The Insiders: Obama’s road to Paris is paved with pretentious hypocrisy

An ad for the upcoming climate summit in Paris is pictured in Bonn, Germany, on Tuesday. The United Nations held a climate change conference in Bonn in preparation for the Paris summit. (Oliver Berg/European Pressphoto Agency)

After failing at almost every foreign policy challenge he has been confronted with, perhaps there is now something on the horizon that actually sets up nicely for President Obama. The Paris Conference on Climate Change, which will be held from Nov. 30 to Dec. 11, could be an event that perfectly matches his skills and interests.

The U.N.-sponsored Paris festival lends itself to unrealistic giveaways and meaningless rhetoric — the more self-righteous and pretentious, the better. The meeting won’t produce any particular result, and the day of reckoning where we find out it was all for naught won’t be scientifically determined until many years in the future. It seems well-suited for this president.

All Obama has to do is go to Paris, give a vapid speech about saving the planet, capitulate to those who would like to see the United States weakened, pretend that others will fulfill their pledges to reduce carbon emissions and then return home to a round of self-congratulations from his own staff and sycophant appointees. To follow up on his brave proposals, all he has to do is sign a couple of executive orders that slap American businesses with some gratuitous, onerous regulations and declare that a noble deed has been done. And, by the way, the White House will have to do whatever it takes to keep any agreement reached in Paris from being voted on in Congress.

Let’s remember that the Obama administration failed in its pivot to Asia, could not reset with Russia, could not find an opening to the Arab world, could not successfully negotiate with Iran, could not successfully end two wars, could not follow through on its own red lines drawn in Syria —  much less change the regime — so forgive me if I am skeptical that this president can go to Paris and save the world. Isn’t it a little ironic that the elite will meet in Paris, of all places, to plan the energy scarcity they want the rest of us to endure? The bar at the Hotel George V seems to be the perfect place to decide that Africa will remain energy-starved and the rest of us will have to pay more for the energy we have.

The pious media parade has already begun. The solemn coverage of the “road to Paris” has started, and it almost universally has an earnest, determined and reverent tone that suggests the whole affair should be treated as something almost spiritual. And you can bet it will be a gathering of true believers. No skeptics will be given the microphone. Only the most zealous among the affluent will be allowed to talk and only the most compliant among the poor will be allowed to beg. And oh, by the way, Obama will make commitments to burden the rest of us with higher energy prices and even lifestyle changes that will never apply to him.

Thankfully, a few sober Republican senators, including Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.), are on the case, and they are already objecting to the idea that the president could make commitments in Paris that will escape the necessity of a vote in Congress before they take effect.

The 2015 Paris Conference on Climate Change deserves a lot of attention. Insiders will be reading a lot more about it right here. I hope the presidential candidates in both parties will talk about what they would propose for Paris, exactly what it would cost and who would pay.