Charles, your interpretation doesn’t work. The quote is ambiguous and Tim Blair’s interpretation may be wrong, but ‘this’ in ‘this is the response’ clearly refers to the earthquake and not the international relief.

If we substitute “the international relief” into Danny Glover’s sentence, it reads: “when we did what we did at the climate summit, in Copenhagen, the international relief is the response, this is what happens, you know what I’m sayin’? That[’s why] we have to act now.”

Doesn’t make sense—why do we have to act now. On the other hand, substituting “the earthquake” makes perfect sense in context:

“when we did what we did at the climate summit, in Copenhagen, the earthquake is the response, this is what happens, you know what I’m sayin’? That[’s why] we have to act now.”