WE are beginning to learn more about why US President Trump cancelled Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s trip to North Korea. Apparently, North Korean Foreign Minister, Kim Yong Chol, sent a letter to Mr. Pompeo which is reported to have stated that “the US is still not ready to meet [North Korean] expectations in terms of taking a step forward to sign a peace treaty,” and that the current negotiations are “again at stake and may fall apart.” Additionally, US Secretary of Defense, Jim Mattis, indicated that the US is prepared to restart military exercises with South Korea which President Trump had suspended last June as a concession to North Korea. The breakdown of the talks with North Korea leaves the US with few options since both Russia and China have eased up on the sanctions against North Korea and they show no willingness to renew them. It is safe to say that Kim Jong-un has outplayed President Trump. We shall see if North Korea resumes bomb or missile testing to test President Trump.
The Atlantic has published an essay on the apparent breakdown in the will of the US, Australia, and Canada to support efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The author of the essay, Robinson Meyer, is blunt about the failure to address climate change:
“At a basic level, this pattern holds up, well, everywhere. Every country except the United States supports the Paris Agreement on climate change. But no major developed country is on track to meet its Paris climate goals, according to the Climate Action Tracker, an independent analysis produced by three European research organizations. Even Germany, Japan, and the United Kingdom—where right-wing governments have made combatting climate change a national priority—seem likely to miss their goals.
“Simply put: This kind of failure, writ large, would devastate Earth in the century to come. The world would blow its stated goal of limiting atmospheric temperature rise. Heatwaves might regularly last for six punishing weeks, sea levels could soar by feet in a few short decades, and certain fragile ecosystems—like the delicate Arctic permafrost or the kaleidoscopic plenty of coral reefs—would disappear from the planet entirely.”
The Washington Post has a stunning graphic on high temperatures in every country on the planet and how the temperatures have risen since 1880.
World Politics News 
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