Portside

For delegates in Bonn from Nov. 6-17, the goal was to define and firm up terms and goals of the Paris Agreement, drafted with much fanfare at COP21 in Paris in 2015.

Fifty or a hundred years from now, the fiscal cliff, the current tensions with Russia, and many other issues that now seem pressing will be remembered dimly, if at all. What will be remembered is whether, as then-Senator Obama said in June of 2008, “this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal.” It was an inspiring call to action then; in the wake of the droughts, the wildfires, and hurricane Sandy, it’s even more so now.