What's with this???? Scream!
http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2009/05/obama-wh-keeps.htmlSecretary of the Interior Ken Salazar is keeping a Bush administration rule to limit polar bear protections from global warming. After the polar bear was added to the protected species list under the Endangered Species Act last May, the Bush administration limited its protection, saying only action within the Arctic region could be considered a threat to the bear population. The bear population's greatest threat to habitat loss is due to shrinking sea ice, caused by global warming. Environmentalists argue that all federal actions that contribute to climate change should be included in the protections. President George W. Bush disagreed and apparently, so does President Barrack Obama.
"The ESA is not the appropriate tool for us to deal with what is a global issue, and that's the issue of global warming," Secretary Salazar said. He went on to say that the administration will be pursuing comprehensive climate change and energy legislation to deal directly with global warming and that, "Both President Obama and I are committed to doing everything we can to protect the polar bear and it's habitat."
The administration does not believe that the ESA was written to address global warming, and contends that it is not sure that legally it could be used to regulate climate change to protect polar bears.
"I think it would be very difficult for our scientists doing the evaluations of a cement plant in Georgia or Florida and it's impact that it's gonna have on the polar bear habitat. I just don't think the ESA was ever set up organizationally with that contemplation in mind," Salazar said.
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