From our editorial today:

The actual result is inconclusive and kicks the can down the road, where much mischief will need to be fought off again. While the U.S. agreed to participate in framing a successor treaty to Kyoto that will include “measurable, verifiable steps” toward reducing GHG emissions, the desired 25–40 percent reduction was conspicuously left out, to the anger of many greens. “This deal is very disappointing,” the head of Friends of the Earth told the London Times. “This conference has failed to give us a clear destination.” Opposition to the numerical target apparently came from Russia as well as key developing nations such as China and India. The Washington Post called the Bali agreement a “road map,” and it is likely to prove no more successful than that other, more famous “road map” for Middle East peace.
While it might have been better for the U.S. simply to walk out of Bali, the shifting political landscape arguably made it prudent to hang in. The next president is likely (certain if he is a Democrat) to participate in any future climate agreement, and a “stubborn” U.S. position today would give a Democratic president a free shot at ingratiating himself with Europe by ostentatiously repudiating the Bush administration. Meanwhile, the grim economic realities of greenhouse-gas emission reductions continue to loom in the background. If Congress enacts a modest emission-reductions plan in 2008 or 2009 (either an emission-trading scheme or a carbon tax), it is unlikely the U.S. will want to commit to a more ambitious U.N. emissions target subsequently, for the same reason the Senate voted 95–0 in 1997 to reject Kyoto.
So the high-stakes climate poker game will go on to the next hand, where the U.S. still has some decent cards to play. If hypocrisy were a clean energy source, the U.N. could solve the problem of climate change instantly. While the climate warriors heap scorn on the U.S. for its supposed “lack of leadership,” no one is taking note of the fact that the U.S. is probably the only industrialized nation whose greenhouse-gas emissions went down in 2006. (Figures for Europe are not available yet.) The Department of Energy reports that U.S. emissions declined 1.5 percent. This is significant because it has never before happened in a non-recessionary year. That it happened now is a sign of the increasing energy efficiency and superior innovation of the U.S. economy. In fact, the U.S. has had the best GHG-emissions record in the industrialized world for most of the last decade.