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29-Mar-2024
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Mr Trump is trying to save money rather than the planet

          US President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw his country from the 2015 Paris climate agreement has irked world leaders, businesses and scientists alike.

          It has also promoted many to anticipate the world’s impending doom with some Twitter users forecasting global disruption and proposing possible solutions and lifestyle changes.

          The Weather channel’s homepage on 1 June offered a range of “proof” of how the world could “suffer”. A screen grab of the page was widely shared online, with at least 100,000 interactions and was also archived.

          Meanwhile, one Democrat commentator on twitter predicted plans for a Trump library and museum underwater in New York. 

          According to Trump, “the Paris climate accord…disadvantages the United States….leaving American workers and taxpayers to absorb the costs in terms of lost jobs, lower wages, shuttered factories, and vastly diminished economic production.”

          The fact is, the Paris climate accord cannot disadvantage any country. It is a nonbinding agreement. There is no enforcement mechanism in the agreement, and no penalties, for missing declared targets. Each country can pursue its own course of action on reducing emissions and tailor its own climate change strategy. However, an ever bigger and more debilitating lie is one that the  Republican Party has been peddling for years and Trump articulated at the White House: that pursuing a green future will cost American   jobs and hamstring the US economy.

          Among the biggest opponents of the 

Paris deal are coal companies,  which is hardly surprising, since coal burning is one of the worst contributors to climate change.

          Yet the US coal industry represents just over 50,000 American jobs – a 100,000 decline from 30 years ago. Pulling out of Paris will not save one coal mining job or revive an industry that even its biggest boosters concede is not coming back.

          In contrast, there are more than 260,000 jobs in the US solar industry and more than 100,000 in wind. In all, more than 800,000 Americans have jobs in the renewable energy industry.

          If there’s any silver lining to be found in Trump’s terrible decision, it’s that other countries actually recognize the dangers of global warming and the economic benefits of trying to combat it. The fight will continue without America.

          The deal actually unites all the world’s nations in a single agreement on tackling climate change for the first time in history. Coming to a consensus among nearly 200 countries on the need to cut greenhouse gas emissions is regarded by many observers as an achievement in itself and has been hailed as “historic”.

          President Donald Trump faced a chorus of global disapproval in the wake of his decision to pull the United States out of the Paris agreement on climate change, with allies and rivals uniting to accuse him of failing future generations.

          Following trump’s announcement, German chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Emmanuel Macron and Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni  put out a joint statement in which they pledged

to implement the Paris climate agreement notwithstanding the withdrawal of the US.

          Macron decried Trump’s move ina live televised address, saying that “on the climate there is no plan B because there is no planet B” and that “we will not renegotiate a less ambitious deal”.

          Macron threw one of Trump’s campaign slogans back at him, saying: “We all share the same responsibility to make our planet great again.”

          Merkel called Trump’s decision “very regrettable.”

          Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said that Trump’s decision was “disappointing but not at all surprising,” since it was entirely as expected and as predicted and as promised by him.”

          “Climate change is a global challenge and no country can stay away from it,” said Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswomen Hua Chunying. 

          While Americans make up just over 4 percent of the world’s population, they 

are responsible for almost a third of the excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. China emits more carbon into the atmosphere today, but according to the reports, the United States has a long head start on burning coal, oil and natural gas. 

          But since Mr. Trump has decided to leave, other countries - especially the poorer ones - could consider doing the same. That could reverse years of hard-won progress on climate change.  The United States will join Nicaragua and Syria as the only countries that are not part of the Paris agreement. Most Americans say the United States should participate in the Paris accord. But Trump didn’t seem to be questioning climate change-only the economic burdens of the climate change.

          Under the terms of the agreement, the United States cannot exit until Nov 4, 2020-the day after the next presidential election. That could make climate change a future campaign issue.

          He is trying to save money rather than the planet. When will trump realize the fact that without this planet, nobody could survive, even Americans!!