John Oliver is livid over Donald Trump’s decision to leave the Paris Climate Accord last week, given all of the global implications it could have.
Oliver looked at Trump’s speech and pointed out that the logic for the decision was often incoherent, inaccurate, and widely mischaracterized. Trump believed that the Accord, which had voluntary goals set, would be bad for businesses. He also thought the rest of the world was out to get the United States, citing how other countries celebrated when the U.S. signed the Paris Climate Accord. Trump thought they were laughing at the U.S.
“What are you talking about? They were happy because they secured a landmark victory for the future of the planet, you fucking egomaniac! The whole world is not secretly conspiring against the United States.”
Oliver goes into even more detail about Trump’s false statements and says China and India will emerge as leaders in renewable energy, but as he pointed out, for those who want to do something about climate change, it’s not quite as easy as just waiting until Trump gets voted out of office. The push on climate change is now left to U.S. companies, mayors, and governors, so people who want to do something need to find out where their elected officials stand and vote climate change deniers out of office. In Trump, people have something to rally against.
“But finally, finally this week, the climate change movement may have gotten a symbol to rally around because apparently it was never quite enough for us to motivate ourselves out of love for this large, gassy orb,” Oliver said, referring to Earth. “But maybe, just maybe, we can now motivate ourselves to do something out of our loathing of this one.”