G8 preview: Merkel wants specific benchmarks

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Lionel Beehner at CFR.org has a preview of what's in store at the G8 summit. This stands out:

the most controversial topic may prove to be climate change, which German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the G8’s host (Deutsche Welle), has put atop the agenda, and which British Prime Minister Tony Blair views as something of a legacy issue. But Europe and the United States do not yet see eye-to-eye on greenhouse gas emissions (NYT). President Bush laid out a proposed new approach to climate change Friday at the tail end of a speech on development aid.

Merkel wants specific benchmarks set, which include G8 members cutting greenhouse gas emissions to half of their 1990 levels by 2050 and limiting temperature rises this century to two degrees Celsius. Because the United States accounts for one-quarter of the world’s greenhouse emissions, “Merkel argues, we Americans really have a moral obligation to take the lead on this,” William Drozdiak of the American Council on Germany tells CFR.org’s Bernard Gwertzman.

Someone should tell Merkel that Bush doesn't do benchmarks...and don't ask about moral obligations.

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