In honor of John McCain's eco-week, both the McCain campaign and the Republican National Committee have launched sites where folks can make personal pledges to protect the planet. The McCain campaign has also put out a line of "eco-friendly" swag -- shirts, hats, tote bags, etc.
Meanwhile, McCain adviser Kevin Hassett, who is also the director of economic-policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute, argues in an op-ed that polar bears shouldn't be listed as endangered because such a decision could lead to severe restrictions on fossil-fuel drilling and burning. Here's a portion of his piece:
[T]his ruling ... will likely end all Arctic exploration for oil and gas, at least in the U.S. Given surging world demand for oil, increased supply is the only thing standing between us and $200-a-barrel oil.
These restrictions will have a large cost. "The U.S. Geological Survey and the Norwegian company StatoilHydro estimate that the Arctic holds as much as one-quarter of the world's remaining undiscovered oil and gas deposits," Scott Borgerson, an international affairs fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, wrote in the March/April issue of Foreign Affairs. "Some Arctic wildcatters believe this estimate could increase substantially as more is learned about the region's geology."
Many biologists believe that global warming is a serious threat to the polar bear. If that leads to the polar bear being listed as threatened this week, then the world you live in will have fundamentally changed.
The deadline for the Bush administration's ruling on whether or not to declare the polar bear an endangered species is tomorrow, but the Interior Department is actually scheduled to announce a decision today. [UPDATE: DOI did list the polar bear as threatened today.] Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne hasn't added any animals or plants to the endangered species list since he took office two years ago.
If McCain's advisers are already pushing for Bush-administration-style policies on issues like the polar bear, how credible are his claims this week that he's not Bush when it comes to the environment? All the eco-swag in the world can't make up for policies that continue to prioritize industry interests over the planet.
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Comments
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josullivan58 Posted 5:24 am
14 May 2008
Via NY Times
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/washington/AP-Polar-Bear. ...
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caniscandida Posted 6:01 am
14 May 2008
Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.
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Delay And Deny Posted 3:07 pm
14 May 2008
McCain is receiving advice from many quarters. Today, it looks as if a successful decision from the standpoint of Grist and environmentalists was reached.
That doesn't mean that people cannot continue to argue and debate. There was no delay: polar bears are now a threatened species.
That can be used as a pivot to enact the type of far reaching environmental policies that McCain advocates.
Still, I think Kevin Hassett raises a good number of points about the role of the polar bear in the ecosystem, some of which I have made myself, and I read his article with interest. In the end, do I want polar bears around...sure, why not...the kids like 'em!
But, Greens must now move from outside the windowed "Greenhouse", throwing rocks in...to living inside it, and taking the full consequences (and rewards) for their advise.
It's only fair.
Texeme.Construct(Participant)
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Tasermons Partner Posted 5:55 pm
14 May 2008
Actually, there was significant delay. Under federal law, listings for the ESA can only take 12 months, no longer. This one took more than 15 months.
And the only reason they made it when it did, rather than delay further, was because the courts said they had to make a decision by May 15 or face consequences.
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