The Bear Necessitates

Feds to consider listing polar bears as threatened

Congressional Republicans waging jihad against the Endangered Species Act may soon have a new reason to hate it: The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is considering giving polar bears federal endangered-species protections because climate change is melting their Arctic sea-ice habitat. If the feds are compelled to protect polar-bear habitat, and the habitat is threatened by climate change, then the feds may be forced -- horrors! -- to do something about climate change. Recent data show that Arctic sea ice has declined by 15 to 20 percent in the past 30 years; some climate experts think that there will be no summer sea ice in about 50 years. Some polar bears in Alaska and Canada have become thinner and less able to breed in recent years, and there's evidence that they're drowning as they try to make the lengthening swims between land and ice. The FWS will take public comments for 60 days, review climate-change studies, and announce its decision in 12 months.