With the periodic regularity of swarming cicadas filling the air with loud buzzing, reliability of flocking swallows returning to Capistrano, and insect-minded determination of migrating monarch butterflies traveling thousands of miles seeking refuge from cold conditions, many thousands of activists will fly thousands of miles this week to converge at a ritualistic annual U.N. Climate Summit ... this time a 28th "Conference of the Parties" (COP28) in Dubai.
Whereas public figures from nearly 200 countries are expected to attend, President Joe Biden will reportedly miss the occasion.
According to The Wall Street Journal, he will instead attend a National Christmas Tree lighting.
This doesn't mean, of course, that Joe doesn't support the U.N. climate crisis mantra which he asserted in September poses an even greater threat than nuclear war.
Just to prove it, no grandchildren's stockings will reportedly be hung on the White House mantel this year.
This apparently avoids the necessity of leaving an environmentally polluting lump of coal in one for Hunter's love child whom the family has finally had to acknowledge after a tradition of publicly recognizing only the other six.
On the other hand, as the New York Post's Jesse O'Neill wrote last Christmas, "The only thing worse than getting coal in your stocking is not even having one hung for you."
Although everyone attending COP28 will likely agree that our SUVs and natural gas stoves, not their private jets, are setting the planet on fire, yet from their perspective, merely killing fossil-fueled prosperity won't go nearly far enough.
No, that still leaves problems of deadly climate-killing agricultural nitrogen and animal flatulence.
Not to worry.
COP28 promises to make this a priority, dedicating a full day during the two-week summit expressly to solving these urgent matters as well.
As Tim Benton, research director of the Environment and Society Program at the Chatham House think tank, said: "It is unprecedented that food systems is on the political agenda in this coming COP and it's an opportunity that we need to support. On the other hand, it is not separate from the need to phase out fossil fuels and is not separate from the energy transition."
However, giving up energy and food abundance in a hopeless crusade to save the planet from warming a couple of degrees may not be entirely popular winning political strategies.
Take for example, developments in the Netherlands following a 2022 Dutch court ruling that would aim to cut nitrogen emissions from livestock like cows, pigs and chickens in half by 2030.
The only way to accomplish this would be through government forcings of farming bankruptcies and land grabs.
Also bear in mind the global impacts here as the Netherlands, with a total surface area that would fit inside Ohio, is second only to the U.S. in global agriculture.
Responses by farmers and supporters were immediate.
Within days, rage against upcoming land confiscations and mandated livestock cuts prompted rural processions of tractors with banners draped on their grills stating, "No Farmers, No Food," while demonstrators stacked piles of manure on highways and lit them on fire.
By 2023 it had become clear that a seismic revolution was occurring when a Farmer-Citizen Movement in English (BBB Party in short) founded less than four years earlier won a stunning upset victory after centrally targeting Prime Minister Mark Rutte's elitest nitrogen plan.
This was followed with shock waves throughout Europe just days ago when strong conservative Geert Wilders who had supported the farmer demonstrations won a massive victory in a Dutch election pole position to form a ruling coalition to become the next prime minister.
The EU's green agenda will face increasing political climate pressure as next year's European parliament elections test voter priorities on some unpopular national initiatives, such as Germany's attempt to ban new gas boilers.
French President Emmanuel Macron dropped his proposal for such a ban earlier this year, adding evidence that alarmist, destructive and costly climate-premised policies can also have bad political consequences.
This being the case, let's wish COP28 every success in getting conservative U.S. climate realists elected in 2024.
Larry Bell is an endowed professor of space architecture at the University of Houston where he founded the Sasakawa International Center for Space Architecture and the graduate space architecture program. His latest of 12 books is "Architectures Beyond Boxes and Boundaries: My Life By Design" (2022). Read Larry Bell's Reports — More Here.
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