Saturday, June 3, 2017

We Never Liked the French Anyway

On Thursday, the White House had tweeted, "The Paris Accord is a bad deal for Americans," and linked to a video which said the agreement "undermines" US competitiveness and jobs, was "badly negotiated" by former president Barack Obama and "accomplishes little." In its surprise response on Friday, France's foreign ministry tweeted, "We've seen the @WhiteHouse video about the #ParisAccord. We disagree - so we've changed it."

[...]

In the new video, statements such as "The Paris Accord is a bad deal for America" are changed to "Leaving the Paris Accord is a bad deal for America - and the world."

The video also refers to major companies such as ExxonMobil and Microsoft which "disagree" that the accord will "undermine" US jobs. It also quotes the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on the urgent need to reduce carbon emissions.

The tweet includes a now-popular hashtag "Make Our Planet Great Again" - a cheeky adaptation of the nationalist slogan used by Trump on his election campaign trail.

[...]

Macron, along with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni, also released a statement saying that the agreement cannot be renegotiated, as Trump had demanded.

The three leaders said they took note "with regret" the US decision, but added that they regard the accord as "a cornerstone in the cooperation between our countries, for effectively and timely tackling climate change".

  alJazeera
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

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