Posted on 10/22/2009 1:01:29 PM PDT by Libertarianize the GOP
The Obama administration is setting aside 200,000 square miles in Alaska and off its coast as "critical habitat" for polar bears, an action that could add restrictions to future offshore drilling for oil and gas.
Federal law prohibits agencies from taking actions that may adversely modify critical habitat and interfere with polar bear recovery.
Assistant Interior Secretary Tom Strickland called the habitat designation a step in the right direction to help polar bears stave off extinction, recognizing that the greatest threat to the bear is the melting of Arctic sea ice caused by climate change.
The Bush administration last year declared polar bears "threatened," or likely to become endangered, citing the dramatic loss of sea ice in recent decades.
Drill here, drill now!
Alaska should just say no. Either that or sell the land to the FED for about $100,000/acre.
Last I checked the government can’t just seize property whether owned privately of my a state.
Punish Palin’s Alaska!
Teach that uppity woman a lesson....
/sarc
- JP
Um...they do realise that we have about a million square kilometres of land we’re not using in the Northwest Territories, do they not?
And let me guess whats below those 200k acres.
Hey libs I see a lot of cool stuff in your future.
Term Limits and Repeal, Repeal, Repeal, Repeal everything you moonbats pass.
The federal government has no right to take this land away from Alaska per their constitution. Someone there should raise a big stink!
MORE ABUSE OF POWER BY OBAMA!
IMPEACH!!
STUPID BASTARDS.
F*** these communist, lying bastards.
Interestingly, the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), an international organization that has worked for 50 years to protect endangered species, has also written on the threats posed to polar bears from global warming. However, their own research seems to undermine their fears. According to the WWF, about 20 distinct polar bear populations exist, accounting for approximately 22,000 polar bears worldwide. As the figure shows, population patterns do not show a temperature-linked decline:
Only two of the distinct population groups, accounting for about 16.4 percent of the total population, are decreasing.
Ten populations, approximately 45.4 percent of the total number, are stable.
Another two populations - about 13.6 percent of the total number of polar bears - are increasing.
The status of the remaining six populations (whether they are stable, increasing or decreasing in size) is unknown.
Moreover, when the WWF report is compared with the Arctic air temperature trend studies discussed earlier, there is a strong positive (instead of negative) correlation between air temperature and polar bear populations. Polar bear populations are declining in regions (like Baffin Bay) that have experienced a decrease in air temperature, while areas where polar bear populations are increasing (near the Bering Strait and the Chukchi Sea) are associated with increasing air temperatures. Thus it is difficult to argue that rising air temperatures will necessarily and directly lead to a decrease in polar bear populations.
We knew this was coming as soon as the bears were listed as threatened. Kempthorne and the environazis are idiots.
Are your square kilometers catching up in size to our square miles like your dollars are to ours? :-)
Polar Bear Gram for Barry...
“Hey, Barry,
What’s with this extra land grab so that the American companies cant drill ?? And then blaming us ???
If you stop the oil drilling, the price of gas will go up...
And there’ll be less gas...
how’s that suppose to help us Polar bears ???
What we gonna put in our cars ??? Our planes ???
Yes, I said “OUR CARS” OUR Planes ???
How do you think we will get around up here ???
Ya think we walk ???
And then there will be this extra 200,000 square miles you’re going to force us to live in ???
Have you lose your cotton pickin’ mind ???
You try living in this much space...
You dont even drive to the super market...but for us...its a long way to the nearest fishing hole already...
And now you want to add all those miles..
I live in frozen waste, dummy, not on the shores of a lake...
You ever hear of Global Warming ???
Yeah, well, it aint happening here...
200,000 extra square miles of snow and ice...
Hey, maybe you’d like to bring the missus and the kiddies up here for a vacation ???
Didnt think so...
Ya can keep your 200,000 square miles if ya aint gonna let us have the gas to get around...
No thanks...
Disgruntled in Alaska..
"I can't hear you!"
Polar bears are cute, I saw them in a Coke commercial once...
“The Bush administration last year declared polar bears “threatened,” or likely to become endangered, citing the dramatic loss of sea ice in recent decades.’
Bush the socialist that just keeps on giving.
The Arctic Holds an Estimated 90B Barrels of Crude, 1,670TCF of Gas
http://www.rigzone.com/news/article.asp?a_id=64591
Obama just “F”ed our chances of accessing this! “F” the bears!
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