Book Description

Despite other presidents who preceded President Obama and who responded somewhat to global climate change, environmentalists look to Barack Obama as a president who might make a real difference regarding global warming. This was particularly so given Obama's campaign statement that this would be a number one priority of his once in office. In this study we compared Barack Obama's first year efforts in responding to global warming with those of George W. Bush, his immediate predecessor, in his first year. To do so we assessed each president in terms of political communication, legislative leadership, administrative actions, and environmental diplomacy. We found a marked difference in political rhetoric between the two with Bush being much more willing to mislead the public regarding climate change, whereas Obama was much more likely to argue that change was needed due to the threat posed by increasing greenhouse gases particularly during the first few months in office.The presidents' relationship with the Congress was also very different that first year with Bush having a very supportive Republican Congress supporting his lack of desire to do much regarding the environment, while Obama, who also had a Democratic-majority in Congress, nevertheless faced a skeptical Congress when it came to his desire to see cap-and-trade legislation that would regulate climate change emissions. Despite Obama's declaration during his campaign that global climate change would be an a number one priority on his agenda, economic hard times, the wars abroad, severe partisanship, an unsupportive public, and an unwillingness to aggressively engage the Congress on this issue have taken their toll on the president shifting climate change from that priority position.