In her Monday evening interview with Hillary Clinton, ABC anchor Diane Sawyer suggested that a widely panned deal on carbon emissions reached at the 2009 U.N. climate conference in Copenhagen is one of Clinton’s achievements as Secretary of State.
"They got a deal with the Chinese, but even [Clinton] says it was far from perfect," Sawyer said after recounting a her and President Barack Obama’s efforts to woo reluctant representatives of Beijing.
"Far from perfect" may understate how poor the eventual agreement was for U.S. policymakers who hoped for a binding cap on global carbon emissions.
"China wrecked the talks, intentionally humiliated Barack Obama, and insisted on an awful ‘deal’ so western leaders would walk away carrying the blame," according to one reporter who was present at Copenhagen negotiations.
Clinton and her supporters have struggled to point to any concrete accomplishments during her tenure as Secretary of State.