The US and China must unite to fight the climate crisis, not each other – Bernie Sanders. Can a corporatist imperial sheepdog such as Bernie Sanders ever be an ally? 美國和中國必須團結起來應對氣候危機，而不是彼此 – 伯尼·桑德斯。 像伯尼·桑德斯這樣的社團主義帝國牧羊犬可以成為盟友嗎?
Would the Guardian have printed him if he were actually saying something rational and constructive?
Highly unlikely.
This is virtue signalling, in that it is designed to make not one whit of difference on climate change.
Sanders has undermined his statement even as he made it:
It is no great secret the Chinese government is undertaking many policies that we and the international community should oppose. They are cruelly repressing and interning the Uyghurs, threatening Taiwan and stifling freedom of expression in Tibet and Hong Kong.
China has bullied its neighbors, abused the global trading system, stolen technology and is building out a dystopian surveillance state.
By telling a crock of lies and insulting the other party even as you call for cooperation with them is a trick right out of the Joe Biden “COIN” handbook. It is an impressive feat of bad faith, akin to the US police practice of simultaneously assaulting citizens while asking them to cooperate (for the camera and the public).
If Bernie were honest, he would say:
That China is doing extraordinary things to transform the world towards a sustainable future. By itself, despite being a net GHG creditor nation, with 1/8 the per capita GHG emissions–it will reduce global warming 0.3-0.6 degrees celsius through renewables,afforestation*, and other sustainable practices. By itself. China is the only bright spot in the future against global climate change. This is what forward-thinking, science-based, conscientious leadership is capable of. If only we had that in the US. If only we had real socialists, not corporate wolves in socialist sheep’s clothing.
It is the US that is disengaging with China. The US needs to re-engage and cooperate. China has always extended the hand of cooperation on global warming and other critical matters. The UN SDG’s passed because of Chinese advocacy and support. “Both sides need to re-engage” is a dishonest canard, and Bernie knows it.
In particular if the US were serious about Climate change rather than global unipolar dominance, it would stop preventing the importation of Chinese polysilicon and other components needed for a domestic renewable energy system.
Polysilicon for solar renewables is banned precisely because it is supposed to be built with slave labor in Xinjiang. This is a deliberate lie, designed to cause hardship and stress to the Uighurs in Xinjiang. The US sponsored a Salafist-Takfiri terror movement designed to carve out a sharia-based theocratic ethnostate (“East Turkestan”–a region that is mutli-ethnic and multi-religious) within China. Think of a US-controlled Salafist Israel deep inside Chinese territory and you get the idea. The Chinese thwarted these US plans by deradicalization, job creation, and economic development. (This is the contrast between being a marxist materialist–and a capitalist imperialist, like the US with its wars of aggression).
This polysilicon ban along with the XJ cotton and tomato bans, is intended to turn the clock back, re-impoverish XJ, and in so doing, once again, create conditions of discontent to prepare the ground for another resurgence of terrorism in the region. In the meantime, any attempts by China to maintain security stability, development and harmony are depicted as HR violations, intending to put China in a bind..
China is building coal plants–which are all modern, high efficiency supercritical or ultra-supercritical plants, comparable in real emissions to natural gas energy plants. They are doing this most likely because the US threatens to choke off other China’s energy supplies by triggering war in the SCS. This is part of the plan of war against China, detailed in ASB and the RAND corporation’s 2015 “Thinking through the unthinkable”. As a result, China needs to have a backup energy plan as it transitions to a zero-carbon future–which it is doing rapidly. It generates more KWH of sustainable energy than the rest of the world combined. In fact, it’s worth noting, China builds these plants, but often does not turn them on, or uses them with great circumspection.
Note, natural gas plants are supposed to emit 1/2 of the CO2 that coal fired plants emit. However, in practice, methane (the key hydrocarbon in natural gas) is 84 times more potent and damaging as a GHG than CO2. All gas plants leak methane, both during transport and operation. (Note, Coal doesn’t leak at all due to its solid form). Methane leak rates are claimed to be about 1.5-2.3% according to the EPA, but in actuality are estimated to be 5x higher for pipelines alone. This is not surprising, given the decrepit state of US infrastructure. A recent scientific paper calculates leakage at 9% in the permian basin. Leakage during fracking alone is estimated at 7.9%. Due to these leaks, gas-fired plants in the US have no advantage over the advanced supercritical and ultra supercritical coal fired plants in China. In fact, the only advantage of gas over coal is like that of recycling, a virtue signalling scam.
BS says: The US is rightly organizing its allies to press Beijing on these and other issues.
But organizing most of our national effort around a zero-sum global confrontation with China is unlikely to change Chinese behavior and will alienate allies and partners.
BS is BSing. China’s behavior is not what needs changing.
It’s the US’s behavior, both towards China and regarding global warming. Most of China’s top leadership are scientists, and they are working conscientiously towards a sustainable, carbon neutral future.
It’s the US–where a good portion of its leadership do not even believe in global warming–even as they blame China for it–that is the problem.
To begin with, the US could start out by not waging endless war. The pentagon is a huge emitter of GHG.
The sabotage of the NSI & NSII alone resulted in a release equivalent to millions of tons of CO2.
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