thank you for spending your sunday morning with you. "fareed zakaria gps" starts right now. this is "gps" the global public square. welcome to all of you in the united states and around the world. i'm fareed zakaria coming to you from new york. today on the program, a today on the program, a hell scape across europe as temperature records are demolished. and fires devastate greece, italy, spain and more. now that climate change is here for sure, how do we adapt? i'll talk to the chief heat officer, yes, that's heat officer of athens greece. then as inflation is at a

40-year high, is a recession next and how bad will it be? i asked about the man that warned of today's inflation problem, larry summers. which country might president putin target next? some believe he has eyes on moldova. why? find out in my conversation with that country's prime minister. but first, here is my take. it was getting hotter. so opens the ministry for the future, the disturbing novel by kim stanley robinson, the opening chapter set in india's largest state depicts a heat wave that kills millions across the subcontinent and galvanize people to radical action. the heat waves we're experiencing are going to get worse. that of course, will have dire consequences. more likely than mass death is

mass migration. as bill gates points out, the area around the equator is soon going to be too hot for people to work outdoors. that could mean a collapse in farming, the most common occupation in these regions. stressed by heat, lack of water and no jobs, millions of people could start moving from these areas to more temp erate climates, in the north, europe, and the united states. many climate activists do not think in terms that are urgent enough. they're often focused to get to net zero in the future or insist every new energy source must be entirely green. but the reality is that we need to cut emissions now, not promise to do so by 2030 and the only way to do so now on that scale is make some tough choices and tradeoffs. we do not currently have green technology like clean nuclear

fusion and long duration battery storage that can fully replace fossil fuels today. we may get them in 10 or 15 years perhaps if we're very lucky, but we don't now and hoping what we do is part of what has caused an energy crisis around the world. investment in fossil fuels has plunged over the last decade, while green technology has not been able to fill the gap/ germany cut back on nuclear activity and ended up burning more coal. california is phasing out nuclear and discouraging natural gat. but is now confronting a sharp increase in the number of wasteful diesel generators being used for backup power. let me suggest practical ways to make progress in the next five years with technologies we already have. we can start by converting the most polluting coal fired power plants to natural gas, which emits half as much carbon as coal.

a study surveyed 29,000 power plants around the world and found that 5%, the dirtiest, generate 73% of all emissions. in other words, replacing around 1,500 coal burning plants would make a huge dent in emissions, a giant cut on par with the boldest plans being discussed today. if the west wants to compete with china's belt and road initiative, why not put together a collision that would finance this effort across the planet? there is the problem of methane leaking from natural gas ex traction, agriculture and landfills. this can be solved technically and needs smart, tough regulations. we should extend the life of nuclear power plants and start building new smaller and safer ones. nuclear energy evokes grim images, but the facts speak for themselves. in the 21st century so far, just a handful of people have died from nuclear accidents around

the world, while more than 1,500 people died in oil and gas extraction in the united states alone from 2008 to 2017. for more people die each year from lung disease caused by coal pollution, with some estimates running into the millions, and that's without factoring the climate impacts. we should also keep working on developing new modular reactors that have much safer designs far less likely to have the same kind of meltdown problems as in the past. and let me remind you, nuclear power plants produce nearly zero emissions. plant a trillion trees, the science is simple. trees absorb carbon dioxide. we're all impressed by greta tunburg, but what about a young journalist at the age of 9 proposed that every country plant 1 million trees and in

2018 suggested the united nations, we target a trillion. let's start by curbing deforestation and try to plant as many trees as we can as fast as we can. and yes, all of these solutions have their draw backs, planting trees may not do as much good as some scientists initially claimed. nuclear power is expensive up front. natural gas does emit some carbon, but the crucial point is that such measures would cut emissions a lot and we can do them all now. we do not have to make a choice between half measures now and full measures later when we have the technologies to do so. there are other proven technologies ranging from weatherizing buildings to electric cars and we should create incentives for all of them. the perfect should not become the enemy of the good. that should be the motto of every environmental group that wants to see actual positive change today.

go to cnn.com/fareed for a link to my "washington post" column this week and let's get started. ♪ >> it was outright sweltering this week. britain saw the hottest day with temperatures hitting 104.5 degrees fahrenheit in one town, that's more than 40 degrees celsius and not just britain. this devastating heat wave blanketed much of europe. alongside the heat were wildfires, one of the city's plagued by extreme temperatures and fires this week has been athens. last summer, athens hit its highest temperature ever, a shocking 115 degrees fahrenheit and it appointed europe's first-ever chief heat officer. miss murveli joins me now from athens. thank you for joining us. >> thanks for having me. >> what i like about your

perspective and work is it acknowledges that at the end of the day, there is enough carbon dioxide in the atmosphere already that there is already global warming happening and so there has to be some kind of adaptation to it. and so when you think about that, you know, in the long run we can build better infrastructure. what are you doing in the short run beyond that? >> in the short term, you have to take care of the vulnerable. right? you have to figure out who are the ones that are at risk and we have to make sure that we protect them. first of all, we create more awareness so people understand how deadly this heat is. we know there is a under reporting of deaths and the more we're looking into this, the more we realize it really is the

most dangerous extreme weather phenomenon that are linked to global warming. extreme heat and heat waves are killing more people than any other extreme phenomenon and they very few people know about that. these are temperatures our bodies are not made for. so we need, you know, we need air-conditioning, even though air-conditioning is a double-edged sword because it's actually heating up the planet more. and heating the public space but this is, right now, something that we need to use. we quickly have to find a difference way to cooling indoor spaces and we have to figure out better ways to cool the indoor and cool the outdoors and city as a whole. as you said, even if we stop producing carbon dioxide and othere greenhouse gas emissions tomorrow, we're still going to be heating up the planet. >> i read about a plan you have

to revive or to use a roman aqua duct that transports water in athens? >> so we have this aqua duct built in roman times in athens which still today has a lot of water in it but we're not using it, so we have to figure out ways to use things like the water in this aqua duct, which is tons and tons, millions of tons of water that gets thrown into the sea and use sustainable ways, without using a lot of energy or using only renewable energy, to pump it and support green areas. new green areas or existing green areas, and bring water up to the surface to cool athens, to cool a big part of our athens by creating a big green corridor. >> interesting how you can learn from all parts of the world.

in mettia, colombia, they have done something very similar and very successfully, right? >> that is absolutely true. they have created 36 green corridors and have managed to cool the city and bring the city temperature down about four degrees in the surrounding areas of this 36 corridors. but if you make a combination of water elements and trees and green, then you can actually have even a larger percentage of heat mitigated. so, you know, even two degrees celsius or three degrees celsius which is the difference of us in the sun or under a tree can make a big difference for our health. >> and in cities, heat accumulates for a variety of reasons. right? can you give us a sense?

there is a kind of a compounding effect. >> exactly. so cities with hard surfaces, concrete, cement, steel and glass surfaces, they basically absorb heat all day long and usually they are radiated at night and we also have heat humans produce with cars and air-conditioning and use of energy so these things create cities into heat traps and make our cities into heat traps. especially when we have high temperatures at night when the bodies are supposed to relax and recover from the day's heat, this is actually what becomes quite deadly and quite serious for people's health. >> this almost requires us to

really accept the global warming is happening and really come up with a whole new way of living almost particularly in cities, but really everywhere. >> yeah, you're absolutely right. the most important shift, i think, has to do with what you just said, that we have to realize that we live in a different world and this world needs a lot of adapting and a lot of changes in our behavior in the way we build, in the way we farm, in the way we move around. i mean, we really have to take this seriously from this point onward. >> thank you so much. this was so helpful and i hope there are many more chief heat officers all over the world and that they can follow your example. >> thank you, fareed. thanks for having me. next on "gps" from practice to policy. should president biden declare a climate emergency? and what would that do? what are his powers to deal with

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on wednesday, president biden called climate change a clear and present danger and laid out some executive actions he is taking. but he did not take the ultimate step declaring a national climate emergency. it's been less than a month since the supreme court stripped biden and any president of certain powers to combat climate change. and just days since democrats climate legislation was due to failure, when senator joe manchin said he wouldn't support it. so what can the president do?

liam litman is an assistant professor at michigan law school where she teaches about constitutional law in federal courts. she was a law clerk to supreme court justice anthony kennedy and she is a co-host of the strict scrutiny podcast. welcome. so first question, if he were to declare a climate emergency, the "wall street journal" says he would be doing exactly what donald trump did when he declared an emergency because congress wouldn't fund the border wall and then took money out of the of the pentagon budget and diverted those funds to build the wall. and this is the journal's editorial, if liberals were so outraged about that use of executive power, why are they all clambering for biden to do it now? is that a fair comparison? >> the two situations are similar in some respects.

in both cases, the presidents are trying to address a problem they believe exists that congress did not address but they are also different in important ways. one is that in president trump's case, congress specifically rejected appropriating money for the precise purpose that president trump wanted to use the money. namely constructing a border wall. whereas, here we don't know extra exactly president biden would do if the funds were available to him if he declared a climate emergency so we don't know if he would be taking the precise steps senator manchin in congress would pursue when they did not adopt the climate legislation. >> there is a chance or tell me how strong the chance is if president biden declares a climate emergency, use some funds, what is the chance the supreme court would knock it down? >> so it depends what president biden attempted to do. if what he was trying to do with the funds was let's say offer the states an incentive to address climate change, it's not clear that the supreme court would strike that down.

but in light of the supreme court's decision in west virginia versus epa, the epa climate change case, it's clear the supreme court would not allow president biden to take measures that are not specifically and explicitly authorized by the statute that gives the president certain powers when he declares a nationwide emergency. so he might be limited in what he can actually do in order to address the climate emergency even if he declares one. >> so let's talk about that case. it strikes me as a very important case. as i understand it, the way the federal government has been set up really since franklin roosevelt created the modern administrative federal government, is that congress passes these laws, which are fairly broad, and administrative agencies interpret them in light of changing circumstances over the years and decades. does the epa -- does the supreme

court's ruling on the epa essentially say unless congress has specifically, you know, given you the authority to do some very specific thing, no agency can do anything? and if that's the case, is that a recipe for administrative paralysis? >> it's certainly a recipe for administrative paralysis but that rule congress must specify what agencies can do only applies in a certain subset of cases. the cases that the supreme court designates as major questions or major issues. now, we know, from the supreme court's decision in west virginia versus epa, that they believe how americans consume energy is a major question and is a major issue so any measures that president biden took to address that issue would need to be specifically authorized by congress but we don't know exactly what other issues would present major questions or major issues that the court would say

congress has to specifically authorize rather than allowing an agency or the president to address that issue themselves under a broadly worded congressional statute. >> so what would happen? would this all just get pushed down to the states? would no action take place on things like climate change? any new kind of regulatory system that has to be put in place, let's say crypto currency, or all the new challenges that somehow the congress would not have thought about 40 years ago when it wrote some law? >> i think that that's exactly right. unless there is congressional action in response to those problems, they would be tackled at the state level and that is, you know, not exactly a recipe for success, given how polarized congress is on certain issues like climate change but also, as you note, there are problems that develop that congress just has no expertise over and might not be able to foresee and that's why it relies on administrative agencies and gives them the authority with

their expertise and flexibility to address these problems as they develop and that's precisely the sort of governance that the supreme court has called into question. >> all right. this feels like a big issue that we will have to monitor and we will almost certainly be coming back to. thank you so much. >> thank you. next on "gps" is america in a recession? well, we'll find out one piece of the puzzle next week's second quarter gdp. but in the meantime, let's hear from the man that warned about our current inflation problems, larry summers. le on skin. for wrinkle results in one week. neutrogena®. for people with skin. oh, hey. buying a car from vroom is so easy, all you need is a phone and a finger. just go to vroom.com, scroll through thousands of cars. then, tap to buy. that's it. no sales speak. no wasted time. just, straight up great cars. right from your phone to your driveway.

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its highest rate in four decades and americans incomes are not keeping pace. next week, we'll see the release of america's second quarter gdp data that could show economic contraction just as it did in the first quarter. all of that put together plus many other data points may point to a recession. let me bring in larry summers for his thoughts. he was treasury secretary in the clinton administration and, last year, repeatedly warned that inflation could be coming. larry, let me ask you first, just looking forward, what does the state of the economy look like? a recession, a recession plus inflation which means stackflation? how do you see it? >> i think there is a high likelihood of recession when we've been in this kind of situation before, recession has essentially always followed when inflation has been high and unemployment has been low.

soft landings represent a kind of triumph of hope over experience. i think we're very unlikely to see one. whether or not we put inflation fully back in the bottle with that recession, i think is very hard to judge at this point. i've been encouraged by the feds' commitment to do that, but other central banks at other times have professed to be committed, but have not done enough once the economy turned down to actually assure that inflation came down substantially. so i think there is also a greater risk of stagflation and this episode being with us for some number of years than the market is currently discounting. >> so what does this mean for the average person?

because what you're describing is an aggressive federal reserve raising rates, which means mortgages get more expensive, loans get more expensive, harder to buy houses. so there is pain coming? >> i think there is pain coming. that's what happens when you borrow too much in order to overspend, but i think the important thing to remember is we've had a ton of pain because of inflation. we've had prices go up 3% or 4% a year faster than wages over the last 12 months. that kind of thing will continue unless we do what is necessary to bring inflation down.

and so i think we do need strong action from our central bank. we need the government to do the other things that it can do. it can take tariffs off, which will bring down prices of goods that are imported or compete with imports. we can bring down pharmaceutical prices by using government's purchasing power, fareed. we can pursue what we clearly need, which is a both and energy policy that promotes the availability of anything that will produce energy so that the price of energy comes down. there are things we can do. we can bring down the budget deficit so it doesn't all have to rely on the fed by doing tax increases that are starting with just enforcing the tax law we have with respect to the people who don't pay taxes.

there is a lot we can do to contain or control inflation, but if we continue with the kind of ostrich policies we had in 2021, there is going to be much, much more pain later. i think that's increasingly appreciated and that improves our prospects, but i'm afraid i can't be confident that we're going to get through this without a recession. >> i got to ask about one of the people that disagreed with you in previous years has been paul krugman who has written something where he says you were right, he was wrong about inflation. but he says you were right for the wrong reasons, that actually, the big covid spending bill didn't have that bad an effect on the economy. what really happened was something unforeseen by anybody, which was that coming out of the pandemic, supply chains got screwed up, people started buying lots more goods rather than services and all those kind

of snafu and doing jams caused by the pandemic are really what has produced this inflation. >> there wouldn't have been nearly the same kinds of supply chain problems if huge amounts of money had not been put in people's pockets that enabled them to spend. if we weren't giving people who were laid off unemployment insurance that was far more than the salaries they had been earning. if we weren't mailing checks willy-nilly to families, there would have been less spending, that would have meant less bottlenecks. it was predictable that supply would be reduced given that we had a pandemic. but when supply is reduced, you have to reduce demand as well if you don't want to have substantial inflation. printing money and distributing it well ahead of the supply of goods is a prescription for inflation and that is what we did.

we injected enough money into the economy to make total spending grow at an 11.6% rate last year. when you have 11.6 growth rate in spending, then on any reasonable theory of how much capacity there is, you'll have a lot of inflation and that's what we did. >> larry summers, pleasure to have you on. >> thanks, fareed. next on "gps" if vladimir putin sets his sights beyond ukraine, what nation might be next? many think the answer is moldova. i'll talk to its prime minister when we come back. an aarp medicare supplement insurance plan from unitedhealthcare. medicare supplement plans help by paying some of what medicare doesn't... and let you see any doctor. any specialist. anywhere in the u.s. who accepts medicare patients. so if you have this... consider adding this. call unitedhealthcare today for your free decision guide.

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on ukraine's southwest border, has many similarities with its larger neighbor. most importantly, it is on a swift march toward democracization and westernization. in fact, in late june, it was granted e.u. candidate status alongside ukraine, but moldova has a russian backed break-away region where 40 years ago, they fought russian troops. today, russian troops are still based there. i wanted to know how it felt to be caught between russia and the west. and i had an opportunity to talk to moldova's prime minister national -- natalia gavrilita. madam prime minister, pleasure to have you on the show. moldova seems like ukraine, once part of the russian empire and soviet empire really wants to become a western liberal democracy. >> indeed.

moldova has had the troubled history and a complicated region and it has not only been part of the soviet union, it has also been part of romania between the first and the second world war. the majority of the population is romania speaking but we also have ukrainian, russian, bulgarian and a turkish speaking minority. and in the last elections, the people voted massively for a pro-european majority, for going the course of democratic institutions, fighting corruption, ensuring the respect for human rights and striving towards the european integration course. so achieving candidate status for e.u. integration has been a significant victory for moldova, one that the people have waited

for for a long time, but it is very unfortunate that it happens in such a complicated context in the region and such horrible times for ukraine. >> tell us what it's been like to be dealing with this russian invasion of ukraine, because you're right there as you say, and i think half a million ukrainians have passed through your country. describe what is going on. >> indeed. you know, as many people around the world, we were surprised on the 24th of february when russia invaded ukraine and we had to deal very quickly with a massive refugee flow and, of course, there were contingency preparations and there were some plans but, of course, we did not consider the probability to be very high. the entire society mobilized in

a exemplary way and moldova not only helped a million refugees move through moldova but also, at some point, was hosting the highest number per capita of any country. >> how worried are you that the russians will move next into moldova? >> we are worried. of course, this is a risk, it's a hypothetical scenario for now, but if the military actions move further into the southwestern part of ukraine and towards odessa then, of course, we are very worried, especially considering that troops on the territory of the region. we are doing everything possible to maintain peace and stability and to ensure that the fighting does not escalate. >> for you, when you look at the situation in ukraine, explain the stakes.

if russia were able to get away with this aggression and keep the territories it has conquered since february 24th, what kind of a position does this put you in? >> this is a very difficult position not just for moldova, but for any small country, any country that relies on the rules based international order. if a country can start an annexation war without any regard for, you know, international law then, in this sense, nobody is safe and i think that a lot of countries are worried. >> you're paying a pretty heavy price economically. do you think you'll be able to continue to do what you have to do even if the price goes higher, gets higher? >> indeed. moldova is the most affected country after ukraine

economically from this war. we saw already very high inflation. the inflation in june was at 32%. we continue to see a rise in energy prices. it has gone up six-fold since the government assumed office a year ago. and just to give people perspective, the average consumption of family in europe of energy is about 5% of its income in moldova. before the crisis, it was 15%. now, if the price goes six-fold then actually this is above any reasonable affordability level. but we really hope that our society and our people are resilient enough to fare through this very, very difficult time. we have seen, for example, in

polls that even after receiving a very large number of refugees, 85% of moldovans say that they would receive more refugees and 50% say unconditionally for whatever time. so this makes me very optimistic about the wisdom of my people. >> madam prime minister, a pleasure to have you on. >> thank you. so we offer a complete exam and x-rays free to new patients without insurance - everyday. plus, patients get 20% off their treatment plan. we're on your corner and in your corner every step of the way. because your anything is our everything. aspen dental. anything to make you smile. book today at aspendental.com, walk in, or call 1-800-aspendental.

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and now for "the last look." when the cdc announced just weeks ago that covid vaccines were safe for children under 5, it was the good news many american parents had been waiting for since the pandemic began. but we now have some very bad vaccine news for parents in much of the rest of the world. the world health organization and unicef announced last week that routine vaccinations of children globally have dropped

sharply since 2019, the largest sustained decline in 30 years. by last year the percentage of children who had received all three doses of the several vaccines had dropped to 81%. dtp is a benchmark for immunization coverage and the drop means that in 2021 alone 25 million children missed out on the vaccine. first dose meeasles cases droppd and cases are up 80%. the average vaccination rate of 11 major diseases including polio and hpv has fallen for the first time in more than 30 years. and the number of children who have not received a single dose of the most basic vaccines has risen sharply in the pandemic from 13 million in 2019 to 18

million in 2021. vaccinations have been an amazing good news story in public health. as "the times" reports organizations like the bill and melinda gates foundation have poured resources into routine immunization in poor countries. over time vaccination rates mirrored or even exceeded those of rich countries, and deaths from common diseases fell sharply. there are many causes including conflict and climate change, but in large part the back sliding on vaccines is a natural outcome of the chaos of the pandemic. supply chains were disrupted. attention and funding diverted to covid efforts. lockdown focused individual attention on daily survival. but what surprised researchers was the fact vaccinations didn't rebound last year, and they actually got worse after the first shocks of the pandemic wore off. the back side is curious because many of the same countries that

registered steep declines in routine immunizations were able to successfully roll out the covid-19 vaccine. look at indonesia where 62% of the population is fully vaccinated against covid-19, but indonesia registered a sharp decline in routine vaccinations. the w.h.o. estimates the percentage of children targeted for the dpt vaccine who actually received all three doses dropped from 85% in 2019 to 67% last year. part of the problem is the nature of public health intervention itself. funding streams and vaccination programs are often siloed. authorities didn't bundle covid vaccination drives with routine immunizations. but there is another menace that has exacerbated this problem, misinformation. look at brazil. as "the new york times" reports, it has a historically strong

vaccination program. but the president criticized the covid-19 vaccination early and often announcing that he, himself, was not vaccinated, that he would not vaccinate his 11-year-old daughter, and that the vaccine could increase one's chances of contracting aids. it does not, of course. shadowy anti-vaccine groups gained purchase in brazil during the pandemic, "the times" notes, and this further stoked the sentiment. brazil is among ten countries with the highest number of children who have not received a single vaccination of any kind. 26% of all infants in brazil last year did not receive any vaccinations, which is up from 13% in 2018. or look at the philippines where misinformation about the covid-19 vaccine abounds. harsh lockdowns and a shortage of health care workers has led to this stark reality. 43% of all infants there have yet to receive a single dose of

the most basic vaccines last year. vaccines are in many ways the low hanging fruit of public health. they're inexpensive and they work. because of them generations have grown up not having to fear illnesses that were once widespread and deadly. routine immunization may be a victim of its own success. new parents who haven't lived through the ravages of measles and polio may take that success for granted. but we must remember that progress of any kind in any field is not inevitable and as the world becomes more volatile without constant effort and vigi vigilance, progress can easily be reversed. thanks to all of you for being part of my program this week. i will see you next week. when you have technology that's easier to control... that can scale across all your clouds...

we got that right? yeah, we got that. it's easier to be an innovator. so you can do more incredible things. [whistling] hey, caleb. what's going on? homework. i'm supposed to learn how to cook a souffle. ooh. french impressive.

i have no clue what you're saying. yeah, i said that you should learn french because it makes you sound smart. i got you. you know what else is smart, alec? donating to shriners hospitals for children. i thought you'd say that. and you know what? you're right. just think what it would be like if people didn't support shriners hospitals for children every month. i don't even want to think about it. i know so many kids whose lives are completely different because of the specialized care shriners hospitals for children provides. yeah. like sebastian, who can stand now? yeah. and the best part is, it's so easy to become a monthly supporter. all you need to do is call the number on your screen or go to loveshriners.org your support will make sure our amazing doctors and nurses keep helping kids like us who need them now and in the future.

alec, do you think i could try this part? go for it, buddy. when you call right now. and your $19 a month only $0.63 a day, we'll send you your very own love to the rescue blanket as a reminder of all the kids you are helping every day. your monthly support makes a huge difference for kids like us. so please call now or go to loveshriners.org to give. on behalf of all the kids you're helping, alec and and i just want to say - thank you. you got that right. thank you so much. please call the number on your screen or go to loveshriners.org with your monthly support right away. your support shows you care too.

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happening now in the "newsroom," the january 6 committee eyes ginni thomas, the wife of supreme court justice clarence thomas for her role in trying to help overturn the 2020 election. >> we certainly hope that she will agree to come in voluntarily, but the committee is fully prepared to contemplate a subpoena if she does not. plus -- >> it was scary when we left because we were getting ashes on us, but we had such a visual of this billowing. it just seemed lik