U.S. President Barack Obama will go to Copenhagen for a U.N. climate change meeting on December 9, hoping to add momentum to an international process despite slow progress on a domestic bill to cut carbon emissions. Obama planned to make a visit at the beginning of the climate negotiations in Denmark, an administration official told Reuters on Wednesday, before picking up the Nobel Peace Prize at a ceremony in neighboring Oslo.

Despite the myriad incorrect predictions on the matter in the status quo media, this is no surprise to Climate Progress readers — see my October 9 post Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize in part because “the USA is now playing a more constructive role in meeting the great climatic challenges the world is confronting.” Looks like he’ll be going to Copenhagen after all!

Still, the media can always find something to criticize Obama about.  Reuters adds:

Obama did not plan to return for the end of the December 7-18 meeting, when roughly 65 other heads of state and government are expected to attend, the official said.

Obama has made climate change a top priority of his administration, but a bill to cut U.S. emissions is bogged down in the U.S. Senate. The U.S. House of Representatives has passed its version of climate change legislation.

“Bogged down”?  Or is it on track for passage next year? (see Sen. Baucus (D-MT): “There’s no doubt that this Congress is going to pass climate change legislation.”)  You decide whether that is accurate reporting or questionable editorializing.

Most nations have given up hopes of agreeing to a binding legal treaty text in Copenhagen, partly because of uncertainty about what the United States will be able to offer.

Or perhaps they’ve “given up hopes” of a binding legal treaty in Copenhagen because the leaders of the big emitters recently told the world their wasn’t going to be one!  (see World leaders say Copenhagen to be a steppingstone to final climate deal)

Environmentalists had hoped Obama would be present for the leaders meeting at the end of the talks to give legitimacy to a “politically binding” agreement that host Denmark still hopes to achieve.

And just who would these “environmentalists” be?  I’m not saying they don’t exist, just that Reuters doesn’t even bother to quote a single one.

Reuters can do better than this piece.


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