An interesting piece up at Slate on the efforts of environmentalists to have polar bears designated as an endangered species:
In the short term, populations are at reasonably high levels and holding steady. In the longer term, designating polar bears for protection won't stop climate change and therefore won't save their Arctic sea ice habitat. Given these harsh facts, is this battle to list the polar bear right away worth the fight?
You got that? Say it with me, populations are at reasonably high-levels and holding steady, which is a nice euphemism for wholly unaffected by climate change as far as anyone can tell. Still, this is Slate, home of the ridiculous and months-long " Green Challenge," so you can guess how our author answers the question. But if you really want to know how absurd the hyperventilating about polar bears is, read Bjorn Lomborg's Cool It. Turns out global warming might kill a polar bear or two every year. But here's my question, and I'd be grateful if someone who really understands the issue could answer it for me: why can't we just ship a bunch of polar bears down to Antarctica? There's a whole continent down there with millions of penguins to munch on and no humans to speak of. Even if it goes horribly wrong, it'd make for a great IMAX documentary.