Ugh, here we go again: Self-righteous globalism-loving environmental zealots hellbent on getting developed nations to voluntarily “contract” their relatively prosperous economies, ostensibly in order to combat climate change, while trying to dictate the type of “green” development they’d like to see happen in poorer countries.

As I’ve noted before, environmentalists are hopefully sniffing the air now that President Obama has won a second term, banking on the more “flexible” Obama’s willingness to once again take up the mantle of climate change — especially in the wake of this past summer’s droughts and superstorm Sandy. From the AP:

[A]s a re-elected president talks about global warming again, climate activists are cautiously optimistic that the U.S. will be more than a disinterested bystander when the U.N. climate talks resume Monday with a two-week conference in Qatar. …

They will focus on side issues, like extending the Kyoto protocol – an expiring emissions pact with a dwindling number of members – and ramping up climate financing for poor nations.

They will also try to structure the talks for a new global climate deal that is supposed to be adopted in 2015, a process in which American leadership is considered crucial. …

“We need the U.S. to engage even more,” European Union Climate Commissioner Connie Hedegaard told The Associated Press. “Because that can change the dynamic of the talks.”

Yes, you do need the United States, because our economic prosperity that you semi-secretly hate so much is what provides the lion’s share of the funding for the United Nations and is the reason that so many climate scientists and environment officials even have jobs. Why is it that all of these environmentalist gurus just can’t grasp the concept that environmental quality and a high standard of living are not mutually exclusive? A thriving and robust economy is what’s going to bring about the technological innovations, efficiency, and renewable energy sources that they’re looking for — and putting self-imposed limits on what we can and can’t do is only going to bring about completely unnecessary misery.

As Jazz wrote this morning, the U.S. is standing on the edge of a potential economic boom that could be propelled forward by our vastly abundant energy resources recently unlocked by new technologies — and the possibility of the Obama administration putting quixotic restrictions on our economy to comply with globalists’ ideas of “sustainability”-virtue, does not bode well.