Another United Nations Earth Summit: Rio+20
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Two decades after the first Earth Summit in Rio, world leaders are back for another attempt to jump-start a sustainable global economy. We hear what's happening at Rio+20. Who's there? Who's not? Also, the Taliban attack a hotel outside of Kabul. On Reporters Notebook, yesterday Mitt Romney told Hispanic leaders that Democrats take them for granted. What has the President told them today?
Banner image: US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton delivers a speech during a plenary session of the UN Conference on Sustainable Development, Rio+20, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on June 22, 2012. Photo by Antonio Scorza/AFP/GettyImages
Making News
Taliban Attack Hotel outside Kabul ()
In another demonstration of continued strength today, insurgents attacked a luxury hotel on a lake near Kabul where some 300 elite Afghans were holding a party. They used rocket-propelled grenades, suicide vests and machine guns. Laura King is in Kabul for the Los Angeles Times.
Guests:
- Laura King: Los Angeles Times
Main Topic
Back to Brazil for Another Try ()
President George H.W. Bush joined other world leaders at the United Nations' first Earth Summit in Rio in 1992. Since then, global temperatures have been on the rise. in 1997, Bill Clinton tried, but failed, to get Senate ratification of the Kyoto Protocol, which has been called a "missed opportunity" to mobilize international action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. George W. Bush did not go to Johannesburg in 2002 for the summit's tenth anniversary. Now the focus is back on Rio, with Secretary General Ban Ki-moon calling for "revolutionary action" to overcome the global "suicide pact" of industrialization. Can Rio+20 get a better start on a "sustainable" world economy? Where are the leaders of Germany, Britain and the United States?
Guests:
- Peter Lehner: Natural Resources Defense Council, @NRDC
- Juliet Eilperin: Washington Post, @eilperin
- Nick Robins: HSBC
- Bjorn Lomborg: Copenhagen Consensus Center, @bjornlomborg
Links:
- US Secretary of State Clinton addresses the UN conference
- Eilperin on the summit's results
- Washington Post poll on the environment
- Cloud of Committments (action and accountability at Rio+20)
- Robins on the conference, 'green economy'
- Lomborg on 'feel-good environmentalism' at the UN
- Lomborg's 'The Skeptical Environmentalist: Measuring the Real State of the World'
Reporter's Notebook
Romney and Obama Vie for Latino Votes ()
During Republican primaries this year and in 2008, Mitt Romney took a tough line on illegal immigration. In one of this year's GOP debates, he called the answer "self-deportation." With Hispanics of growing importance in this year's election, President Obama pulled a surprise last week, ordering a modified version of the Dream Act, giving a break to undocumented workers brought here as children under 16. Yesterday, Romney told Latino leaders the President could have done much more when Democrats controlled the Congress. Today, the President is speaking to the same audience (link to follow). Ruben Navarrette, a nationally syndicated columnist with the Washington Post Writers Group, says both have failed this country.
Guests:
- Ruben Navarrette: Washington Post Writers Group, @rubennavarrette
Links:
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