Industry Groups Suing To Reverse Polar Bear Protection
source: http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/09/industry-groups-want-polar-bear-protection-reversed.php
-
-
- benjaminV
- added this
This give Alaska Gov. (and vice-presidential hopeful) Sarah Palin's administration's own lawsuit opposing the polar bear's listing a boost. On August 4, the state of Alaska argued that the animal's populations are stable and that melting sea ice isn't an immediate threat to their survival.
The petroleum institute was joined in the lawsuit by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Mining Association, the American Iron and Steel Institute, and the National Association of Manufacturers, the last of which recently praised Palin's Republican vice-presidential nomination because of her support of Alaskan oil and gas exploration.
The industry groups' main objection is to what they call the "Alaska Gap," a special rule issued by the federal government meant to prevent the polar bear's protected status from being used to impose greenhouse-gas limits. Because the ruling exempts projects in all states except Alaska from undergoing emissions reviews, NAM vice president Keith McCoy says it unfairly subjects Alaskan industry to greenhouse-gas controls and may open a backdoor for tighter emissions regulations nationwide.
"This could significantly curtail oil and gas exploration," especially on Alaska's North Slope, he's quoted in The Washington Post as saying. "It's discrimination against the state of Alaska. During a time when gas prices are high and we need to look at all options, to issue something that shuts off a viable resource" is ill-advised.
To add insult to injury, Palin chose the grizzly bear over the Arctic resident for the state's commemorative quarter, which was released into circulation last week.
-
- tags:
- Green, Environment, Climate Change, Global Warming, 13 more
-
-
benjaminV
-
The fact that animals evolve and adapt doesn't mean we humans aren't having an adverse effect all over the globe. We have the power to influence nature, both good and bad. And by good I mean healthy, clean, abundant.
Semantics about the welfare of polar bears seems like a way to justify our actions as humans. Is that your intent?
- 4 years ago
-
benjaminV
-
-
arcticspirit
-
-
#
I know this is longer than most will want to read, but it does give history and the political reasons for this happening in our media.------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Does anyone know why the bears have a life on the ice in the first place?
(WARP IN TIME>>> POLAR BEAR HISTORY 101)
Their once lush landscape (during parts of the year) eventually became frozen all year as it has been for a very long time...
So, the once grown bears how to adapt and evolve to survive on the desolate surface of ice, that they suddenly had to call home. THAT was a crisis, actually.The bears couldn't eat the herbs, vegetation and the death of everything in their food chain due to the complete ice that for their natural diet. The originally brown bears over time became what we call polar bears.
What happens if the ice melts? Massive death of bears?
NOT HARDLY!
To claim, however, that they are facing imminent doom is stretching the truth. In 1950, let us not forget, there were about 5,000 polar bears. Now there are 25,000.Probably they will have a better diet in the summer.
We will eventually see higher birth weights of cubs as the bears adapt to any climate changes.FEAR SARAH, that is the true reason for this "crisis"
Don't worry about the bears, they survived the first crisis that froze their homeland, this should be cake.Why is this political?
First there came the computer-generated polar bear in Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth; then that heartrending photo, syndicated everywhere, of the bears apparently stranded on a melting ice floe; then the story of those four polar bears drowned by global warming (actually, they’d perished in a storm).Now, in a new cinema release called Earth – a magnificent, feature-length nature documentary from the makers of the BBC’s Planet Earth series – comes the most sob-inducing “evidence” of all: a poor male polar bear filmed starving to death as a result, the quaveringly emotional Patrick Stewart voiceover suggests, of global warming.
Thanks for reading.
- 4 years ago
-
arcticspirit
-
-
benjaminV
-
We have, as a society, made 'nature' a spectacle. Something you go to a park for. Or visit a zoo. When in reality, we are inextricably linked, and we benefit from the unseen natural processes all around us. It is sad that so many people have completely lost their connection to the land.
- 4 years ago
-
benjaminV
-
-
Parasol29
-
Amen to that benjaminV! The States have been going downhill on enviromental policies during the last 7 years...Some naive people sitting in their luxury flats enjoying the full panorama of cement city cant even grasp how exhilerating it is to go climbing in a beautiful mountain range...
- 4 years ago
-
Parasol29
-
-
lavenderballoon
-
Pretty telling about the priorities of the oil companies, in case we had any doubts about that.
- 4 years ago
-
lavenderballoon
-
-
benjaminV
-
It is time for the American public to stand up for causes other than industry and the cost at the pump.
Cheaper gas?! For what? So you can save a little bit to buy that bigger flat panel TV? Greed in this country just makes me sick.
I wish so much that people would gain a bit of appreciation for the absolute beauty of the natural world. These species existed for thousands of years until our industrial revolution raped the world and shit it out the other side.
- 4 years ago
-
benjaminV
