As World Leaders Gather At UN For Climate Talks, Trump Will Be Next Door
Credit to Author: Steve Hanley| Date: Mon, 23 Sep 2019 11:00:57 +0000
Published on September 23rd, 2019 | by Steve Hanley
September 23rd, 2019 by Steve Hanley
World leaders from 60 countries are coming to United Nations headquarters in New York City next week to discuss how they will respond to the climate crisis caused by humanity’s insistence on making the combustion of fossil fuels the basis of civilization. Emmanuel Macron of France will be there. Boris Johnson of the UK will be there. Narendra Modi of India will be there. The speakers will outline “only the best plans, only the most committed leaders will be on the stage,” according to Luis Alfonso de Alba, the UN’s special envoy for the climate summit.
Credit: United Nations
But Donald Trump will not be there. Instead, he will be next door in the same building addressing a conference on religious freedom. According to The Guardian, the administration decided at the last minute to book one of the largest conference rooms at the UN for Trump’s appearance.
The purpose of his appearance is intuitively obvious to the most casual observer — to deflect attention from the climate conference by drawing attention to himself. It’s precisely the kind of “up yours” moment we have come to expect from the dangerous lunatic who is America’s alleged national leader.
Mary Robinson, former Irish president and ex-UN high commissioner for human rights, understands perfectly. “He’ll clog up the whole system. He won’t go to the climate summit and he wants the distraction factor, I suppose.” The fact that an American president who has declared war on Muslims would attend a meeting on religious freedom instead of dealing with an existential threat to all humans is just the icing on the cake.
Following on the heels of the largest global climate protest in history, skipping the UN summit meeting is a carefully calculated snub to America and the entire world. “I will see you all in Hell before I lift a finger to address the climate crisis,” Trump is saying. And Republicans are cheering. Their attitude appears to be, “Yeah, he’s a jackass but he’s our jackass.” The Republican party has made it clear that will support the antics of this unhinged man with their dying breath — which will occur on January 20, 2021 at 9:00 AM when the next US president is sworn in.
Let’s be clear. Donald Trump is a clear and present danger to the United States of America and the world. He is like a drunk driver speeding the wrong way on the highway during rush hour. And his enablers in the Republican party are applauding his every move. His antics are tearing America apart and making the US into a pariah nation. Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Trump is living proof of that adage.
Lenore Taylor, an Australian journalist with 30 years of experience, visited the US recently and was struck by how unhinged this president is in person. Viewing a press conference about a section of the border wall under construction along the US border, she watched Tramp rant on and on and on about how solid the concrete was and how engineers from three countries had visited the site to learn more about advanced “concrete technology.”
He raved about how 20 world class mountain climbers were unable to scale it — “That’s all they do, they love to climb mountains.” — and how the wall could not be penetrated even by someone using a blowtorch — as if poor migrants from Central America would drag a blowtorch along with them on their 2,000 mile long journey. He called the wall “amazing, world class, virtually impenetrable” and “a good, strong rust color.” That’s what making America great again is all about, apparently.
Taylor was amazed by Tramp’s “full and alarming incoherence.” News reports often fail to convey the extent to which is unable to form complete thoughts or present ideas in a consistent fashion as he darts from topic to topic, seemingly at random.
I have been accused of being too harsh in my judgments of Tramp. The truth is I have not been harsh enough. The man is a demagogue, a narcissistic, self-aggrandizing fool who always puts his need for constant adulation first. He has the mental age of pre-pubescent teenager. He is a serial liar who cannot distinguish fantasy from reality.
He is nothing more than a charlatan and a con man. He deserves nothing more than our utter contempt for the despicable way he has embraced fossil fuels to the detriment of the health and safety of every American, including the gun toting white supremacists who so zealously support him. “Everything Trump Touches Dies,” writes author Rick Wilson. What a perfect epitaph for the worst president in US history.
Steve Hanley Steve writes about the interface between technology and sustainability from his home in Rhode Island and anywhere else the Singularity may lead him. His motto is, “Life is not measured by how many breaths we take but by the number of moments that take our breath away!” You can follow him on Google + and on Twitter.