In what much of the mainstream media is gleefully reporting as a “surprising development,” Joe Biden’s climate envoy John Kerry and Beijing’s climate envoy Xie Zhenhua announced a climate agreement between the two nations. In their joint statement, they both agreed to boost efforts to cut emissions. Both have agreed to “work actively to address climate change,” Xie stated, with Kerry adding that “the U.S. and China have no shortage of differences, but on climate, cooperation is the only way to get this job done.”

While much of the MSM heralded the “agreement” as a significant step forward in the effort to tackle climate change, the reality is, like the dubious Paris Agreement, it’s a lot of bloviating and regulation without any real substance when it comes to affecting the earth’s temperatures. In truth, it’s little other than an agreement to talk.

Nevertheless, Biden will proudly claim to have gotten the world’s largest carbon emitter to agree to take climate change seriously and work to put together a plan to curb emissions. When and how this will happen is anybody’s guess, but hey, Biden’s got a “deal.”

China elected not to show up to the latest climate confab in Glasgow, so it’s almost humorous that while Biden was napping there, his handlers were working behind the scenes on this supposed “blockbuster” announcement. He’s got to do something about his plummeting poll numbers, after all. Something to distract from his border crisis, the Afghanistan disaster, and the latest inflation numbers that show how precarious the economy is. (Never mind that hamstringing the economy with climate regulations won’t exactly help.)

Oh, and 21 months into the China virus pandemic, Biden isn’t too keen on doing anything to hold Xi Jinping accountable for that little Wuhan lab leak.

The point here is that symbolism doesn’t equal substance — not even close. Beijing didn’t want to get roped into a deal such as a pledge to cut its natural gas emissions by 30%, an issue pushed by the Biden administration and the European Union. However, China does want to appear that it is taking climate change seriously and therefore is willing to play to the crowd. Ergo, like painting the fronts of buildings before the Olympics to create a beautiful but phony facade, Xi agreed to look like he’s doing something. Biden’s more than happy to play along to placate his own audience here at home.

More strategically for the ChiComs, this action works to further soften Biden and dissuade him from any potentially aggressive action toward China when Beijing moves on Taiwan. Anything that serves to distract and make China look the part of acting as a reasonable and responsible world power is worth the investment, so long as it doesn’t require any significant change that threaten’s Beijing’s geopolitical ambitions.