One note not mentioned in my discourse, below, is that the administration is fully cognizant that they cannot get two-thirds of the Senate to sign on to anything resembling Kyoto, as the global-warming industry insists that any Son of Kyoto/Kyoto 2.0 must do and as the talks are already designed to ensure. That means covering only a handful of nations, and creating numerous “mechanisms” for wealth transfer to the rest of the world who are indispensible parties to the treaty and the process and must be at the table . . . just not actually covered.
Faced with this political reality, one band of Kyotophiles is pushing the Obama team to adopt a curious strategy: if treaties must be ratified by two-thirds of the Senate, simply claim that Kyoto 2.0 is not a treaty. Presto! If they declare it a congressional-executive agreement instead — and there is likely only one opportunity to impede what is quite possibly nothing but a matter of discretion — then they need only a simple, bicameral majority.
I have a piece just published in the Federalist Society’s Engage walking through the weaknesses of that approach.