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      The BBC’s flat Earth policy should be roundly condemned | Letters

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      The BBC’s flat Earth policy should be roundly condemnedHelen Johnson, Bob Ward, Dr Richard Milne and Piers Burnett on the BBC’s director of editorial policy and his pursuit of impartiality It’s hard to know whether to laugh or cry at the BBC’s latest pronouncement rejecting cancel culture, when the example given is the willingness to give a fair hearing to flat-Earthers (BBC does not subscribe to ‘cancel culture’, says director of editorial policy, 11 January). It’s nothing new for the BBC to give a platform to fantasists, of course; but there did seem to be an acknowledgment post-Brexit that it had perhaps been wrong to give equal weighting to fact and delusion. And there must be someone at the national broadcaster who regrets affording quite so many opportunities to Nigel Lawson to deny climate change reality on the airwaves.Which other minority beliefs can we now expect to be expounded in the 8.10am interview on the Today programme? It’s surely time we looked seriously at the view that the Covid vaccine is connecting us to a vast AI network, and that upstate New York was once inhabited by giants. There are also apparently people who still believe that Boris Johnson is a great prime minister, though finding a government minister to represent that view this week may be beyond even the bending-over-backwards, non-cancelling capacity of the BBC.Helen JohnsonSedbergh, Cumbria It was disappointing to read that David Jordan, the BBC’s director of editorial policy, told a House of Lords committee that “if a lot of people believed in flat Earth we’d need to address it more” in order to ensure impartiality. He appears to have forgotten that the BBC’s editorial guidelines also state that the broadcaster is “committed to achieving due accuracy in all its output”. Or perhaps he is genuinely unaware that for the past couple of millennia the shape of the Earth has not been just a matter of opinion, but instead has been established as a verifiable scientific fact.Either way, let us hope that the BBC’s new action plan on impartiality and editorial standards does not lead the broadcaster to promote more of the daft and dangerous views of those who believe that Covid-19 vaccines do not work or greenhouse gas emissions are not heating Earth.Bob WardPolicy and communications director, Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment The BBC’s stated policy to “represent all points of view” is worrying on two levels. First, where does the policy stop? There are people out there who think the value of a person depends upon their gender or skin tone – should those views be represented? What about Holocaust deniers? And those who think homosexuality, or marrying the wrong person, should be punished by death?Second, one of the BBC’s worst failures this century has been to present ill-informed opinion as being equal in value to professional expertise – most notably on climate change. At the absolute minimum, it needs to make crystal clear who is and who is not an expert. A lot of misinformation originates from well-funded pressure groups, which need no help getting their message across. So if we must hear ill-informed opinions, let it be from a person on the street – then at least the defence of representing public opinion would have some merit.Dr Richard MilneEdinburgh According to your report, David Jordan, the BBC’s director of editorial policy, told a Lords committee that the corporation does not subscribe to “cancel culture” and that everyone should have their views represented by the BBC, even if they believe Earth is flat, adding that “flat-Earthers are not going to get as much space as people who believe the Earth is round … And if a lot of people believed in flat Earth we’d need to address it more.”I understand that many Americans fervently believe in the QAnon conspiracy theory and most of the Republican party believes that Donald Trump won the last presidential election – and here in the UK there are substantial numbers of anti-vaxxers. I assume that Mr Jordan will now ensure that the views of these groups are given airtime on the BBC’s channels commensurate with their numbers.In fact, it appears that Mr Jordan has no genuine editorial policy – which would require him to make judgments based on facts and values – only a desperate anxiety to appease the cultural warriors on the right of the Conservative party.Piers BurnettSinnington, North YorkshireTopicsBBCHouse of LordsConservativesClimate crisisCoronavirusBrexitQAnonlettersReuse this content More

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      From Kremlin leak to sperm counts: our readers’ favourite stories of 2021

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      From Kremlin leak to sperm counts: our readers’ favourite stories of 2021 Here are 20 articles that may have helped convince people to support the Guardian’s journalismThe Guardian benefited from hundreds of thousands of acts of support from digital readers in 2021 – almost one for every minute of the year. Here we look at the articles from 2021 that had a big hand in convincing readers to support our open, independent journalism.Kremlin papers appear to show Putin’s plot to put Trump in White House – Luke Harding, Julian Borger and Dan SabbaghExclusive leak reveals Moscow’s deliberations on how it might help Donald Trump win 2016 US presidential race‘We are witnessing a crime against humanity’ – Arundhati RoyThe author and activist plumbs the depths of India’s Covid catastrophe and finds much to reproach the prime minister, Narendra Modi, for‘I’m facing a prison sentence’: US Capitol rioters plead with Trump for pardons – Oliver MilmanThe past very quickly catches up with those who ransacked the seat of US democracyClimate crisis: Scientists spot warning signs of Gulf Stream collapse – Damian CarringtonA shutdown of the Atlantic current circulation system would have catastrophic consequences around the worldAn Afghan woman in Kabul: ‘Now I have to burn everything I achieved’ – A Kabul residentAs the Taliban take the Afghan capital, one woman describes being “a victim of a war that men started”.Plummeting sperm counts, shrinking penises: toxic chemicals threaten humanity – Erin BrockovichA warning from the environmental advocate and author about the damage being wrought by toxic chemicalsPandora papers: biggest ever leak of offshore data exposes financial secrets of rich and powerful – Guardian investigations teamMillions of documents reveal deals and assets of more than 100 billionaires, 30 world leaders and 300 public officialsThe Hill We Climb: the poem that stole the inauguration show – Amanda GormanShe spoke, and millions listened, at Joe Biden’s inaugurationRates of Parkinson’s disease are exploding. A common chemical may be to blame – Adrienne MateiIs an epidemic on the horizon? And is an unpronounceable chemical compound to blame?Capitalism is killing the planet – it’s time to stop buying into our own destruction – George MonbiotThe Guardian columnist at his most incandescent‘Take it easy, nothing matters in the end’: William Shatner at 90, on love, loss and Leonard Nimoy – Hadley FreemanThe actor discusses longevity, tragedy, friendship, success and his Star Trek co-star‘Our biggest challenge? Lack of imagination’: the scientists turning the desert green – Steve RoseIn China, scientists have turned vast swathes of arid land into a lush oasis. Now a team of maverick engineers want to do the same to the SinaiOff-road, off-grid: the modern nomads wandering America’s back country – Stevie TrujilloAcross US public lands thousands of people are taking to van lifeThe greatest danger for the US isn’t China. It’s much closer to home – Robert ReichThe columnist and former secretary of labour warns of enemies withinThe rice of the sea: how a tiny grain could change the way humanity eats – Ashifa KassamCelebrated chef discovered something in the seagrass that could transform our understanding of the sea itself – as a vast gardenRevealed: leak uncovers global abuse of cyber-surveillance weapon – Guardian staffThe Guardian teams up with 16 media organisations around the world to investigate hacking software sold by the Israeli surveillance company NSO GroupBeware: Gaia may destroy humans before we destroy the Earth – James LovelockLegendary environmentalist argues that Covid-19 may well have been one attempt by the planet to protect itself, and that next time it may try harder with something even nastierThe Rosenbergs were executed for spying in 1953. Can their sons reveal the truth? – Hadley FreemanEthel and Julius Rosenberg were sent to the electric chair for being Soviet spies, but their sons have spent decades trying to clear their mother’s name. Are they close to a breakthrough?Out of thin air: the mystery of the man who fell from the sky – Sirin KaleWho was the stowaway who fell from the wheel well of a Boeing plane into a south London garden in the summer of 2019?The life and tragic death of John Eyers – a fitness fanatic who refused the vaccine – Sirin KaleThe 42-year-old did triathlons, bodybuilding and mountain climbing and became sceptical of the Covid jab. Then he contracted the virusIf these pieces move you to support our independent journalism into 2022, you can do so here:
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      TopicsRussiaInside the GuardianDonald TrumpVladimir PutinCoronavirusIndiaUS Capitol attackClimate crisisfeaturesReuse this content More

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      in US Politics

      Our favorite photos from 2021: how Guardian US pictures captured a historic year

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      Our photographers captured many moving and inspirational moments in 2021. Here’s our pick of the most striking imagesby Gail Fletcher and Alvin ChangIn 2021, our photographers told some of the most profound stories in America. They captured personal moments, like a man assessing the remnants of his home after Hurricane Ida. There were inspirational stories, like how a majority Black high school created a girls lacrosse team during the pandemic. And there were historic scenes, like the lead-up to the presidential inauguration just weeks after insurrectionists tried to overturn the election results. Thank you to all the photographers who worked with us this year.US cities are suffocating in the heat. Now they want retributionThe city of Baltimore is suing oil and gas companies for their role in the climate crisis, which has had an outsized impact on community of color. The image below shows Karen Lewis, who says her row house in Baltimore can get so hot that sometimes she has trouble breathing.Photographer: Greg KahnBallparks, stadiums and race tracks: US mass vaccination sites – in picturesPhotographer Filip Wolak took aerial photos of mass Covid-19 vaccination sites around the US. The Delta Flight Museum in Atlanta was selected as one of Georgia’s four mass vaccination sites beginning 22 February 2021.Photographer: Filip WolakAfter slavery, oystering offered a lifeline. Now sewage spills threaten to end it allRaw sewage leaks in Virginia have threatened the livelihoods of the few remaining Black oyster-people on the east coast. These leaks can be seen draining through neighborhoods, like this culvert that connects the historic African American Pughsville neighborhood to the larger drainage system. Below is five-year-old Braxton Miller swinging above the water.Photographer: Alyssa SchukarA quiet revolution: the female imams taking over an LA mosqueIn some mosques, women aren’t allowed to pray in the same room as men; in some mosques, women can’t even pray inside. But female imams in Los Angeles are pushing those boundaries with mixed congregation mosques and LBGTQ mosques, and using their sermons to talk about topics like sexual violence and pregnancy loss. Below are Nurjahan Boulden, Tasneem Noor and Samia Bano after praying together in Venice, California.Photographer: Anna BoyiazisThe preparation for an inauguration like no other – a photo essayThe Guardian asked photographer Jordan Gale to document the lead-up to the presidential inauguration, which happened just weeks after insurrectionists tried to overturn the election results on 6 January 2021. Below are steel gates blocking off parts of Pennsylvania Avenue leading up to the US Capitol and a woman looking through a security checkpoint.Photographer: Jordan GaleSalmon face extinction throughout the US west. Blame these four damsFour closely spaced damns in eastern Washington state are interfering with salmon migration. Below, salmon are seen swimming through the viewing area at Lower Granite Dam Fish Ladder Visitor Center in Pomeroy, Washington.Photographer: Mason TrincaThe California mothers fighting for a home in a pandemic – photo essayIn this photo essay about the precarious nature of America’s safety net, Cherokeena Robinson, 32 – who lost her job during the pandemic – lays in bed with her son Mai’Kel Stephens, 6, at their transitional house in San Pedro, California that they share with one or two other families at a time.Photographer: Rachel BujalskiA tiny Alaska town is split over a goldmine. At stake is a way of lifeIn Haines, Alaska, a mining project promised jobs, but some are worried contamination from the mine could destroy the salmon runs they rely on. In the photo below, a seagull flies above hundreds of spawning chum salmon on a slough of the Chilkat River, just below the Tlingit village of Klukwan.Photographer: Peter Mather‘Sad and so unfair’: Palestinian Americans celebrate a painful EidFor Palestinian American Muslims, the conclusion to the Muslim holy month of Ramadan is supposed to be a time of celebration. This year, the violence in Gaza and Jerusalem made it a somber event. The photo on the left is Tiffany Cabán, who would eventually win a seat on the New York city council. On the tight are Muslim greetings each other after morning Eid al-Fitr prayers.Photographer: Ismail Ferdous‘This is a spectacular chorus’: walk into the cicada explosionTrillions of periodic cicada emerged this year after a 17-year dormancy underground along the eastern US. In the photograph below, cicadas swarm the trees near a home in Columbia, Maryland.Photographer: Gabriella DemczukHow a majority Black school in Detroit shook up the world of lacrosseDetroit Cass Technical high school, where the student body is 85% Black, only offered three spring sports for girls – until a group of girls asked the administration to add lacrosse. It was a unique request; while it’s a Native American game, most participants are white. This story is about this team’s two-year journey to get on the field and, eventually, win. Below, clockwise, are Kayla Carroll-Williams, 15, Zahria Liggans, 18, Alexia Carroll-Williams, 17, and Deja Crenshaw, 18.Photographer: Sylvia JarrusA chemical firm bought out these Black and white US homeowners – with a significant disparityIn 2012, the South African chemical firm Sasol announced plans to build a complex in Mossville, Louisiana. They bought out the homes of people who lived on that land, but an analysis found that they offered significantly less money to Black homeowners than white homeowners. The image on the right shows Eyphit Hadnot, 58, and his older brother Dellar Hadnot, 61. The Hadnot family lived in Mossville for 80 years when Sasol offered them the buyout, which they rejected. On the left is a plot of land where a home used to stand before Sasol leveled the building.Photographer: Christian K Lee‘Ida is not the end’: Indigenous residents face the future on Louisiana’s coast – photo essayThe communities of Pointe-aux-Chenes and Isle de Jean Charles suffered some of Hurricane Ida’s worst destruction. That left then with a hard question: Stay to rebuild, or leave? The photo shows Kip de’Laune searching for any salvageable items at his home in Point-Aux-Chenes after Hurricane Ida.Photographer: Bryan TarnowskiShe survived Hurricane Sandy. Then climate gentrification hitAfter Hurricane Sandy, Kimberly White Smalls hoped the city would help her rebuild her home in New York’s Far Rockaway neighborhood. Instead, the only option she was left with was to sell the house to the city. Below are Smalls’ grandsons – Donovan E Smalls, 9, left, and Kelsey E Smalls Jr, 8 – running down the street in Far Rockaway, Queens.Photographer: Krisanne JohnsonTopicsPhotographyUS politicsCoronavirusClimate crisisCaliforniaAlaskaReuse this content More

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      in US Politics

      Why the collapse of Biden’s Build Back Better would be a major blow to the climate fight

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      Why the collapse of Biden’s Build Back Better would be a major blow to the climate fightIt would be almost impossible for the US to comply with its greenhouse gas reduction pledges without the $1.75tn package that Manchin refuses to support The collapse of Joe Biden’s Build Back Better legislation would have disastrous consequences for the global climate crisis, making it almost impossible for the US to comply with its greenhouse gas reduction pledges made under the Paris accords.Dire end to Biden’s first year as Manchin says no on signature billRead moreThe US president’s sweeping economic recovery and social welfare bill is in serious trouble after the Democratic senator Joe Manchin announced his opposition to the $1.75tn spending package that includes the country’s largest ever climate crisis investment.The shock move by the fossil fuel-friendly West Virginia lawmaker came after a year of record-breaking fires, floods, hurricanes and droughts devastated families across America, and amid warnings that such deadly extreme weather events will intensify unless there is radical action to curb greenhouse gases.The Build Back Better (BBB) legislation earmarks $555bn to tackle the US’s largest sources of global heating gasses – energy and transportation – through a variety of grants, tax incentives and other policies to boost jobs and technologies in renewable energy, as well as major investments in sustainable vehicles and public transit services.It is by far the largest chunk of federal funding for Biden’s climate crisis initiatives, without which experts say it will be impossible to meet the administration’s target of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by at least 50% below 2005 levels by 2030.Globally, the US is the second-largest emitter of greenhouse gases after China, and scientists warn that even halving emissions by 2030 may not be enough to avoid a catastrophic rise in atmospheric and oceanic temperatures.But BBB would be a major step forward towards the US meeting the goals laid out by Biden at last month’s UN climate talks in Glasgow, with no time to waste given the regression during the Trump administration. Without it, the Biden administration would be forced to rely on a web of new regulations and standards which could be overturned by future presidents.Lawmakers, climate experts and labor groups have voiced intense anger and frustration over Manchin’s refusal to support the bill, which would leave the Democrats without the necessary votes to get it through the Senate.Raúl Grijalva, chair of the House natural resources committee, said the concentration of political power in a few hands had caused nothing but “gridlock and frustration”.“Our country has serious economic and environmental problems that demand government action. If we don’t take that action, we’ll look back at this moment as a decisive wrong turn in the life of our country,” Grijalva said in a statement.“Who died and made Joe Manchin king, how is this a democracy?” said Mary Annaïse Heglar, climate writer and co-host of the podcast Hot Take. “There’s been a dereliction of duty by politicians for decades who’ve failed to make the case for climate action … climate math won’t reset just because the political math did.”Writing on Twitter, Jesse Jenkins, an energy professor at Princeton University who leads a group analysing the potential of BBB, said Manchin’s decision was “devastating” given the high stakes. “Passing #BuildBackBetter would lower energy costs and secure both the US’s climate goals and its global competitiveness in some of the most important industries of the 21st century. Failure would cost Americans dearly.”BBB would build on a bipartisan infrastructure bill, signed into law last month, which contains important steps towards transforming America’s fossil fuel fired transport system by incentivizing zero emission public transit, a national network of electric vehicle chargers and a renewables energy grid.But BBB goes much further. For instance, homeowners would get incentives to install rooftop solar systems and insulate their homes.It also provides significant funding to address a range of environmental injustices which have led to Black, Latino, Indigenous and other marginalized Americans being disproportionately exposed to the harmful effects of fossil fuel pollution, ageing infrastructure like lead pipes, emerging toxins and the climate crisis.The bill includes billions of dollars in grants and other schemes to clean up pollution and create toxic-free communities, healthy ports and climate-resilient affordable housing, as well as research and development infrastructure at historically Black colleges and universities.So if Manchin move finally scuppers the BBB act – as is widely feared – frontline communities in the US, and across the world, would bear the brunt of the inaction.“Build Back Better is our once-in-a-generation opportunity to combat the climate crisis and advance environmental justice through transformative investments that only the government can provide,” said Abigail Dillen, president of the legal non-profit Earthjustice. “The urgency couldn’t be greater. As communities across our country are displaced by weather disasters and others breathe polluted air and drink poisoned water, political leaders like Senator Manchin cannot continue denying the crisis before us.”The climate crisis is undeniably causing havoc and misery across the world, with 2021 one of the deadliest ever years for weather disasters in the US. This year’s death toll includes at least 200 people killed by extreme heat in the Pacific north-west over the summer and 125 deaths caused by the extreme freeze in Texas in February.After years of scepticism, the majority of Americans now want government action to tackle the climate crisis but the majority of republicans – and a handful of democrats – continue to obstruct meaningful policy initiatives.Manchin, whose family profits from the coal industry in West Virginia, has already pushed out key climate policies during the BBB negotiations including a program to incentivize electricity utilities to use renewable power sources.Yet even some of Manchin’s core supporters are urging him to reconsider his opposition to the current bill, which includes several policies that would directly benefit large numbers of West Virginians including the state’s struggling coal miners.In a statement, the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA), which named Manchin as an honorary member last year, warned that benefits to coalminers suffering from black lung disease will expire at the end of this year unless BBB is passed. The union also supports the bill’s tax incentives that encourage manufacturers to build facilities on abandoned coalfields that would employ thousands of unemployed miners.Cecil Roberts, the union’s president, said: “We urge Senator Manchin to revisit his opposition to this legislation and work with his colleagues to pass something that will help keep coalminers working, and have a meaningful impact on our members, their families, and their communities.”TopicsUS politicsClimate crisisJoe BidenJoe ManchinUS CongressDemocratsfeaturesReuse this content More

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      By ditching landmark climate legislation, America makes the world unsafe | Kate Aronoff

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      By ditching landmark climate legislation, America makes the world unsafeKate AronoffThe rest of the world needs to start treating the US as what it is: a dangerous country that needs to be reined in As the now very likely collapse of the Build Back Better Act underlines, what’s exceptional about the United States is its extraordinary ability to dole out harm. Besides its ever-ballooning military budget and foreign wars, America also makes the world unsafe thanks to the prodigious amount of fossil fuel it continues to send around the world.US ‘closer to civil war’ than most would like to believe, new book saysRead moreOil Change International, Earthworks and the Center for International Environmental Law have found that burning the oil and gas expected to be drilled in the US alone over the next decade could gobble up 10% of the entire world’s remaining carbon budget, the amount of carbon dioxide that can be released before the planet warms above 1.5C.The Build Back Better Act wouldn’t have made a dent in that drilling, of course: constraining US fossil fuel production or exports has been a political third rail on both sides of the aisle, despite John Kerry having spent months hectoring other smaller and less wealthy nations about their own fossil fuel use in the lead-up to Cop26.Just last week, energy secretary Jennifer Granholm went out of her way to assure oil executives that the administration wouldn’t reinstate the longstanding crude oil export ban, assuring them: “I don’t want to fight with any of you.”West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin – whose promised no vote on Build Back Better seems to have hammered the nail into Biden’s legislative agenda – made half a million dollars last year off his family’s coal business, and was reportedly speaking weekly with ExxonMobil lobbyists this spring. But he’s hardly the only Democrat furthering the fossil fuel industry’s interests.What the Build Back Better bill represented was a bare minimum, at best: the roughly $55bn a year the bill would spend on incentives for renewables deployment, building upgrades and electric vehicles over the next decade is roughly half of what Americans spent on caring for their pets in 2020, and pales in comparison to the $768bn one-year Pentagon budget that breezed through both chambers last week.Even the White House’s topline goal of reaching net-zero emissions by 2050 is dangerously behind the times: that’s when the entire world should be carbon neutral. With its vast resources and outsized historical responsibility for the climate crisis, the US should get there much, much sooner. But what the United States should do to reduce emissions and what its staid, corporate-captured democratic institutions are capable of at this moment are two different things.That’s not to say the fight is over. Congressional leadership could finally call Manchin’s bluff and force a vote on Build Back Better. Biden has a slew of emissions-cutting executive actions at his disposal should he choose to use them, including the EPA’s ability to regulate carbon dioxide. And there are exciting victories at the state and local level to build on.But the road ahead is a rocky one. With a deadly Omicron surge encroaching, the child tax credit about to lapse and student loans payments starting up again in February, Democrats will struggle to point voters to success stories during next year’s midterm elections without Build Back Better in hand.They face a potential blowout in the House, where a Republican majority may well refuse to recognize that any Democrat could win the 2024 presidential election. It’s very likely that the United States, the world’s largest economy and second biggest greenhouse gas emitter, will not pass its first-ever comprehensive climate legislation for at least a decade.Should they take back control in Washington, Republicans will expand drilling as quickly as possible, rest of the world be damned. Countries committed to seeing temperatures not rise above 1.5 or 2C should start treating the US for what it is: an exceptionally dangerous country that needs to be reined in.
      Kate Aronoff is a staff writer at The New Republic and the author of Overheated: How Capitalism Broke the Planet – And How We Fight Back
      TopicsUS politicsOpinionJoe BidenClimate crisisUS domestic policycommentReuse this content More

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      Humanity’s failure to tackle climate change in the 1980s had many causes | Letter

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      Humanity’s failure to tackle climate change in the 1980s had many causesNathaniel Rich responds to claims about Losing Earth, his 2018 article for the New York Times, later published as a book In his article (Neoliberalism wrecked our chance to fix the climate crisis – and leftwing statements of faith have changed nothing, 17 November), Jeff Sparrow repeats Naomi Klein’s simplistic claim that, in Losing Earth, I “attribute” the missed opportunity on climate change during the critical decade between 1979 and 1989 to “human nature”. Anyone who reads Losing Earth will see that I do no such thing.The failure can be attributed to various causes. Among them are: the fecklessness of bureaucrats tasked with developing legislative solutions to a global problem; a generation of influential US scientists’ blind faith in American exceptionalism; the anti-environmental blitzkrieg launched by the Reagan administration on taking office; the failure of journalists, scientists and policymakers to explain the severity of the threat to a disinterested public; the refusal by the major environmental organisations to embrace climate change as a cause worthy of their attention; the machinations of George HW Bush’s chief of staff, John Sununu; and ultimately the mobilisation of the oil and gas industry around a massive disinformation campaign, the origin story of which I reported for the first time.Humanity’s general reluctance to take urgent, dramatic action to counteract long-term threats offers a serious challenge to the passage of major climate policy, but not a decisive one. The story is far more complex, fascinating and tragic than that. It doesn’t serve anybody to condense history into talking points for the purpose of hollow sloganeering. When “neoliberalism” is the answer to everything, it’s the answer to nothing.Nathaniel RichNew Orleans, Louisiana, United StatesTopicsClimate crisisUS politicsEnergyFossil fuelslettersReuse this content More

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      in Elections

      Biden-Xi virtual summit: Biden says US and China must 'not veer into conflict' – video

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      US president Joe Biden has told Chinese leader Xi Jinping that he hoped to have a candid conversation about human rights and security issues as the two began a meeting meant to lower tensions between the two global superpowers. Biden added that the two leaders must make sure their relations do not veer into open conflict, including by installing ‘common sense’ guardrails. Biden spoke with Xi over a video conference as the two leaders engaged in their most extensive talks since Biden became president in January. Xi said the two sides must increase communication and cooperation to solve the many challenges they face.

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      Cop26 reveals limits of Biden’s promise to ‘lead by example’ on climate crisis

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      Cop26 reveals limits of Biden’s promise to ‘lead by example’ on climate crisisUS declined to join promise to end coal mining and to compensate poor countries for climate damage. Critics ask, is that leadership? The crucial UN climate talks in Scotland have produced landmark commitments to phase out coalmining, to call time on the internal combustion engines and to compensate poorer countries for damage caused by the climate crisis.The United States, which has trumpeted its regained climate leadership at the summit, has not joined any these pledges as the talks draw to a close.This disconnect has provided the world with a muddled sense of America’s willingness to confront the unfolding climate catastrophe, with the fate of historic legislation to lower planet-heating emissions still uncertain ahead of an expected vote in Congress next week.Joe Biden arrived in Glasgow vowing the US will “lead by example” on climate change and avoid disastrous global heating beyond 1.5C, dispatching his entire cabinet to the Cop26 talks and making widely praised new promises to cut methane, a potent greenhouse gas, and to end deforestation.Two dozen Democratic lawmakers wearing congressional lapel pins have swept the conference venue this week, all expressing confidence that the vast $1.75tn spending bill will pass back home.“This is the most ambitious climate legislation of all time,” Nancy Pelosi, the House speaker, told the summit. “America is back and is ready to lead,” added Kathy Castor, chair of the House select committee on the climate crisis. “Once we pass this historic package, finally, it will help keep 1.5C alive.”But the US is bedeviled by its recent past and – many delegates of other countries fear – its potential future, following Donald Trump’s embrace of climate science denialism and American isolationism. “We have not recovered our moral authority,” admitted Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the progressive New York representative, when asked about the specter of the former president. “I believe we are making steps, but we have to actually deliver the action in order to get the respect internationally. It’s that simple.”There is also mounting criticism that Biden’s actions have not matched his words and that the US president’s negotiators haven’t pushed hard enough for an ambitious deal in Glasgow to secure the deep emissions cuts needed to avoid disastrous warming that will spur ever-worsening floods, heatwaves and wildfires.More than 40 countries announced at Cop26 a promise to end the mining of coal, the dirtiest of fossil fuels, although the US was conspicuously absent from the list. “It’s very disappointing because the science is quite clear that we have to turn sharply away from coal this decade if we are going to meet our climate goals,” said Rachel Cleetus, policy director at the Union of Concerned Scientists.“We need very clear signals that orientate the US towards clean energy,” she added. “The climate crisis is too dire to just wait for coal to fall out. It’s just another signal of the sway the fossil fuel industry still has over US politics.”Despite its attempts to expand the rollout of electric vehicles, the Biden administration has also declined to set an end date for the sale of new gasoline and diesel cars, unlike the UK, European Union, Canada, India and a slew of other countries at Cop26. Its delegation in Glasgow is similarly wary of a push to provide “loss and damage” payments to countries vulnerable to climate impacts and has sought to shift criticism towards the inaction of China and Russia, although the US and China did unveil an unexpected plan to work together on cutting emissions, despite the enmity between the two countries.This reticence, critics claim, undermines Biden’s credibility on climate. Others say the dysfunctional nature of Congress, where sweeping climate legislation to expand renewable energy and wind down fossil fuels is effectively in the hands of a senator who derives most of his income from investments in coal, is to blame.“There is a handful of members of Congress who represent coal-intensive parts of the country who see [climate action] as a threat to their region,” Sean Casten, a Democratic representative, told the Guardian. “It’s kept the president from doing all that he’d like to do.”Pete Buttigieg, the US transport secretary, told the Guardian that the Biden administration aims to give Americans better public transit options, as well as electric vehicle rebates and infrastructure, but that “each country is on its own path” to ending the age of fossil fuel-powered cars.“What we are talking about is a race to the ambitious targets the president has set,” Buttigieg said, adding that the goal of half of all car sales being electric by 2030 will be in itself a “massive lift”.Biden will face further scrutiny almost immediately after some sort of deal is struck in Glasgow, not only over the fate of the Build Back Better bill but also his issuance of permits for oil and gas drilling.An auction of 80m acres of the Gulf of Mexico seabed, an area larger than the UK, will be offered to fossil fuel companies next week, while a new report has warned that the oil and gas that will be burned in the Permian Basin, a geological formation in the south-west US, by 2050 will release nearly 40bn tons of carbon dioxide, nearly a tenth of the remaining global “carbon budget” to stay under 1.5C.“If the Biden administration wants to be serious about its promise to demonstrate US climate leadership, it must first clean up its own back yard,” said Steven Feit, senior attorney at the Center for International Environmental Law.“The Permian Basin is the single largest fracking basin globally, and the continued reckless pursuit of oil extraction from New Mexico to the Gulf coast is the ultimate display of hypocrisy.”TopicsCop26Climate crisisUS politicsanalysisReuse this content More