Cue the Wingnuts to Spin Environmental Disaster as a GOOD Thing

Even if you believe that homo sapiens is the only species that deserves to survive and that polar bears are expendable, the very real likelihood that the Arctic ice cap will be reduced by forty percent by 2050 and that seasonal polar ice may be nonexistent this summer ought to be cause for concern. Ecological consequences, ranging from the disappearance of coastal areas of Florida, Louisiana, and the Caribbean and an increase in predator species, combine with the possibility of land wars as passages between northern areas of Canada, Alaska, and Russia become more likely.

But today, watch for the gasbags of right-wing radio to declare the polar bear, the walrus, the seal, and the very life of the indigenous people in the northernmost areas of the world to be expendable in the name of Cheap Gasâ„¢:

The Arctic may contain as much as a fifth of the world's yet to-be-discovered oil and natural gas reserves, the United States Geological Survey said Wednesday as it unveiled the largest-ever survey of petroleum resources north of the Arctic Circle.