Please Protect the Polar Bear

WaPo's Juliet Eilperin clocks in today with an update on the court case over giving the polar bear a little bureaucratic love under the Endangered Species Act. Like many such cases, this one is gummed up in federal court, with environmental groups pushing the Bush administration to make a decision on the Endangered designation. The Interior Department missed its own deadline on this matter back in early January.

It all boils down to ice. That is the PB's habitat, and that's what's melting everywhere. The Bushies don't wanna act because protecting the habitat would require it to make the sacrifices it hasn't wanted to make ever since it kicked Kyoto to the curb.

But I swear–who in good conscience can stand around while another big animal fades from the landscape. Last time I checked, there were, like, 3,000 tigers left in the entire world, a fact I'm not going to verify right now. Elephants are in trouble. Grizzlies have serious issues.

Large vertebrates! We all love them. Kids, especially, adore them. Though I am a professional journalist and unbiased and objective on all issues, I say, List the PB. I'll gladly install solar panels, cut back on auto trips, use corn in more creative ways, eat cereal out of the same, uncleaned bowl every morning, make greater use of the hand dryer, refrain from liposuction, or do what's necessary to stave off a planet consisting solely of humans and squirrels.