Inside the show halls on Monday, preparations were under way to get ready for a show of glamour that contrasts sharply with the real world outside, where the economic climate remains positively frosty.

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But transmitting to young people the sense that this is really their world for the making and that on issues like climate change or economic inequality or how do we deal with world health issues or how do we deal with conflict, that in all these areas, creating a more peaceful, prosperous world is up to them.

WHITEHOUSE: THE WHITE HOUSE

"I think the evidence of this decade is clear, that if we organize properly, addressing the problem of climate change will provide the biggest economic boom since we mobilized for World War II, " Clinton said.

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Many of the challenges brought to the Arctic by climate change and economic development are the same as those faced around the world.

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Also, by then they will also have more economic clout on the world stage to enforce their own ideas of who ought to take moral responsibility for climate change.

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The announcements by China and the United States follow the world's top economic powers acknowledging earlier this month that there was no hope of a major breakthrough over climate change by year's end.

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With a new president and Congress in place, we must act together quickly to avoid the worst effects of climate change -- in doing so we also will find economic benefits for people the world over.

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But there Clinton was in all his vehement glory last week, in front of thousands of Dell World attendees, ranting on about his favorite subjects: childhood obesity, economic and political instability, income inequality, climate change, sustainability, medical advances, and harmony among nations.

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