The U.S. Department of Interior made history this afternoon by invoking the Endangered Species Act (ESA) to protect the polar bear from global warming. This is the first time the ESA has been used to protect a species from human generated CO2, and the implications bode ominous for the human race. While there are said to be provisions in the designation that will offer protections to power companies and other businesses,1 it is unlikely that individual consumers will be afforded protection from this sweeping legislation.
Ostensibly, motorists could be forced to have their vehicles fitted with monitoring devices that record aggressive green-house driving habits and relay that data to federal agencies that could, in turn, mail out citations to drivers in the same way that speeders get ticketed by red light cameras. Even before these evasive controls are implemented, a new ESA tax could be added at the gas pump to modify driver behavior. Of course, this is only speculation
Yet, the probability of these federally mandated causes and effects are much clearer to trace than the murky science behind claims that the polar bear is endangered; even from natural climate cycles, much less from anthropomorphically induced global warming.
Notes:
1. H. Josef Hebert, “US lists polar bear as threatened species,” Breitbart.com, May 14, 2008.
2. DOI News Release: http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D90LJ4BO2&show_article=1
An economist’s guess is liable to be as good as anybody else’s.