Unfortunately that will mean 4 more years of severe damage.

[Yank2133]

"I was elected to serve the people of PITTSBURGH, not Paris." He doesn't know Pittsburgh is a tech area now, not a coal town.

He also lost Pittsburgh.

[Yank2133]

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Good riddance, cupcake.

Just out of curiosity, what's your position on climate change? That line sounds like "if it makes liberals angry, I'm for it," which doesn't really sound like you have a definite ideology, Grumps, beyond making Democrats angry.

I mean this seriously, but you seem the type of guy to watch Fox news a lot rather than being an objective reader of news.

This is the only thing this people believe in these days. The only good thing about the Trump election is that it finally exposed the GOP's voters as full of **** when it comes to ideology. Granted, I have know this for years.....but it is nice to see out in the open.

[Technocracy Timmy]

We will no longer surrender this country or its people to the false song of globalism.

We will now surrender it to Vladimir Putin and Trump's cronies instead.