[cogitator]

Arctic nations that are home to most of the world's polar bears should be leading the charge against global warming

The United States isn't exactly an "Arctic" nation, sweets (parts of North Dakota and Maine excepted).

Any Canadians care to comment?

[smokinleroy]

Increasing CO2 emissions have caused Arctic temperatures to rise by five degrees Celsius over the past 100 years

It boils my blood when they repeat such statements as proven facts. Maybe increased solar activity caused the increase. Maybe inaccurate thermometers caused the increase. Maybe the stove in their research station caused the increase. Maybe their imaginations caused the increase.

By around 2050, scientists now predict a 60 percent loss of summer sea ice

What kinds of scientists? How many scientists? What of the political agenda of these scientists? I'm a scientist of sorts and I predict a 60 percent increase of summer sea ice. I need one other scientist to agree with me so I can issue the opposite statement of theirs. Any takers?

[Always Right]

Increasing CO2 emissions have caused Arctic temperatures to rise by five degrees Celsius over the past 100 years

What is the sourse on that claim? That sounds like an outright lie.

[JasonC]

Next they will be reading sheep entrails...

[Fredgoblu]

Increasing CO2 emissions have caused Arctic temperatures to rise by five degrees Celsius over the past 100 years, and the extent of sea ice has decreased by six percent over the past 20 years. By around 2050, scientists now predict a 60 percent loss of summer sea ice, which would more than double the summer ice free season from 60 to 150 days.

Ummm...this is bad?

Yeah, a 5 degree C increase in the tropics would be bad. But a 5 degree C rise in arctic temperature still leaves it too !@#$%%^ cold to be habitable.

I'm sorry, but here at the 45th parallel (give or take), a little warming makes for milder winters, a longer growing season, and generally better living. Let's think about humans first, polar bears second.

[Fredgoblu]

They are skinny bears by the end of summer, which in the worst case can affect their ability to reproduce.

No...in the worst case, you just need to marinate their steaks a little longer, and make sure you don't overcook them.

[kidd]

Isn't this good news for the seals? I thought the WWF was also concerned with the seal population. So there's a shift in the population of wildlife that favors one species and disfavors another. Is there any historical data supporting this theory? There's a long stretch of "maybe's" to blame skinny polar bears on SUV's.

[redhead]

"Hungry polar bears are one of the early signs that global warming is impacting Arctic habitat, suggests a new study from World Wildlife Fund."

Now, let's see...early spring...bears emerging from hibernation...fat stores used up...Naw. Couldn't be.

[redhead]

"The United States isn't exactly an "Arctic" nation..."

One word: ALASKA

Last time I looked, Alaska was still part of the United States.

[glory]

These chicken little reports are laughable, especially as I sit here in Central Ohio the morning of a new record low at freezing.

[Calvin Locke]

I was listening to RCI tonight. Canadians are too busy fighting over a stuffed grizzly to worry about
Pally McBear. At least the the ones in BC are.

However, the US has this overweight Senator who'd I'm sure wouldn't mind driving a snowmobile
under-the-influence while looking to be part of an Eskimo sandwich.

Probably find a good spot to put up a couple of windmills too, away from his "view".

[<1/1,000,000th%]

Hey! Here's another thread you and your friends can huff and puff on.

[Lazamataz]

Thin Polar Bears Called Sign of Global Warming

I blame SlimFast.

[VOA]

Thin Polar Bears Called Sign of Global Warming

As for herds of Polar Bears that look like they just escaped a concentration camp...
I'd say what Enrico Fermi said in his skepticism about extra-terrestrials:
"So, why aren't they here?"

The only skinny polar bear I've seen on television has been the one on the Greenpeace fund-
raising infomercial.
All the ones I see (even in one major TV news story about skinny polar bears)
looked fairly beefy to me.
And all the others in "nature" documentaries are NOT malnourished.

If the polar bears are, in reality, going hungry, I more suspect that some fish that
the seals eat has probably been over-fished by the Japanese and/or to put
on the plate of yuppie seafood restaurants in San Francisco or Paris.

Or, global warming is such a hoax that the ice is too thick and the bears can't
get at their food...

[Scott from the Left Coast]

Find out their weight-loss secret and use it on American kids.

[N. Theknow]

"Instead, the United States - the world's largest global warming polluter - is essentially ignoring this problem.

Pretty much sums up the entire article as a bodacious quantity of bovine fecal matter.

[verity]

Staff from the Environmental News Service will have to personally weigh the unrestrained bears on a scale before I believe it. What? No volunteers?

[Exit148]

A passage from an article on Global Warming - Time, April 9, 2001; Vol 157 #14:

"By contrast, if melting ice caps dilute the salt content of the sea, major ocean currents like the Gulf Stream could slow or even stop, and so would their warming effects on northern regions. More snowfall reflecting more sunlight back into space could actually cause a net cooling. Global warming could, paradoxically, throw the planet into another ice age."

[Political Junkie Too]

Somehow, I think that the number of blue-haired snowbirds in Miami would be as accurate a measure of global warming as the weight of polar bears is.

-PJ