Bill Clinton: “We've got to wrap up the first panel and get on to the next one, but I'd like to ask--I think I'd like to ask, John, you…”

“We've got to wrap up the first panel and get on to the next one, but I'd like to ask--I think I'd like to ask, John, you to respond to this. If anyone else wishes to, you're welcome to. I think there is a more sophisticated question to be asked--although the Vice President is right, there still are some people who claim that this scientific case that I have been completely persuaded by has not been made. I think the more difficult argument, John, goes something like this: Look, you put all this stuff in the atmosphere and it stays there for 100 years at least, and maybe longer, and so what's the hurry? And in a democracy, it's very hard to artificially impose things on people they can't tangibly feel, and so why shouldn't we just keep on rocking along with the kind of technological progress we're making now until there really is both better scientific information and completely painless technological fixes that are apparent to all? Why shouldn't we just wait until all doubt has been resolved and hopefully we have even better technology--and because, after all, the full impact of whatever we do if we start tomorrow won't be felt for decades and maybe even for a century? Number one, if that's true, how quickly could we lower the temperature of the planet below what it otherwise would be, and, number two, what about the argument on the merits? [John Holdren, member, President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, and professor, Harvard University, used graphs to demonstrate the need to reduce the amount of greenhouse gas emissions in the atmosphere as soon as possible in order to avoid unmanageable degrees of climate change in the future.]”