'A code red to China, to the US, to Europe'
| 'Our allies believe that we have to lock in progress as much as possible'  Joe Biden said sorry to the world on Monday for the environmental negligence of his predecessor, former President Donald Trump, at the start of the UN climate conference in Scotland. The President also showed up with a $555 billion vow to reduce US carbon emissions — the biggest-ever US climate budget.
"I guess I shouldn't apologize, but I do apologize for the fact that the United States -- the last administration -- pulled out of the Paris Accords and put us sort of behind the eight ball," said Biden, testing the colloquial flair of summit translators with his saloon bar American English.
Biden's contrition will no doubt cause Trump's conservative media devotees to pull out the old "Apology Tour" headlines they used whenever President Barack Obama went abroad. And Biden himself noted the incongruity of calling for cuts in carbon emissions while pressuring oil producing nations to pump faster to bring down politically damaging high US gasoline prices.
The ex-President is hanging over Biden's Europe trip like a dark cloud. Foreign leaders are wondering just how long the break from Trumpism will last and whether the nation that once stabilized the world will pitch it into a new paroxysm of populist nationalism if Trump is reelected in 2024.
In the meantime, Biden is chipping away at Trump's legacy with his climate pitch and by reaching a deal to end his predecessor's steel tariffs on Europe. But his ebbing opinion polls are plain to see, Democrats face big losses in next year's midterm elections and Trump is already positioned to be a shoo-in for the next Republican presidential nomination.
As a senior, unnamed member of Biden's own team, quoted by the Washington Post, noted at the weekend that America's allies in Europe know that a like-minded President is far from a given after the next presidential election. "I think our allies believe that we have to lock in progress as much as possible while there is a president who is a deeply committed trans-Atlanticist in office," the official said.  'A code red to China, to the US, to Europe' The Prime Minister of Barbados Mia Mottley has warned that the current climate crisis facing her own country should serve as a "code red to China, to the US, to Europe, to India." Speaking to CNN's Christiane Amanpour from the COP 26 summit, Mottley accused large greenhouse gas emitters like the US of effectively burying their heads in the sand. "Those who need to make the decisions are kicking the can down the road and they believe that they can because they are not seeing us -- they see themselves," she said. "For them, they don't reach that period of peril for another 15 to 20 years. … There are a lot of us who are going to be affected before Shanghai and Miami." The world and America A 22-story luxury development collapsed in Lagos.
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'I'm equally open to voting against a bill' Sen. Joe Manchin is still not happy with Democrats' social safety net bill, which has been effectively halved from a proposed $3.5 trillion to $1.75 trillion. The West Virginia Democrat said Monday that he wouldn't support the bill his party is negotiating until there is "greater clarity" about its financial impact, and criticized fellow Democrats' push to expand social programs. "I'm open to supporting a final bill that helps move our country forward, but I am equally open to voting against a bill that hurts our country," he warned. A tough job John Kerry's return to the political spotlight as US climate envoy hasn't gone quite as well as he hoped.
The former secretary of state, senator and presidential nominee greeted the Biden administration by "reporting for duty," to quote his 2004 Democratic national convention speech. Kerry spent nine months flying around the world trying to drum up a unified effort to fight climate change. Dipping into his old diplomatic contacts book, he tried to secure big buy-in from China and Russia, but neither nation's president showed up in Glasgow this week.
As CNN's Natasha Bertrand and Ella Nilsen report, Kerry's team bemoans a global energy crisis that came along just at the wrong moment for a UN summit meant to speed up the transition away from coal, oil and gas. The growing US showdown with China hasn't been helpful either. The Biden White House has refused to play Beijing's game of bartering climate pledges with US concessions in other geopolitical and economic areas, a factor that has complicated Kerry's own diplomacy.
Kerry didn't appreciate the administration's decision either to ink a new security pact with the UK and Australia to counter China. He also pushed for more direct communication between Biden and Xi, write Bertrand and Nilsen. But the two presidents have spoken only twice since Biden took office. A one-on-one was expected at the G20 summit, but Xi is staying home because of the pandemic.
Even as the summit begins, there is speculation in Washington about how long Kerry, 77, will stay in a job long seen as his last kick at the political can. But as they downplay expectations, US officials are now saying that Glasgow is just the start of a longer process. If that's the case, the man who has worked for Uncle Sam since he shipped out to Vietnam as a young Swift Boat captain may not be able to resist.
 Meet New Zealand's "bird" of the year: the pekapeka-tou-roa, or long-tailed bat. It received 7,031 votes in an online vote, beating the kakapo, which got 4,072 votes for second place. The kakapo, a fat, flightless and nocturnal parrot, won last year's competition. Thanks for reading. On Tuesday, Virginia and New Jersey hold statewide gubernatorial elections. New York and several other key US cities vote for mayor. The International Energy Forum conference takes place in Oslo. View in browser | All CNN Newsletters
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