There's No Progress Like Slow Progress

Lots of talk, no targets at Brit-hosted climate meetings

Twenty nations participating in a climate-change confab in London this week vowed to take dramatic action to stop global warming. Hee hee ... we never get tired of pulling your chain, do we? Actually, the energy-hungry attendees -- the G8 industrial nations and up-and-coming economic powers like China, India, and Brazil -- pledged cooperation on deploying clean-energy technologies and mitigation techniques like carbon sequestration. Specific goals and timelines were notably absent from the agreement. On Tuesday night, U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair, who's recently edged away from his long-standing support for Kyoto-type greenhouse-gas emissions caps in favor of U.S.-style emphasis on informal measures and technological solutions, told the assembled environment ministers, "the blunt truth ... is that no country will want to sacrifice its economy in order to meet this challenge." Easy to say while you still have a choice ...