News fairly unbalanced. We report. You decipher.
President Barack Obama returns from Russia this week with a verbal commitment in hand from President Dmitry Medvedev to slash stockpiles of nuclear weapons as a preemptive strike against one of the top five potential causes of man-made global warming — unrestrained atomic fission.
“Our conflicting notions of national security made previous nuclear arms reductions difficult,” said Mr. Obama, standing next to his Russian counterpart at a news conference, “but our shared concern over the threat of global warming has brought us together this week. Dmitry and I both realize that the greatest threat posed by nuclear weapons is that they heat the atmosphere to roughly 300,000 degrees Celsius and therefore could cause measurable climate change.”
The U.S.-Russia deal includes a cap-and-trade system that allows nations with large volumes of nuclear weapons to purchase radiation-emission credits from nations which have no nuclear arsenals. The plan won’t reduce the overall potential temperature of the atmosphere, however, it will provide an income stream to boost the prosperity of pre-nuclear nations and drain the resources of nuclear superpowers forcing them to consider alternative sources of national defense.
Experts say nuclear detonation has a global warming impact potential that rivals carbon dioxide, second-hand cigarette smoke, lawn mower exhaust and even livestock emissions in its ability to heat the atmosphere, thereby threatening wildlife habitat.
President Obama said the new round of negotiations would “lead to a world of clean air and clean energy where the only people who have nuclear weapons are those who have no respect for the rule of law.”
Examiner columnist Scott Ott is editor in chief of ScrappleFace.com, the family-friendly news satire site, and anchor of ScrappleFace Network News, seen on YouTube.
