Obama team changes US tune on climate change

This time around, the U.N. climate talks look quite different. According to MSNBC, the Obama Administration has made some pretty compelling statements.

• Sunday...President Barack Obama's envoy pledged to "make up for lost time" in reaching a global agreement on climate change.
• Todd Stern also praised efforts by countries like China to reign in their carbon emissions, but said global warming "requires a global response" and that rapidly developing economies like China "must join together" with the industrial world to solve the problem.
• "We are very glad to be back. We want to make up for lost time, and we are seized with the urgency of the task before us," Stern said to loud applause from the 2,600 delegates to the U.N. negotiations.
• They clapped again when Stern said the U.S. recognized "our unique responsibility ... as the largest historic emitter of greenhouse gases," which has created a problem threatening the entire world.
• Stern said no one on his team doubted that climate change is real. "The science is clear, the threat is real, the facts on the ground are outstripping the worst-case scenarios. The cost of inaction or inadequate action are unacceptable," he said — a total change of tone from his predecessors.
• "America itself cannot provide the solution, but there is no solution without America," he said.