We can’t have a truly global solution to global warming if the U.S., India, and China don’t get with the program. Now that Australia’s prime minister-elect has signed on to the Kyoto Protocol, the U.S. is the lone holdout among industrialized nations. But President Bush remains adamantly opposed to mandatory measures to curb carbon emissions, insisting that any actions taken should be voluntary. So Yvo de Boer, the U.N.’s top climate change official, was understandably elated to learn that the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee yesterday approved legislation outlining a cap-and-trade system for industry, power generators and transport. De Boer, who’s heading up the U.N.’s climate change talks in Bali, Indonesia this week, told Reuters, “That’s a very encouraging sign from the United States.” The bill was co-sponsored by Republican senator John Warner, who’s decided to take the lead in the absence of leadership from our self-proclaimed “Decider”:

“The United States simply has to take a leadership role. If we don’t act, China and India will simply hide behind America’s skirts of inaction.”