Polar Bears

I like polar bears. For one, I like most all animals (notable exceptions: crickets and grasshoppers, most everything that lives in the ocean - they all creep me out). And polar bears are cool: they're big and mighty and you so don't want to mess with one. But at the same time they're cute. Often they look like they're smiling, they're furry, all baby bears regardless of species are cute, etc. See?Polar bears are neat.

They're also now a threatened species. The Bush administration readily chalks up the decline to climate change. Warmer weather = less polar ice = fewer bears. Obviously it's more complicated than that but it really comes down to warm weather being bad for polar bears. You probably guessed this from their name. Does this mean that the administration is starting to take notice of the serious problem and try to do something about the problem? Ratify the Kyoto Protocol? Push for stricter emissions regulations?

Well...no. It means that they're saying "Yup, that's a problem. Sucks to be a bear."

Again, everyone likes polar bears. Everyone's heard of them and there's a certain cool factor to them that many animals don't have. "Climate change" or "global warming" or however you want to phrase it lacks that; it's harder to connect on a personal level.

So here's to the mighty polar bear. The bear that shills for Coke and requires about 2kg of fat, every day, to survive. The bear that's at once graceful and terrifying; by far the mightiest animal in it's realm - until we muscled onto the scene. Maybe the fine Ursus maritimus has finally found it's match and it's us, our pollution, our waste and toxic gasses.

Here's hoping that more people start to wake up, and the polar bear has a better 2007 than 2006.