A warning by Secretary of State Kerry that the climate change talks underway at Paris will not deliver a treaty is a moment to mark. The scoop was brought in by the Financial Times, which interviewed the secretary at the Norfolk, Virginia, naval base, which, the FT interjected into its story, is “threatened by the prospect of rising sea levels.” That’s a concept, a Navy threatened by more water. But we digress. Mr. Kerry allowed as how whatever comes out of Paris would “drive a significant amount of investment toward a low-carbon economy but is, the FT quotes him as saying “definitely not going to be a treaty.”

The question to mark is why. The fact is that there’s not a snowball’s chance in the ever-hotter climate of Hell that the Senate would approve a pact coming out of the parley at Paris. Delegates from the 195 countries participating at Paris may be set to wrap up what the FT calls a “new global climate accord. But the delegates haven’t even come close to convincing the Congress of the United States that is the accord ought to rank as the Supreme Law of the Land, of which treaties are one of the components. It’s not that Congress is dumb or blind. It’s that Congress thinks the Paris talks are ridiculous.

What will come out of Paris, Mr. Kerry told the FT, is “not going to be legally binding reduction targets like Kyoto or something.” Then again, Kyoto is not legally binding, either, at least in America, for the same reason. The Kyoto Treaty didn’t stand any more of a chance of getting ratified in the Senate than a snowball dropped in the maw of Krakatoa. The Senate is no dummy. It is inalterably opposed — it voted 95 to zero on the point — to any pact that does not bind the developing countries as well as the rich and that would harm the American economy.

That America is even participating in the Paris talks is an affront to the sense of the Senate — as is the line Mr. Kerry is taking. The FT says he “played down concerns that Congress would play a big role.” The secretary of state said the administration was “fine” about “some review” by Congress so long as the “scrutiny was sincere.” What is the constitutional definition of insincerity in Congress? Could it be money? Mr. Kerry acknowledged that, as the FT put it, “lawmakers were already making it difficult to come up with the $3 billion” that the administration “pledged ahead of the Paris deal.”

Mr. Kerry tried to palm off on the FT the notion that “other countries should not worry about U.S. politics.” He claimed: “Republicans have no chance of taking the White House.” President Obama will outmaneuver the Congress on climate funding, Mr. Kerry suggested, leading the FT to write: “The man who fought with Congress over the Iran deal earlier this year said Mr. Obama would find a way to press lawmakers into approving funding.” It quotes Mr. Kerry as saying: “When something is a high enough priority for a president, you have a way of getting it done, even though it’s opposed by people.”