Polar Bear Fight: Round 2

The polar bear won't receive unneeded, economically devastating protection without a fight, as litigants are lining up to challenge the Bush Admin's latest cave-in to the radical environmental agenda.

We Republicans used to fight against Statism, working diligently to keep federal over-reach at bay. There were a dozen ways the Bush Dept. of Interior could have denied the environmentalists' ploy to seize control of America's economy through the Endangered Species Act, but they folded. With no true Republicans left in Washington, it's come to this: Alaska and private enterprise are stepping in where the lost GOP fears to tread.

First, Alaska via AP:

ANCHORAGE, Alaska - The state of Alaska will sue to challenge the recent listing of polar bears as a threatened species, Gov. Sarah Palin announced Wednesday.

I like Palin more and more. Too bad McCain's not inviting her to Sadona.

She and other Alaska elected officials fear a listing will cripple oil and gas development in prime polar bear habitat off the state's northern and northwestern coasts.

Palin argued that there is not enough evidence to support a listing. Polar bears are well-managed and their population has dramatically increased over 30 years as a result of conservation, she said.

On the private sector side, I got this email today from the Pacific Legal Foundation, one of the nation's leading champions of property rights:

PLF WILL FIGHT POLAR BEAR LISTING THAT THREATENS TO CHILL THE ECONOMY

Crushing, economy-wrecking regulation in the name of “global warming.” Is that what the future holds for the United States? Not if Pacific Legal Foundation can help it.

The first big, dangerous step toward oppressive global warming restrictions on economic activity—and personal liberty—came last week. Federal officials bowed to environmentalist pressure and put polar bears on the Endangered Species Act list.

Pacific Legal Foundation is swinging into action to fight this move. We are immediately ready to file the 60-day notice that is required for litigation involving the ESA.

Yes, you do have to give the federal government 60 days' notice that you intend to sue. It would be nice if they'd extend the same courtesy to mere citizens.

Why? Because the listing is wrong—scientifically and legally. And it can be used as a tool by enviro-radicals to curtail vast amounts of productive activity, throughout the country.

The Polar Bear Isn’t In Peril

There simply isn’t verifiable evidence that polar bears are in danger. Quite the contrary. As an editorial in Investors Business Daily reported last week, polar bear numbers “are actually growing. There might be as many as 25,000, and probably no fewer than 22,000, today, while 50 years ago, there were somewhere between 8,000 and 10,000.”

The newspaper went on to quote PLF Principal Attorney Reed Hopper: “ ‘Never before has a thriving species been listed under the Endangered Species Act, nor should it,’ said [Hopper]... . Hopper also notes another reason the listing was unwarranted: The polar bear has already survived two global warming eras that were as hot or hotter than the anticipated coming climate change.”

The government is following questionable computer models that project shrinking ice floes—but ice has been shrinking for a couple of decades already, yet polar bears are increasing!

Meanwhile, the government of Canada—where more polar bears reside—says they’re not threatened. Indeed, the polar bear is already among the most protected species in the world.

They go on to quote the same economic arguments against the listing (not that economic arguments hold any weight in species listings; they don't). They also got this juicy quote from the Center for Biological Depravity:

According to the Center for Biological Diversity, which petitioned to list the polar bear, a listing could subject “all U.S. industries” emitting greenhouse gases to the “purview of the Endangered Species Act.”

To channel Johnny Cochran: "You're up to your ears in s*** if you emit."

I wrote a check to PLF today to help them with their lawsuit. Won't you, too? Here's their donate page.

Looking Closer At The Polar Bear Listing

Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne tried to mute the impact of his listing today of the polar bear by assuring us in his comments that he's covered our fears of economic meltdown by preparing an administrative guidance:

“I am also announcing that this listing decision will be accompanied by administrative guidance and a rule that defines the scope of impact my decision will have, in order to protect the polar bear while limiting the unintended harm to the society and economy of the United States.” ...

[Fish & Wildlife Service] Director [Dale] Hall will issue guidance to Fish and Wildlife Service staff that the best scientific data available today cannot make a causal connection between harm to listed species or their habitats and greenhouse gas emissions from a specific facility, or resource development project, or government action.

Forget it; the guidance might as well have been written on toilet paper; it cannot alter the provisions of ESA, and you have to dig no further into the final rule to find this:

This final rule activates the consultation provisions of section 7 of the Act for the polar bear.

That means that any project in the US -- Alaska or lower 48 or anywhere else our flag flies -- that could increase greenhouse gases will now be subject to a challenge by enviros if it doesn't undergo a section 7 review, and that they will almost certainly win those challenges. So thanks to Kempthorne's pathetic punt today, projects like factories, power plants (as if we'll ever build another one of those), developments on the urban fringe and new roads or transmission lines will be challenged, and subsequently cut back, delayed or even stopped.

This was the Greens' intent all along; otherwise they wouldn't have petitioned for listing, so they won very big today. Even so, the mere mention of the guidance document got the paranoid hyper-greens on the left hysterical and paranoid, as evidenced by this blogger:

Ah ha! Since the news on this is just filtering out this minute, you'll forgive me for my delusional optimism spawned from the new listing rule for the imperiled polar bear. No, you knew it was too good to be true that the Fish and Wildlife Service's acknowledgment that the polar bear is threatened by sea ice loss and that sea ice is lost by global warming would mean that we would try to stop global warming.

[He then quotes parts of the same Kempthorne quote]

No, we must instead continue to "allow continuation of vital energy production in Alaska," i.e. drill for oil in polar bear habitat. Right. Of course we do. Must. Protect. The. Oil. Economy.

Alaska, Iraq, Afghanistan.... all territories conquered by the Army of Big Oil. And we know who is the Commander in Chief of that particular military.

That will be the Greenie/Warmie response, and they will argue it time and again on project after project, periodically finding sympathetic judges and setting detrimental precedents.

Accompanying the decision was a special rule, allowed under section 4(d) of the act only for threatened listings like today's, not endangered listings. We have used 4(d)s in the past to circumvent some of the more onerous aspects of a listing, but this one is pretty darn milquetoast, dealing mostly with things like Native American take of bears.

There is, however, a lengthy section on successful mitigation measures for oil and gas exploration in Alaska, specifying things like having no operations within a mile of a polar bear den, and having bear biologists on hand to monitor operations. The results of these measures, says the rule, have been positive:

Data provided by monitoring and reporting programs in the Beaufort Sea and in the Chukchi Sea, as required under the incidental take authorizations for oil and gas activities, have shown that the mitigation measures have successfully minimized effects on polar bears. For example, since 1991, when the incidental take regulations became effective in the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas, there has been no known instance of a polar bear being killed or of personnel being injured by a bear as a result of oil and gas industry activities. The mitigation measures associated with the Beaufort Sea incidental take regulations, which, based on the monitoring and reporting data, have proven to minimize human–bear interactions, will be part of the Chukchi Sea incidental take regulations currently under review.

That could give some cover to Alaskan oil ops, but the Greenies/Warmies will peck away at it, creating more and more restrictions, limiting the number of days exploration or extraction can occur, challenging the roadway that links the Prudhoe Bay facilities to the South, ad infinitum. And what of oil projects in, say, Texas or Montana? For that and any other industrial development, the 4(d) also tries to limit when section 7 consultations will be required:

But in the simplest terms, a Federal agency evaluates whether consultation is necessary by analyzing what will happen to listed species or critical habitat “with and without” the proposed action. Typically, this analysis will review direct effects, indirect effects, and the effects that are caused by interrelated and interdependent activities to determine if the proposed action “may affect” listed species or critical habitat. For those effects beyond the footprint of the action, our regulations at 50 CFR 402.02 require that they both be “caused by the action under consultation” and “reasonably certain to occur.” That is, effects are only appropriately considered in a section 7 analysis if there is a causal connection between the proposed action and a discernible effect to the species or critical habitat that is reasonably certain to occur. One must be able to “connect the dots” between the proposed action, an effect, and an impact to the species and there must be a reasonable certainty that the effect will occur.

This is clearly an attempt to limit the enforcement of the provisions of Section 7 only to those projects that would, say, slap a subdivision down over a bunch of polar bear dens, or light big bonfires on the shrinking icecap. Would that it were so.

Again, all the Greenies/Warmies have to do is find a judge who finds a direct correlation between the emissions of a factory in Kansas to the melting of ice in the Arctic, and they're off and running. There are precedents that have protected property owners from the arbitrary and capricious enforcement of Section 7, notably Arizona Cattlegrowers’ Association v. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (273 F.3d 1229, 9th cir. 2001), but everything is endlessly challengable in the ESA world, and challenges mean delay, which mean negative economic impact and sometimes dead projects.

A bolder administration would have said that because polar bear populations have increased, because last summer's loss of polar sea ice was more than made up for with this freezing winter's massive new formations, and because the US has cut carbon emissions substantially and is on the way to cutting them further, a listing isn't warranted at this time.

Not doing so is probably just a sign of how weak and disappointing the Bush administration has become. There is an argument that could be made that this is all strategery, i.e., better to get a "threatened" listing with a guidance and a 4(d) from this administration than a real stinker for the next administration ... but I'm tired of scanning the distant horizons for some sign of good performance from the inept Bush administration ... beyond the surge, anyway. Thank God for the surge.

Bush Authors Polar Disaster

It looks like very, very bad news on the polar bear front:

WASHINGTON -- The Bush Administration Wednesday handed environmentalists a major victory, determining there was sufficient scientific evidence to declare the polar bear a threatened species, according to several people close to the matter.

Opponents said it could not only trigger major new obstacles for oil companies seeking to drill in the Arctic -- where some of the last remaining reserves are to be found -- but could also potentially affect nearly every regulatory decision that might impact global warming, including decisions for coal power plants. (WSJ)

The ruling isn't out yet, and this could be a bad early read. But if they're right and the Bush administration folded to the Greens on this issue, it will be a legacy-maker for him ... and certainly not a good one.

If you play the markets, know that if the decision comes down the way the WSJ says it will, oil prices will continue to rise. Good for Big Oil, bad for everyone else.

Greens Mount Big Polar Bear Push

It's clearly a case of Greens Gone Wild. From the Center for Biological Depravity Diversity to Al Gore's newbie, We Can Solve It (Cutely, "We" for short), they've all got their electronic petitions and letter-generators going wild, flooding the Dept. of Interior with please to ignore science and buy into hysteria list the polar bear under the Endangered Species Act.

"We" is taking a very low key approach, asking folks to sign a petition that says only:

"Mr. Secretary, please ensure that the polar bear gains the protection of the Endangered Species Act today."

The email I got from We today said 100,000 had signed the petition and they're shooting for a goal of 115,000. That sounds fishy; clearly their initial goal was something big and round, like 200,000 or 500,000.

The Center is much more hyper in its pitch for its own petition:

On Thursday, the federal government will make one of the most important decisions in conservation history.

True enough, thus far.

If it declares the polar bear to be an "endangered" species, the decision will set off an unprecedented worldwide discussion on global warming… and establish legal requirements to do something about it.

They don't say what that "something" is -- basically putting any new project of any kind that has a footprint under the federal microscope.

If the government refuses, desperately needed global action will again be delayed by the Bush administration's stubbornness. Short-term corporate profits will continue to control political agendas and threaten life on Earth. All of life on Earth.

How can Bush delay global action? He only has authority (limited authority) over one small part of the globe. Besides, the ESA doesn't allow economic impacts -- "short-term corporate profits" -- to influence decisions on listings, and the Center knows it, since they raise the argument all the time in their endless river of litigation. But that makes lousy rhetoric.

They go on to state a goal of 60,000 signatures on their petition.

Interestingly, another major environmental litigation mill, the Natural Resources Defense Council, apparently isn't on board with the polar bear since its current list of issues shuns the bear. Why? If the critter's about to go under, the NRDC would definitely be engaged. It litigates regularly on endangered species issues.

Perhaps the NRDC knows what we all know -- that the polar bears are doing just fine, thank you, and this is all a false effort to misuse the Endangered Species Act as an economic jackhammer instead of a law to protect animals.

This Thursday And $200-A-Barrel Oil

Thursday is it: The big day for the future of our global economy.

It's not a particularly big day for the polar bear, even though its the cause of all that may follow this Thursday's mandated decision by the Dept. of the Interior regarding the proposed listing of the bear under the federal Endangered Species Act. We could devastate the global economy to save the bear and have no effect on it whatsoever, since the threat to it is only theoretical, while the threat to our economy posed by a listing is anything but.

The theory, for those who have been in hibernation, is that global warming is threatening the polar bear due to thinning polar ice. Never mind that this year's icepack is just about the thickest on record. To save the bear, we must SAVE THE PLANET and STOP GLOBAL WARMING.

That means anything, down to turn the key in your Yukon (or your Prius, for that matter) is contributing to the EXTINCTION OF THE CUTE POLAR BEARS and must be stopped. New power plants? Drilling on the North Slope? Forget it.

Here's a nice summary on the economic consequences of a listing from Kevin Hasset of the American Enterprise Institute, writing at Bloomberg:

There are two reasons why that decision, if it is made, will be momentous.

Geographic Reach

The first is the possible wide geographic reach of the global warming argument. The snail darter almost killed a single dam. The polar bear could, in theory at least, stop everything.

Suppose someone wants to build a coal-burning power plant in Florida. Environmentalists might challenge the construction on the grounds that the plant will emit greenhouse gases leading to global warming and an increased threat to polar bears.

It is hard to say how such challenges would play out. My guess is that it would heighten the pressure on the U.S. to adopt a cap-and-trade emissions program or a carbon tax.

The second impact of this ruling is that it 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.

Costly Restrictions

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.

Calling It

I've worked with the Endangered Species Act for about 20 years now through some of the hairiest listings of the recent era and here's my take on what will happen Thursday.

First, Interior will not list the polar bear as endangered; there is clearly no basis for that.

On the more likely listing as "threatened," Interior will also defer, opting instead to list a few distinct population segments whose numbers have been declining in recent years. The listing will require more study and additional controls on local impacts to those populations, but will be crafted to keep global warming out of the picture.

Science is part of the reason for this prediction, although I've seen Interior ignore science in the past. George Bush is the other reason. If Gore had been elected, the bear would have been listed years ago and we'd be suffering the consequences. If the decision were not to be made before the next president takes office, any of the three candidates could be counted on to list the bear.

So Bush is the final hope for sanity, and the scenario I've laid out is more likely than him denying the listing outright. Such a denial would be justified, but even George has been looking a little green lately. I hope I'm right. $200-a-barrel oil will be just the start of the heartburn we'll suffer if I'm wrong.

If Polar Bear Is Listed, Don't Breathe

OK, the picture of the polar bear eating a horse head is gross -- but it shows the polar bear as it is, not the cuddly critter the Greenies would like you to see them as, as they rally all their resources to get the bear listed as an endangered species.

I've written frequently on the proposed bolar bear listing (see links below), but I admit I've never stated the consequences of a listing as clearly as Hugh Hewitt did yesterday. Here's what he said:

The short version: If the polar bear is listed, every activity that emits a greenhouse gas of any sort in the lower 48 AND which receives a federal permit or requires federal agency action of any sort --even if that permit or action is unrelated to the emission of the gases-- those activities will be subject to new review by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, and the approval may not be forthcoming, will certainly at least be delayed, and will almost certainly come with massive new costs attached.

Thus coastal building programs that require federal flood insurance or Army Corps of Engineers permits, highway construction that gets FHA funding, or joint NASA-private industry initiatives that result in launchings, all these and hundreds of thousands of additional federal permits and actions get gathered in under Section 7 of the Endangered Species Act.

Environmentalist groups have standing to sue to demand the Section 7 process be followed, and they collect attorneys fees when they succeed. It is the full employment act for environmental activists.

As Power Line (which directed me to Hugh, with a hat-tip to Jim) sums it up:

Come to think of it, every time you breathe you emit carbon dioxide which, according to the wackos, "endangers" the polar bear. Good thing you don't (yet) need a permit to breathe; so far, it's only the economy that is in danger of being killed off. Come to think of it, every time you breathe you emit carbon dioxide which, according to the wackos, "endangers" the polar bear. Good thing you don't (yet) need a permit to breathe; so far, it's only the economy that is in danger of being killed off.

There are mulitple source of data, both U.S. and Canadian, that shows polar bear populations are healthy, and last summers big polar ice melt-off was answered this winter with the fastest build-up of polar ice in recorded history.

I'm very glad this decision is being made by George Bush's Department of Interior. Yes, he's gotten squirly on global warming lately, but I think the imminent decision will come down on the side of science, and there will be no listing.

See also:

White Bears And Black People
Too Much Sea Ice For Polar Bears
Di Caprio Lies And Hustles Bucks
Dying Polar Bear Rebuttal Kit
The May's And Might's Of Global Warming

White Bears And Black People

Remember a couple days ago when I wrote about John Coleman (former owner of The Weather Channel) recommending lawsuits against Al Gore and other sellers of carbon credits as a way to fight back against global warming hysteria? Well, quick as a polar ice cap build-up, it looks like we've got a potentially powerful anti-global warming hysteria lawsuit -- from the Congress of Racial Equality!

I can't find the release on CORE's circa 1995 Web site, so trust me on this:

NATIONAL CIVIL RIGHTS LEADER TO SUE BUSH ADMINISTRATION IF THE POLAR BEAR IS LISTED AS THREATENED

CORE's Roy Innis Says Energy Costs Will Rise If Environmentalists Have Their Way, Hurting American Minorities and the Working Poor

NEW YORK (March 6, 2008) - Congress of Racial Equality Chairman Roy Innis is promising to sue the Bush Administration if it lists the polar bear as "threatened" under the Endangered Species Act because such a listing will drive up energy prices and hurt America's working poor more than any other element of society.

Speaking this week at the 2008 International Conference on Climate Change in New York City, Innis said an ESA listing of the polar bear would give environmental extremists a powerful weapon with which to stop energy development in the Lower 48 -- from oil and natural gas production to construction of needed coal-fired and other power plants to even renewable fuels facilities.

Innis said that this will "result in higher energy prices across the board which will disproportionately be borne by minorities. It will cause countless families in our country in winters ahead to choose between food on the table and fuel in the furnace."

Innis, a long-time civil-rights activist, said "energy is the master resource of modern society ... with abundant, reliable, affordable energy, much is possible. Without it, hope, opportunity and progress are hobbled.

"Laws and policies that restrict access to America's abundant energy drive up the price of energy and consumer goods. They cause widespread layoffs, leaving unemployed workers and families struggling to survive, as the cost of everything they eat, drive, wear and do spirals out of control. They could roll back some of the civil rights progress for which civil rights revolutionaries and Dr. (Martin Luther) King died."

An ESA listing for the polar bear -- which could come in the next few weeks -- has been pushed by environmental elitist groups as a means of slowing economic growth and forcing climate change regulation onto the American people through the Endangered Species Act.

Of course, polar bears aren't endangered or threatened. They've survived warm spells in the past. Their sea ice is back thicker than it has been in years.

But what does that matter? Listing the bear would trigger anti-global warming laws and regs from the federal government and that's all the Greenies and Warmies care about. They are incredibly adept at exploiting the Endangered Species Act to stop growth, economic progress, and the advancement of humanity -- as I just witnessed this morning at a presentation by the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California regarding the 30% water supply cuts they may have to make soon, in large part because Greenies used ESA to list the Delta smelt.

The smelt was targeted for listing because it accomplished their desire to reduce water deliveries, accomplishing their goal of stopping or slowing growth. The polar bear is targeted because its listing will force draconian economic and growth control regulations disguised as climate control regulations.

Oh, and both are great for fund-raising.

For earlier posts on the polar bear listing, see:

Too Much Sea Ice For Polar Bears
Di Caprio Lies And Hustles Bucks
Dying Polar Bear Rebuttal Kit
The May's And Might's Of Global Warming

For earlier posts on the Delta Smelt, see:

Sunday Scan: Pucker Up
Smelt Dealt: Greenies Gut Water Supply
Brown Grass Ahead?
Smelt Stink

Too Much Sea Ice For Polar Bears

An over-abundance of sea ice in Greenland is forcing starving polar bears into towns -- in defiance of environmentalist edicts that global warming shall push the bears to the edge of extinction by dramatically reducing sea ice.

Greenie Watch passes along this email received from Svend Erik Hendriksen, a certified weather observer in the Kangerlussuaq Greenland meteorological office:

"Several polar bears (at least 6) located close to Sisimiut town on the West coast...To [sic] much sea ice, so they are very hungry..... Al Gore says the polar bear need more ice to survive....Now we have a lot of ice, but the polar bears are starving and find their food at the garbage dumps in towns. It's also influenced the local community, polar bear alerts keep kids away from the schools and so on.... The first one was shot at February 1st.

In fact, sea ice in Greenland is at its highest level in 15 years, reports the Danish meteorological service. Here's an article from the paper Sermitsiak:

The ice between Canada and southwestern Greenland has reached its highest level in 15 years.

Minus 30 degrees Celsius. That's how cold it's been in large parts of western Greenland where the population has been bundling up in hats and scarves. At the same time, Denmark's Meteorological Institute states that the ice between Canada and southwest Greenland right now has reached its greatest extent in 15 years.

'Satellite pictures show that the ice expansion has extended farther south this year. In fact, it's a bit past the Nuuk area. We have to go back 15 years to find ice expansion so far south. On the eastern coast it hasn't been colder than normal, but there has been a good amount of snow.'

The winter of 2007-2008 continues to flummox the Warmies. Of course, there will always be unusually warm years during a cold run, and unusually cold ones during a warm run -- that's just the way it goes, and has gone, since long before we punky humans have been around.

Di Caprio Lies And Hustles Bucks

Leonardo DiCaprio graced my mailbox yesterday with a big, fat shill for bucks for one of the most successful, richest enviro-litigation mills, the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC).

In it, he uses polar bears as his leverage to try to argue money out of my wallet. I'll get to that pack of frozen lies in a moment, but first let's take a look at the mailing itself. It consisted of a large envelope that could hold 8 1/2 X 11 sheets flat. Inside was:

• A two-sided letter printed in two colors from DiCaprio to Incredible Wife, who he wrongly addressed as "Dear NRDC Member." As if.
  
• A four-page, three color letter from Frances Beinecke, NRDC's president.
• An undersized, four-color slip-in sheet offering us a FREE! POLAR BEAR TOTE BAG if we give $10 or more. The bag doesn't look anywhere near big enough to tote a polar bear.
• A two-color money solicitation form ("Can you give $30 or more to throw polar bears a life line?") with an attached letter to the Fish & Wildlife Service.

The package was addressed to "Dear NRDC Member." There are 1.2 million NRDC members nationwide who presumably received it, along with God knows how many others who, like my Incredible Wife, are not members. An Environmental Impact Report should have been required for this mailing in order to answer these questions and develop mitigations for the impacts:

• How many trees were chopped down to produce the paper, which at best is 30 percent post-consumption recycled, 70 percent new trees?
• What was the global warming impact of the loss of those trees?
• How many gallons of fuel were required to process this order, including fuel used in the lumber operations and the various deliveries, i.e., from the printing house to the post office, and by all the postal carriers carrying it?
• What was the global warming impact of that fuel consumption?
• How much electricity was needed to run the presses on which the job was printed?
• What was the global warming impact of that electrical consumption?
• What was the chemical nature of the inks used, and what impact did their production have on the planet?
• How much fuel and electricity will be used to deliver cash to the NRDC and process the take?

Of course, this was just one mailing, the veritable tip of the iceberg that's melting out from beneath the polar bears. I gave a presentation to the California Mining Association a few years back that included a slide with these bullets:

• In 2001, environmental groups mailed 160 million fundraising letters
• In 1999 alone, The Wilderness Society mailed 348,000 pounds of junk mail soliciting members
• Many of the claims made in these mailings are bogus:
  -- A Rainforest Alliance mailing said, “By this time tomorrow, nearly 100 species of wildlife will tumble into extinction.” No primate species has gone into extinction in decades. The claim is based on faulty computer models, not field science.
  -- The Wilderness Society said “We will fight to stop reckless clear-cutting on national forests … that threatens to destroy the last of America’s unprotected ancient forests in as little as 20 years.” But cutting is down 89 percent from 1990. In 1998, clear-cutting in national forests dropped to a “reckless” 1,395 acres.
• Daniel Borochoff, president of The American Institute of Philanthropy said of the Greenie mailings, "They're spending as little as 15-20% on programs in some cases! These groups should not be allowed to get away with this. We'll sue if necessary."

So the NRDC's polar bear solicitation is but one of an endless stream of expensive, ecologically damaging, untruthful mailings that stream from America's mainstream environmental groups to solicit the money and members they need to keep their top-heavy organizations and well-paid staffs functioning.

Did I say top-heavy and well paid? The NRDC has 350 lawyers and scientists on staff -- and some pretty posh digs, as the photo of its DC office shows. One NRDC lawyer I know comes to meetings in fabulously tailored suits, pulling up in a late-model BMW.

Now, onto the mailing. It doesn't start well. In the second paragraph, DiC writes:

My grandfather, who lived in Germany, told me a story about an industrialist who owned the coal mine my grandfather worked in. The mine owner refused to build a smokestack tall enough to prevent smoke and soot from overwhelming the town.

The filthy capitalist! No, wait a minute! The filthy, lying environmentalist! Coal mines don't have smokestacks. DiC should read up a bit on industry before he hysterically condemns industrialists.

But onto the cuddly, pathetic polar bears. DiC says:

Today, the entire Earth is like my grandfather's town. [heh] Unless we act soon to control our global warming pollution, it will have a devastating impact on our planet's web of life.

Polar bears are already suffering the effects. As one of the first species to face extinction as a direct result of global warming, the bear's [sic] future is literally melting away along with the Arctic sea ice.

One little problem with that hypothesis. There's no evidence whatsoever that polar bears are going extinct, while there is evidence that they've survived worse in the past.

Polar bears survived through a warm spell considerably hotter than predictions the Warmies make for our future. This is now known for certain because scientists recently unearthed and dated a 130,000-year-old polar bear jaw -- dating the species to the toasty Eemian period, when there was no arctic sea ice. (source)

Time to set the heartstrings aquivering:

There have been documented reports of polar bears drowning and starving -- and of snowy dens collapsing on newborn cubs and their mothers from unseasonable rains.

It's called nature, Leo. Get used to it. Critters drown and starve every day with no help whatsoever from our industries. Sometimes it rains when it's not supposed to. Sometimes it snows when it's not supposed to.

Besides, where's the proof? Here are two papers on arctic ice melt (NASA, CIRES), neither one of which mentions air temperature at all. This NYT article mentions that the water temperature is nine degrees above normal and supposes that as the ice melts, the water gets warmer because sunlight is reaching it.

But what set the ice melting in a climate where temperatures rarely get above freezing. Many believe it's above-normal volcanic activity on the Arctic Ocean floor -- something man has nothing to do with and can do nothing about, no matter how much money the suckers send to the NRDC.

Update: A hat-tip to my friend Neil for reminding me that this year saw a little reported fact: a record in the growth of Arctic sea ice. During late October and early November, 58,000 square miles of it formed per day for 10 days straight . Yeah, yeah, record ice melt can be expected to be followed by record water freeze, but it shows that while climatic conditions may come and go, global warming hysteria is stuck on full volume.

Also from Neil, this from the Weekly Standard:

Last March [2006], Ann Bancroft and Liv Arnesen, two renowned polar explorers, set out for the North Pole to raise awareness and document the threat from global warming. Unfortunately, their trip came to an abrupt end when Arnesen suffered severe frostbite in temperatures that fell to 100 degrees below zero. At the time, Ann Atwood, who helped organize the expedition, explained to the Associated Press that “they were experiencing temperatures that weren’t expected with global warming. . . . But one of the things we see with global warming is unpredictability.”

"So," says Neil, "one of the unpredictable elements of global warming will be cooling." (end update)

But I digress, let's get to the heart of the matter: Who's to blame? You got that right:

The polar bear is sending us a desperate S.O.S. We can no longer turn our backs on these warning signs -- even if our political and corporate leaders keep denying the truth.

Greenie-speak, and Greenie quests for green, always require an enemy, and it is always the GOP and business. Never mind that many political and business leaders are on the global warming magic bus; never mind that we do not live in a world where one viewpoint alone has ever sufficed. We have seen the enemy and he is us.

But wait a 'sec here. Didn't those bad guys in government start the paperwork on declaring the polar bear endangered? Ha! Don't be so easily lulled:

Pressured by NRDC's legal action last year, the Bush Administration has proposed that our nation come to the polar bear's [sic] rescue under the Endangered Species Act. [Bush? Really?]

But that proposal will not become reality without the strong support of millions of Americans like you and me. Fortunately, NRDC's Polar Bear S.O.S. campaign makes it easy for you to make your voice heard.

This is Leonard's biggest lie, and he's making it so that people are encouraged to sign the enclosed letter to the Fish & Wildlife Service. Why's that so important? Because NRDC is "giving" you the letter to sign, which psychologically obligates you to it, making it much more likely that you'll give them some of your money.

But the fact of the matter is that species listing decisions are based -- in theory at least -- on science, not the fervent pleas of Greenie whiners. Once and endangered species listing is initiated, it moves forward through studies and Federal Register postings and comment periods until it's finished -- with or without letters from common citizens that don't make scientific arguments.

But DiC pleas for the letters nonetheless to "help us create a blizzard of nationwide support" to offset the efforts of the "big polluters" who are "mounting their own campaign to protect their 'right' to spew global warming pollution into the air."

Who are these "big polluters?" They go unnamed but they are, presumably, the power plants, oil refineries and factories controlled by the Clean Air Act, the car manufacturers whose products must comply with more federal regulations than you can shake a harpoon at, and those nasty, nasty farmers, who continue to spew greenhouse gases into the air, just because they want to grow food.

Not to blame are the people who demand more and more power for their flat screen TVs (Al Gore's got three of those energy-suckers in his office alone), gas for the cars that they insist on driving (whether it's a Prius or a Hummer) and the jets they insist on flying (whether it's commercial or private), and the goods they continue to demand from factories or the food they continue to insist on eating.

And I haven't even started on NRDC president Beinecke's letter, which is even worse than DiC's, begging for money more shamefully than a televangelist consumed in the spirit:

With polar bears drowning and starving -- and their populations declining -- we must act with speed and determination to win this fight for their survival.

That is why I am personally asking you to please dig deep to support NRDC's Polar Bear S.O.S. campaign. Working together, we will do everything in our power to pull the polar bear back from the brink of extinction.

Just two problems. First, polar bears aren't going extinct and their populations aren't declining:

• 1965: About 10,000 (IUCN 1966)
• 1967: About 10,000 (Schuhmacher 1967)
• 1972: Roughly estimated at 20,000 (DeMaster & Stirling 1981)
• 1983: Perhaps 20,000 (Nowak & Paradiso 1983)
• 1996: 20,000 - 30,000 (Watson 1996)
• 1997: 22,000 - 27,000 (Garner 1997)
• 1998: 22,130 - 27,030 (Truett & Johnson 2002)
• 2001: At least 22,000 (Schliebe 2001)
• 2002: 21,500 - 25,000 (Lunn et al. 2002)
• 2005: 20,000 - 25,000 (Polar Bear Spec. Gr. 2005)
• 2006: 20,000 - 25,000 (IUCN 2006)

And second, I've read through both letters several times, and neither one of them says one word about what NRDC is going to do with the money it raises. No promises are made, other than that they'll send in the letters people sign, and no plan is laid out. No budget is set, and no goals, other than the nebulous "save the world" ones, are expressed.

Instead, this environmental group, which DiC calls "America's most effective environmental action group," has simply been doing the equivalent of screaming "fire" in a crowded theater -- shouting "warm" in the vast emptiness of the Arctic -- in order to panic the uneducated and foolish into filling their already bountiful coffers.

Yet most Americans hold groups like the NRDC in high esteem, confusing them with organizations that are actually honorable. There's a sucker born every minute, and NRDC is fishing desperately for them, as aggressively as Japanese going after whales.

Dying Polar Bear Rebuttal Kit

A funny thing happens when you search for polar bear images on the Internet.

You find a lot of pictures like this one depicting the species as cute and vulnerable, in keeping with the Greenie/Warmie mantra that all nature is cuddly and in need of protection. That protection, of course, always comes in the form of the curtailment of human advancement.

What you really have to search for are pictures like this, that show polar bears as they are -- majestic, for sure, but also fierce, nasty, brutally self-sufficient, and not much concerned with what people are up to.

"Oh, but it's the bigger picture!" the Warmies cry. "The bears don't know they're going to go extinct unless we stop global warming!"'

True enough. They don't know ... and neither do we. In fact, evidence is mounting that the polar poster child of the Warmie movement is not at risk at all, and that the more we study polar bears, the more the entire global warming religion seems about as sound as Scientology or Est.

With a hat-tip to Ymarsakar, here's a digest of an extensive post on the subject you can find at Benning's Writing Pad:

1. Polar bears survived through a warm spell considerably hotter than predictions the Warmies make for our future. This is now known for certain because an ancient polar bear jaw was found to be 130,000 years old -- dating the species to the toasty Eemian period. (source)
   
   
2. While they are obligate species, i.e., dependent on a particular environment, they are not as vulnerable as Warmies would have you think. This was demonstrated by the recent find of a polar bear/grizzly hybrid conceived in the wild -- not through a chance encounter, because the polar bear female requires a lengthy mating ritual before an egg will be release.
   
   
3. While the mainstream Warmie belief is that shrinking polar ice is the result of warmer air, Benning points out that polar air remains well below freezing most of the time and blames increased undersea volcanic activity for rising ocean temperatures. Of course, removing all the SUVs and taming the Chinese beast will do nothing to curtail magma flows.
   
   
4. And, in defiance of Warmie dogma, polar bear populations aren't dropping precipitously. As said at Moonbattery, "Even if the Goracle's most frenetic fantasies were to come true, and the North Pole were to melt in the foreseeable future, people living in northern latitudes will still get eaten by polar bears."

Could we send Big Al their way?