Telluride Doc ‘The White House Effect’ Reveals How George H.W. Bush Administration Deliberately Destroyed an Opportunity to Stop Climate Change
variety.comAddie Morfoot Contributor In “The White House Effect,” directors Bonni Cohen, Pedro Kos and Jon Shenk’s document how a chance to take real action on global warming was not just squandered but deliberately undermined by the George H.W.
Bush administration (1988-1992). Bush took office in 1988, which, at the time, was the planet’s hottest year on record. The former president promised to take on the greenhouse effect with what he called the “White House Effect” and tackle the problem head on.
The doc uses only archival footage to tell the story of how seeds of disinformation around climate change were sown in America three decades ago.
In the film, the schism between action and denial plays out in the Oval Office as Bush’s head of the Environmental Protection Agency William Riley and his chief of staff John Sununu face off over setting limits on fossil fuel emissions. “The White House Effect” concludes with Bush’s arrival in Rio in 1992 where the United States not only breaks its own promises but undermines the entire global project to set real limits on emissions by the year 2000, setting the stage for the world’s current climate crisis.
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