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The Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorn announced that polar bears will be listed as “threatened” under the Endangered Species Act. The polar bear is one of the most recognized and in my opinion cutest animals around, but it is losing its habitat at a rapid rate. Currently 23,000 - 25,000 polar bears survive in the Arctic, but scientists from the U.S. Geological Survey are predicting that in 50 years the number will decrease by 2/3rds because of habitat loss due it melting away.
What bugs me about it all is that there is controversy over the fact that this is the first animal added to the list because of habitat loss. Isn’t that an easier to control and easier to remedy problem then poachers? Granted we can’t just plant more ice, but this decision leads us to be able to classify other animals in the rain forests and old growth forests as threatened because of loss of habitat. This would or should in my opinion give way to more habitat restoration program.
The government though like usual added a little bad to their good deed for the environment.
“Listing the polar bear as threatened can reduce avoidable losses of polar bears. But it should not open the door to use of the Endangered Species Act to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from automobiles, power plants, and other sources,” said Kempthorne.
“That would be a wholly inappropriate use of the ESA law. The ESA is not the right tool to set U.S. climate policy.”
So, the habitat is disappearing we know its from greenhouse gases and global warming, but we can’t use the fact that its actually killing off an endangered species to get big business or dirty power plants to regulate their greenhouse gas emissions. That’s a bunch of crap to be honest and blunt they don’t expect that to hold do they? If you protect an animal who is losing habitat due to a direct result of the emissions coming from these businesses how can you expect to protect them with out change to those emissions? I guess only time will tell.
Source: CNN
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Evita (Check me out!)
// May 15, 2008 at 8:55 pm
For starters I hate to sound negative but it was only a matter of time for the polar bear.
And as for the government, frustration…slowly…creeps in! Okay who am I kidding, it sucks, totally sucks that amidst these environmental crises the government is still not taking any serious action for changes and yes it starts with putting up some serious legislation where the companies that contribute to high GHG levels are concerned. But heaven forbid we upset the economy when the Earth is crumbling right out from underneath us…
Evitas last blog post..Gender Differences Found In How Commercials Influence Us
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