The Empty Spectacle of the U.N. Climate-Change Summit

As President Joe Biden limps into Glasgow, there are only two things holding back his big, showy climate agenda: politics and economics.

If you happen to be one of those people who insists that climate change should be “beyond politics,” then you are certainly entitled to the sentiment — but spare us any lectures about “democracy” in the future, because politics is how liberal-democratic societies go about their public business.

And the politics here do not favor dramatic action, whatever is said or notionally agreed to in Glasgow.

Joe Biden and...