Clinton's Climate Negotiator - "The Word (Kyoto) Is Radioactive" To Bush - Reuters

[hatrack]

LONDON - Washington is likely to stay out of the UN Kyoto Protocol for curbing greenhouse gases beyond 2012 even with a shift in power to Democrats from Republicans, a former top US trade and economics official said.

Stuart Eizenstat, lead negotiator for former US President Bill Clinton on the Kyoto Protocol for curbing greenhouse gas emissions, said changes were afoot at state and business level but the mere mention of Kyoto was a red rag and would remain so. "In the United States there is growing interest and growing concern but no chance of joining Kyoto," he told Reuters by telephone. "The word is radioactive."

EDIT

Mid-term elections last month gave Democrats control of Congress by a tiny margin, reawakening speculation of a shift towards accepting Kyoto-style caps.

But for Eizenstat, a former US deputy treasury secretary and under secretary of commerce for international trade, the numbers simply do not add up because it needs a two-thirds majority to get laws through -- and that looks unlikely given most Republicans' ideological hatred of Kyoto. "With the changeover in Congress we really do have the potential for greater interest but not really legislation. It hasn't changed the dynamic," he added.

EDIT

http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/39566/story.htm

[lisa58]

1. Who cares what bush thinks...

...he doesn't care what we think!