Wonderful, wonderful Copenhagen?

With Christmas looming what better way to bring peace and goodwill to all men (other than those who own energy companies/ lobby firms/ former governors of Alaska) than striking a global deal on carbon emissions at Copenhagen? Sadly, it looks as if the developing world will end up with a lump of coal in its stocking again this year.

Despite the fact that the press is full of the news that Barack Obama will be flying into Copenhagen at the end of the week to wave his magic wand of accord (incidentally, why was he unable to tie his Copenhagen trip in with his visit to Norway last week, which is practically next door? Surely the Nobel commission could have set the date of the ceremony back a week – they’ve been appeasing to the extent of sycophancy in every other respect…) I wouldn’t hold my breath for a miracle, folks. There’s a truth universally acknowledged with summits: in order for a successful agreement to be reached, the policy wonks need to make the policy BEFORE the leaders descend to sign the documents. No agreement, no document. And agreeing to agree in future is a cop out.

So the strategists are frantically trying to patch things together before the big boys hit town, sort of like a student running around with an air-freshener because their parents have come home unexpectedly during a mammoth session of quality toking. Meanwhile, the world’s media is acting as their ‘wingman’ by adopting a ‘look-over-there-it’s-a-dancing-polar-bear!’ approach. No wonder the developing nations walked out in disgust yesterday.

And then, at the height of this fragile situation, America’s favourite former beauty queen has decided to stick her Jimmy Choos in and find something other than American foreign policy that she’s ill-equipped to comment on. Taking time out from promoting her book, Palin wrote a widely syndicated article for the Washington Post in which she states she is against doing anything major about climate change on the basis that it may cost money. Good call! Except that many economists, including Lord Stern, believe that doing nothing about climate change now will be more costly in the long run.

In her article, Palin also warns against politicising science – seemingly unaware that writing an article about science from a republican protectionist standpoint counts as politicising science. Of course, Sarah Palin isn’t against politicising science out of some regard for objective evidence-based policy. What she really means is that climate change should be left to the scientists because they have no ability to make laws or effect actual change on the general population. In other words, let’s keep science theoretical (and put the bible into practice).

Palin’s real regard for scientists makes itself clear later in the article. Referring to the climategate emails, Palin says:

The emails reveal that leading climate “experts” deliberately destroyed records

She actually puts ‘the quotes of sarcasm’ around the word “experts” – just how more expert do the country’s leading climate scientists need to be? I’m going to go out on a limb and say, probably more expert than someone who thinks they can see Russia from their house.

The truth is, Sarah Palin doesn’t believe in global warming because she knows she won’t be elected until hell freezes over but her comments are deeply unhelpful. It’s time we stopped seeing ourselves in isolation and it’s high time we stopped continuing this selfish misguided protection of our traditional interests – it makes no sense environmentally, economically or socially. The arguments for doing something now about climate change (let’s be clear – anthropogenic climate change) are there. They need to be effectively restated urgently and then we need to move away from engaging in debate with procrastinators like Palin and towards a global solution that is fair to all.

And if the BBC broadcasts one more news cycle featuring dancing polar bears (no offence Oxfam) I am going to poke out my eyes with nuclear fusion rods.