Change We Can Believe In

   

    The Obama Administration is sticking with a decision made during the Bush Administration, a decision that spells extinction for the polar bear. The decision is that the Endangered Species Act does NOT protect the polar bear from global warming. 

     The polar bear is protected under the Endangered Species Act (ESA), which states: “the United States has pledged … to conserve to the extent practicable the various species … of wildlife … facing extinction”. It defines the word conserve as “to use and the use of all methods and procedures which are necessary to bring any endangered species or threatened species to the point at which the measures provided pursuant to this Act are no longer necessary.”

Global warming is destroying the polar bears habitat, the greenhouse effect melting away arctic sea ice, making it harder for the polar bear to hunt, and forcing the animal to swim far distances to find its way out of water, and onto ice. Scientists predict that in the coming decades, out of the 25,000 polar bears left on the planet, 15,000 will starve or drown to death from loss of Artic sea ice.

The Administration is aware of all of this. Interior secretary Ken Salazar remarks: "To see the polar bear’s habitat melting and an iconic species threatened is an environmental tragedy of the modern age." He then says: "When the ESA was passed, it was not contemplated it would be the tool to address the issue of climate change. It seems to me that using the Endangered Species Act as a way to get to that global warming framework is not the right way to go."

This statement is fucking insane. Of course the ESA didn’t contemplate global warming, it was passed in 1973! If the government will not list global warming as a threat to an endangered species that is threatened by global warming, then I can only conclude that our entire system is insane.

  If global warming applied to the ESA, the government would have to force energy and oil companies to drastically reduce their emissions, meaning that these companies would have to invest their billions of dollars in profit to work toward healing the planet, in order for the polar bear to survive. We are facing one of the greatest ecological disasters in the history of our species, and the Administration is busy safeguarding corporations from losing profit. The Administration will not stop coal-fired power plants, pumping lethal shit into our atmosphere. The toxins from these power plants, each year, give hundreds of thousands of children asthma, give tens of thousands of people heart attacks, and poison babies with the mercury in their mothers breast milk. The Administration will not stop oil corporations like ExxonMobil, a company that is responsible for 5% of the carbon emissions in the entire world. The list of corporations goes on and on: Chevron, Shell, Halliburton, Bechtel, Blackwater, responsible for: torture, assassinations, death to the Niger Delta, death to the world’s rainforests, death and rape to women and children in Iraq, Indonesia, Nigeria, Ecuador, Myanmar, Afghanistan, more and more corporate profit, more and more annihilation of innocent life on this planet.

This nightmare is large and real, and no politician is going to save us from it. It is up to us to save this world. You and I together, those of us with a conscience, those of us with a heart. There are more of us than one would think. I have belief that we can change, but I refuse to give my hope to this system.

I’m uninterested in writing a hip smear article on president Obama. However, I believe we need to wake up to what is really happening. During the presidential debates, I was captivated by Obama’s articulate language and seeming sincerity. I listened to him speak against corporate power. I listened to him denounce the U.S. occupation of Iraq. Still, the indiscriminate violence continues. With over a million civilian casualties in the Iraq War, the same catastrophe builds in Afghanistan. The BBC recently reported U.S. air strikes in Afghanistan killing at least 100 civilians. Women and children’s bodies were hauled away on trucks.

This system is based on war, terror, human suffering, imperialism, and environmental devastation. This is not “change we can believe in”. When decisions are made in favor of the polar bear instead of oil and coal companies, ancient mountains instead of corporate avarice, the oceans instead of plastic production, children’s lungs instead of industry, human beings lives instead of war profiteers, the beauty of all of life on this planet instead of a psychotic finance economy, then that will be change we can believe in. We cannot compromise until we have a world that is sane. 

Here is an excellent 10-minute film on the plight of the polar bear and a call for resistance to the system by activists Derrick Jensen, Lierre Keith, and Nikki Craft. Check it out.

Comments

[charlene]

i love that video and have played it many times. when will i have the courage to do something about it?

charlene

[Peiro]

Ya that video is very powerful. I want my courage to grow to action as well.