Ask questions about climate change. A lot is riding on it.
Donald Trump believes climate science is a hoax perpetrated by the Chinese to rob America blind, and he vows to try to pull the United States out of the Paris climate accord immediately upon being elected president. Meanwhile, as Coral Davenport recently reported, world leaders have been trying to figure out if there is a way to lock in major countries behind the global deal before Trump can do that, because such an action could badly weaken the deal’s long term success.
In other words, international leaders are literally scrambling around to salvage the planet’s long-term prospects from Donald Trump. If he were to try to pull us out, it could not only deal a debilitating blow to the deal itself; one expert has warned it could also precipitate a diplomatic crisis.
If only there were an exceptionally high profile setting in which Trump might be pressed to detail his views on these matters.
Oh wait, there is. There are three presidential debates coming up, and the first one is expected to be watched by as many as 100 million people, an audience that may include viewers from all around the world.
As was widely noted at the time, the 2012 presidential debates featured zero discussion of climate change. But now, a confluence of new circumstances makes it substantially more pressing that the debate moderators and the candidates do discuss these issues this time around.
For one thing, the positions of the presidential candidates on climate issues could have vastly more real world significance than they might have four years ago. Take the Paris accord. It’s not clear yet whether Trump could succeed in withdrawing the U.S. from the deal in the short term, but even if he didn’t, there are other ways that Trump could frustrate its progress, simply by refusing to participate in international meetings about it or by refusing to submit reports documenting U.S. contributions to it.