The Huffington Post is reporting today that Sen. John McCain has hired Bud Day, from the 2004 group Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, to "truth squad" attacks on Sen. McCain's service record. 

 

In hopes of nipping any criticism in the bud, the campaign brought on board a man quite familiar with how these types of attacks gain legs: Bud Day, a fellow POW who was part of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth squad that had worked so hard to defame Sen. John Kerry's own Vietnam record.

On the conference call, Day - in addition to the other participants - decried comments made by Gen. Wesley Clark over the weekend, in which he questioned whether McCain's war experience really qualified him to be commander-in-chief. Defending McCain's service, Day was quick to personalize his remarks.

"Things were very difficult for [McCain]," he said. "He was horribly wounded in his extremities, and it was questionable if he would survive his experience. He set a high standard for himself because the Vietnamese tried to release him and he showed courage by refusing that to come about. We had an opportunity to watch a president in office, a Democrat who was extremely ineffective during those years. [McCain] learned an awful lot from that... General Clark spent a month in Vietnam, got badly wounded and was evacuated, that was his experience. I say let's hold the two of them up and compare them."

That Day would politicize Vietnam in his defense of McCain is not surprising. During the 2004 campaign, he said of Kerry: "My view is he basically will go down in history sometime as the Benedict Arnold of 1971." And after appearing in a national advertisement for the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth campaign, Day formed the Vietnam Veterans Legacy Foundation, an extension of the Swift Boat effort.

Asked to compare the attacks he helped launched against Kerry in 2004 to those being waged at McCain today, Day said the defining issue was truthfulness.

"The Swift Boat attacks were simply a revelation of the truth, the similarity does not exist here. What the Swift Boat campaign was about was to lay out John Kerry's record. John Kerry has never produced any evidence to deny that. We are producing the evidence of these attacks right now to show that those remarks were completely inaccurate."

The irony of it all is that McCain publicly deplored the Swift Boat ads back in 2004, saying they were reminiscent of the smear campaigns launched against him during his initial White House run in 2000.

"It was the same kind of deal that was pulled on me," said the Senator.

Not willing to let the irony go unnoticed, Kerry lashed out at McCain, on Monday, for using the same smear merchant he once decried.

"Colonel Day's comments today only further highlight the McCain campaign's disregard for a new kind of politics," said Kerry. "John McCain condemned these kinds of attacks in 2004 when he called the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth 'dishonest and dishonorable.' Senator McCain should condemn these remarks and cut ties with the Colonel and anyone else connected to SBVT. Day's comments only serve to disparage all those who served on swift boats in Vietnam."

 

The South Carolina primary in 2000 was a nasty affair that had some Republicans using smear tactics against fellow Republican John McCain.  Senator Kerry strongly condemned these sleazy attacks and joined with 4 other Vietnam veterans in the Senate to write a letter of support on Senator McCain's behalf.  As the online magazine Salon noted in 2000,

 

Then the five Vietnam veterans in the Senate -- Max Cleland, D-Ga., Bob Kerrey, D-Neb., John Kerry, D-Mass., Chuck Robb, D-Va. and Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., four Democrats and a McCain supporter -- fired off a letter to Bush calling on him to "publicly disassociate" himself from the "false" allegations.

"We believe it is inappropriate to associate yourself with those who would impugn John McCain's character and so maliciously distort his record on these critical issues," the letter said.

 

It is inappropriate for Senator McCain  to associate himself with those who would impugn John Kerry's character and so maliciously distort his record on these critical issues. It was wrong in 2004 and it is wrong today.  Bud Day may not know this, but John McCain should.

 

Yesterday, South African president Thabo Mbeki met with the leaders of the clashing political parties in Zimbabwe, Robert Mugabe and Morgan Tsvangirai. It is hoped that the local influence of President Mbeki can mediate the conflict surrounding the country’s election process.

Since the March 29^th election, which Tsvangirai and the Movement for Democratic Change party won, there has been an escalating debate over the possibility of fair elections. Mugabe and his ZANU-PF party have been blamed for the violence and arrests surrounding election issues- including intimidation, violence against political activists, kidnappings, and killings. Several of the opposition party’s leaders have also been arrested. While the UN, along with several African leaders, has called on Robert Mugabe to cease these violent acts and ensure a fair election, Mugabe’s party has placed blame for the violence on the opposition.

On April 30^th, the senate passed John Kerry’s resolution calling for Robert Mugabe to accept the election and step aside. It was co-sponsored by Senators Obama, Isakson, Coleman, Dodd, Clinton, Biden, Leahy, Cardin, Feingold, and Durbin.  It called on Mugabe to accept the results of the March 29^th election and begin the transition of power, and condemned Zimbabwe’s ruling party for manipulation of the political process and the use of excessive force. The full text of the resolution is available here:  http://kerry.senate.gov/cfm/record.cfm?id=296753

It remains to be seen whether the June 27^th runoff election will run smoothly. Few are optimistic since the aftermath of the first election. Mugabe has even made statements that some have interpreted to mean he will hold onto power regardless of the election’s results. This is a difficult period for the people of Zimbabwe, and politics actions taken now may have a major impact on the region’s political precedent for years to come.

 --  Frederic Jennings

Fred Jennings is Senior at The George Washington University in Washington, DC.  He is majoring International Relations at the Elliott School. He also writes on international relations at his own blog at blog.simnatic.com.

It's Time to Talk to Syria
By JOHN KERRY and CHUCK HAGEL

After Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1991, President George H.W. Bush did the improbable and convinced Syrian President Hafez Assad to join an American-led coalition against a fellow Baathist regime.

Today, these leaders’ sons have another chance for a diplomatic breakthrough that could redefine the strategic landscape in the Middle East.

The recent announcement of peace negotiations between Israel and Syria through Turkey, and the agreement between the Lebanese factions in Qatar – both apparently without meaningful U.S. involvement – should serve as a wake-up call that our policy of nonengagement has isolated us more than the Syrians. These developments also help create new opportunities and increased leverage that we can only exploit through substantive dialogue with Syria.

Syria’s leaders have always made cold calculations in the name of self-preservation, and history shows that intensive diplomacy can pay off. Secretary of State James Baker made more than a dozen trips to Syria before Operation Desert Storm, and remember President Assad’s price: U.S. support for Syrian dialogue with Israel. The ultimate challenge – moving Syria away from its marriage of convenience with Iran – will certainly not happen overnight. But it’s telling that Iran lobbied Syria not to negotiate with Israel and that Syria decided to proceed regardless.

To support Israel and isolate Iran, President George W. Bush should offer direct support for the Israeli-Syrian initiative. Promoting peace between our ally and its neighbors has always been a bipartisan cornerstone of our foreign policy. Syria views peace talks with Israel as part of a broader rapprochement with America, and its strong desire for U.S. involvement can work to our advantage. We know that high level, direct talks will require a sustained and credible American role, just as they did in 2000, when President Bill Clinton met repeatedly with Mr. Assad in bringing Syria and Israel to the brink of a deal. With so much at stake, it’s in our interests to come to the table again.

The agreement by the Lebanese parties provides another opening. Syria must respect Lebanon’s sovereignty and end its deadly meddling. But the fact that Syria’s ally, Hezbollah, secured much of the political power it sought should remove Syria’s excuse for failing to open an embassy, normalize relations, and finally demarcate the border with Lebanon. Hezbollah must eventually be disarmed, as United Nations Resolutions 1559 and 1701 require, but its agreement not to use force internally could be used to push Syria to shut off the supply of weapons.

Dialogue can open the door for greater cooperation on Iraq. Top Syrian officials have argued that Syria shares America’s interest in a stable, secular Iraq and does not want a strongly pro-Iranian regime in Baghdad. Our partnership with Sunni tribes against al Qaeda may have further aligned our interests. As U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker has noted, Islamic extremists also threaten Syria.

While Syria must crack down on the flow of foreign fighters into Iraq, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad claims positive steps have not been rewarded. We should test whether offering tangible benefits brings better results, starting with providing more humanitarian assistance for the nearly 1.5 million Iraqi refugees Syria has absorbed.

The U.N. tribunal investigating the murder of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, which may soon issue indictments, is also creating pressure on the regime. If government officials are implicated, Syria could face increased international sanctions. The tribunal’s pursuit of justice must never be a bargaining chip, but it adds an incentive to improve relations that we should capitalize on.

Tough economic times in Syria also create leverage. Although domestic oil production accounts for 60%-70% of the country’s exports, Syria became a net oil importer in 2007. With a growing population, greater integration into the global economy and an easing of sanctions could be powerful incentives.

Make no mistake: Cooperation with Syria rests not on shared values, but on shared interests. Syria’s pursuit of a suspected nuclear program underscores why any agreement must be verified. While many doubt Syria’s intentions, we have real leverage and some inducements that have more value to Syria than cost to us. There is no guarantee of an agreement, but the potential payoff is huge, and our current policy is failing.

Israel’s government has concluded that, rather than rewarding bad behavior, dialogue with Syria is the best hope for changing it. As Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said, “the chance overrides the risk, and with this hope I am going for a new path.” We should do the same before the opportunity slips away.

Mr. Kerry, a Democrat, is a U.S. senator from Massachusetts. Mr. Hagel, a Republican, is a U.S. senator from Nebraska.

###

by Michael DeRamo

 I remember what environmentalism meant years ago, when I bought a certificate entitling me to one acre of rainforest, thereby protecting it from deforestation or conversion into grazing land. I remember learning that through the small contributions of everyday people, we could affect the future even of something as massive as the Amazon, something as precious as the planet Earth. In those days, it seemed that the countries directly in control of the most fragile ecosystems didn’t know how to manage them properly, and that the United States needed to urge them to adopt new and greener policies. I worried that Brazil would realize too late that the “lungs of the world” were more valuable than the simple sum of their lumber and acreage.

Fast-forward fifteen years, and the picture has turned upside-down. Brazil has taken the lead in greening its economy, successfully scrapping petroleum-based fuels in favor of a cleaner, home-grown ethanol derived from sugarcane. For our part, the United States has fallen behind the international environmental movement of Kyoto and beyond. Now it seems that the rest of the world is looking to Washington to adopt greener policies and reclaim the lead in scientific and industrial innovation.

The bill currently before the United States Senate may be our next great chance to return to the forefront of the green revolution. The Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act proposes a sweeping cap-and-trade system designed to lower greenhouse-gas emissions gradually over the next four decades. Like most legislation, the bill is certainly imperfect: Senator Kerry, a strong environmental champion, himself admitted weaknesses he hoped to address in the coming days. But, as Senator Warner said today on the floor, “the value of this debate is to have some exchange between us.” Many in the press are already describing the bill as doomed. Yet even if it does not pass, the Senate and the nation will be better-off for having deliberated one possible solution to climate change.

If only the G.O.P. were willing to take advantage of the opportunity for discussion. Watching today’s floor debate, one can’t help but notice the picture of disarray painted by the fumbled talking points of the Republican members. Senator Inhofe indicted the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change as “the ones who started this,” and disparagingly referred to “that science-fiction movie” better known to the world as former Vice President Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth. Senator Barrasso lambasted the bill for not containing a definitive guarantee that every Wyoming coal worker would be awarded a new job in the renewable energy industry, never mind that the bill actually does contain provisions for training green-collar workers. (I wonder whether he truly would support a piece of legislation that mandated which American citizens were to work for which companies.)

And how about when the same Senator Barrasso predicted that without the burgeoning coal industry, the entirety of rural America would be without electricity? Even a fellow Republican caught the sheer absurdity of that claim: within minutes, Senator Grassley was speaking on the floor about the fantastic wind-energy sector thriving in his rural domain of Iowa.

Senator Lieberman made the point early in the afternoon that the name of the Climate Security Act is apt because it “is not only an environmental protection bill, not only an economic growth bill: this is a national security bill.” Climate change threatens the stability of our food supply, the survival of our coastal cities, and so much more. Why does it seem like Senate Republicans are so unwilling to have a productive discussion about change?

by Michael DeRamo

###

by John Kerry

 
As President Bush commemorated Israel's 60th anniversary by attacking Barack Obama from overseas, here at home he found an all-too-frequent ally: John McCain.

When Bush accused "some" -- including Obama, Bush aides explained -- of "the false comfort of appeasement," McCain echoed this slander.

"What does he want to talk about with [Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad?" McCain asked, fumbling to link Obama to the Iranian president's hateful words. Soon, a GOP talking point was born.

Lost in the rhetoric was the question America deserves to have answered: Why should we engage with Iran?

In short, not talking to Iran has failed. Miserably.

Bush engages in self-deception arguing that not engaging Iran has worked. In fact, Iran has grown stronger: continuing to master the nuclear fuel cycle; arming militias in Iraq and Lebanon; bolstering extremist anti-Israeli proxies. It has embraced Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and spends lavishly to rebuild Afghanistan, gaining influence across the region.

Instead of backing Bush's toxic rhetoric, McCain should have called George H.W. Bush's secretary of state, James Baker. After years of stonewalling, the administration grudgingly tested the Baker-Hamilton report's recommendation and opened talks with Iran -- albeit low-level dialogue restricted to the subject of Iraq. Is James Baker an appeaser, too?

While the president attacks political opponents from the Knesset, responsible members of his own administration meet face to face with Iranians. Yes, Ahmadinejad's words often are abhorrent, and often Iran has played a poisonous role in Middle East politics. But when our ambassador to Iraq meets with his Iranian counterpart, he isn't courting "the false comfort of appeasement" -- he is facing the reality that Iran exerts influence in Iraq.

That's why Defense Secretary Bob Gates and Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, have called for engaging Iran. Appeasers all? Nonsense.

Direct negotiations may be the only means short of war that can persuade Iran to forgo its nuclear capability. Given that a nuclear Iran would menace Israel, drive oil prices up past today's record highs and possibly spark a regional arms race, shouldn't we be doing all we can to avoid that conflagration?

Opponents of dialogue often quip that talking isn't a strategy. Walking away isn't a strategy, either. McCain says that "there's only one thing worse than the United States exercising the military option, that is, a nuclear-armed Iran." But for all his professed reluctance, when McCain disavows diplomacy, he is stacking the deck in favor of war.

What might we achieve by talking with Iran? Some say our engagement to date has not been productive -- but a less half-hearted and less conditional approach might well break the stalemate. We won't know until we try.

Dialogue helps us isolate Ahmadinejad rather than empowering him to isolate us. More important, even if we fail to reach an agreement, engaging Iran will spark three conversations likely to strengthen our position.

The first is between our leaders and Iran's. From nonproliferation to counterterrorism, frankly, Iran won't care for much of what we have to say -- but at the right moment, it is not unreasonable to think Tehran would cut a deal in exchange for economic incentives, energy assistance, diplomatic normalization or a non-invasion guarantee.

Second is the conversation America's president should be having with the Iranian people. We should seize the chance to tell some of the region's most pro-American people how their own president has isolated them, denying their great culture its place in the world and the region a constructive dialogue.

There's a reason the late Tom Lantos, Congress's only Holocaust survivor and a formidable diplomat, applied for a visa to enter Iran every year for the last decade of his life. What better way to puncture the petty lies of a demagogue than to force him to confront a man who has lived the very history he denies and trivializes?

Some have asserted that meeting with Iran's leaders would legitimize Ahmadinejad, who is neither Iran's supreme leader nor someone whom Obama specifically promised to meet. Curiously, many critics then hype Ahmadinejad as a threat of historic proportions, thereby granting the stature they seek to deny. Iranian elections in mid-2009 could yield a less objectionable president; engaging Iran makes that more likely.

The third conversation is with the world. By engaging Iran, we reclaim the moral high ground -- no small feat. If Iran refuses to budge, we have new leverage to expose it as a threat whose bad intentions cannot be explained away.

Those who say they take no option off the table should not put America in a straitjacket by denouncing diplomacy.

As Iran's centrifuges churn out enriched uranium, we're asking the wrong question. Instead of wondering why Barack Obama wants to talk with Iran, we should ask: "What are George Bush and John McCain waiting for?" 

This essay is also featured in the Washington Post.

by Rick Albertson

It's nothing short of scandalous just how much the Department of Defense has been able to get away with during George Bush's two terms as President. Without adequate oversight, the people running the Pentagon have been able to manipulate the system and break more rules than ever before.

There's always been a revolving-door problem in Washington, where government officials turn around and go to work for the same people they're supposed to be regulating. But under the Bush administration, the problem has grown exponentially. This is especially true in the defense industry these days, thanks to its ever-increasing reliance on outside contractors to do the heavy lifting. Defense officials quit their government jobs, go to work for defense contractors, then go back to work as hired guns for the government again.

There's always been a problem with inefficiency, waste, and downright corruption in military purchasing and logistics management. But here, again, the problem has grown exponentially while George Bush has been in office. Not only have hundreds of billions of dollars been wasted during the Iraq war, where despite all the outlay there's still a persistent shortage of the right equipment in the right places at the right time, but tens of billions of dollars in cash and assets have simply disappeared. Gone missing, off the books, vanished. That's an awful lot of money that the Pentagon just can't account for.

There's always been a problem with the government trying to spin the facts and massage the message, something the Bush administration has perfected all the way across the board. This especially applies to military matters in times of war, from the deliberately inflated body counts in Vietnam to the carefully-controlled reporting from Iraq. The Pentagon has always known how to use propaganda to advance its aims. But never before has it had so many people on its payroll applying propaganda directly to its own citizens at home.

But now, finally, the official oversight system in Washington is starting to do something about it. The Government Accountability Office is now taking on the Department of Defense in several key areas of concern:

-- They're addressing the DoD Pipeline problem, in which thousands of former DoD officials have resigned in the last few years and gone right to work for the defense contractors they were originally overseeing. (In fact, GAO reports show that 65% of those thousands of officials work for just the seven largest contractors in the system.)

-- They're pushing the DoD to retool its logistics and supply-chain tracking systems to reduce waste, fraud, and mismanagement. Those systems have been hopelessly out of date for years, and are not adequate to handle the size and complexity of our current military operations.

-- They're investigating the Boeing/Northrop dispute over the Air Force's recent decision to buy a new fleet of air refueling tankers, along with a rapidly growing number of other contested contracts.

-- They're digging into the Pentagon's recently-exposed propaganda pundits program. And now so is the DoD's own inspector general's office, thanks to angry House Democrats who pushed through an amendment to the appropriations bill demanding an investigation into the government's use of paid shills to push propaganda to its own citizens.

The GAO investigations and rulings can only accomplish so much, of course. As a non-partisan Congressional investigative arm, its focus is on contracting procedures and administrative issues. It can't enact legislative reforms or alter the system of checks and balances by which our government is supposed to operate. (Only Congress can do that.) But it certainly can do a lot just by enforcing the rules and making sure the system works. And it's good to see that the General Accountability Office is finally starting to hold the Department of Defense accountable again. 

by Rick Albertson

As we head into the Memorial Day weekend, a lot of attention is being focused on ways in which we can remember our brave service members who are no longer with us. Less attention is being focused on how we can help take care of the ones who are still with us.

The Bush Administration and its Roadblock Republican cohorts are doing their best to block passage of the new G.I. Bill, which would extend to our current crop of returning veterans the same educational benefits their forebears from the Greatest Generation had. They're still blocking VA and SSI and SSDI benefits for many of our returning veterans.

As Senator Kerry has often and aggressively stated, that is just all kinds of wrong and we can -- we must -- do better by those who have put their lives on the line for all of us here at home. We're doing the best we can to make that happen in Washington, but that's not enough sometimes. That selfish, shameful lack of support for our veterans on the part of those in the White House and their minions on the Hill has left it to private groups and charities to fill in the gaps and take up the slack instead.

There are many such groups today, some of them excellent, some of them not so much, some are somewhere in between. Some are apolitical, some are politicized, but that's not the point -- however and wherever they are doing what they can to support those who serve in uniform, then that is a laudable goal. And as Americans we all can appreciate and support their collective efforts on behalf of our serving troops and our returning veterans.

With that in mind, and without taking anything away from any of the many other groups doing everything they can to support our service members, here's a cross-post of a special request from Storm Williams, artist/activist and author of the online political comic strip Town Called Dobson, in the service of a very worthy cause indeed. (And, by the way, I can vouch for the fact that those who volunteer for BFS are as grassroots as it gets and are everything Storm says they are.)

---

As some of you may know, I founded Books For Soldiers, a 501(c)(3) non-profit that sends books, DVDs and other care package items to any US Soldier, Sailor, Airman or Marine -- for free of course.

Some of those books are college text books. Some soldiers want to work on their college education while deployed to the Middle East but some of them can’t get access to their education benefits while deployed. So BFS steps up and donates the textbooks for their classes.

We have been doing this for five years now and it is a national disgrace that charities are needed to supply college materials to our men and women in uniform. We have also picked up the slack in other areas like body armor, land mine resistance boots (thanks Wellco) and even tube socks.

Here is how it works:

Troops can go to BooksForSoldiers.com and fill out the form and one of our volunteers will see if they have the book on their shelf and they will then pack it up and ship it off to the soldier.

I got the idea back during the first Gulf war when friends of mine from college were sent off to Saudi Arabia. After the 4 day war, most were stuck in the desert for months on end with nothing to do. I rounded up all my sci-fi books that were collecting dust and then raided my civilian friend’s book collections and sent them to an Army hospital in Riyadh where my military pals were stationed. They then handed out the books to the soldiers on the base. I was receiving letters from strangers a year later, thanking me for the books. They were a good break from the boredom.

When the War On Terror started, I figured our troops would be home in a matter of weeks after Baghdad fell. I erroneously thought the Pentagon had an exit strategy and Books For Soldiers would be a nice six week project then on to something else. I knew I had to reach more people than I did during the first Gulf War -- I just couldn’t do it all myself. So I put together a self-serve website and BFS was born.

Due to the quagmire now known as Iraq, BFS celebrated our 5th year anniversary this past spring.

The economy has been rough this year for charities. Local food banks are reducing services, women’s shelters are closing -- those 1000 Points Of Light that Bush Sr. proudly yapped about are being hit hard by the crushing economy. Financial contributions to BFS this year disappeared almost completely. I think the reason is partially because of the economy and the other part is the lack of MSM coverage of the war in Iraq. I can track rises and falls of traffic on BFS directly to the amount of coverage the war gets. When the statue of Saddam fell, traffic started to tank. By the next day we lost 90% of out traffic and it took almost a year to build back up to the initial level.

Starting at the first of this year, BFS started a robust fundraising campaign here in North Carolina. We contacted small companies and some large companies you probably have heard of. To date, we have received a stack of letters that begin with “we deeply regret not being able to donate this year.” From our corporate donation campaign we have received a tad under thirty dollars from a philanthropy grants group in Winston Salem, NC. That was it, nothing else.

The BFS Board of Directors have discussed this problem for some time and have decided to have another go at fundraising. The Board set a goal of $70,000 to raise by November 1st of this year. If that amount is not raised, the site will close on December 31st, 2008.

If we cannot make the fundraising target, the Board will seek to sell the site to another qualified 501(c)(3) or close. We would also stop accepting new books requests from soldiers on December 1st, 2008.

Below are some ways of how you can help.

1) Office party fundraiser -- Coordinate a “Save BFS Day” at work and urge, beg, cajole your co-workers into coughing up something for BFS.

2) Have your company cough up some cash. We will send your company a formal donation request, just send us the company name, contact name and address and we will get it out right away. Send these requests to me personally: storm@booksforsoldiers.com.

3) Have your place of worship pass the plate (hat, kippah, whatever) for BFS. Consult with your church’s leader about holding a “Save BFS Offering” one day this month. Checks should be made out to “Books For Soldiers.” If they have any questions or concerns, please contact me directly to set up a call.

4) Visit our donation page and give what you can:

http://booksforsoldiers.com/donate.php

or by check:

Books For Soldiers
2008 Fund Drive
353 Jonestown Rd #123
Winston Salem, NC 27104


Thank you so much for supporting our troops,
Storm Bear Williams



And for a heart-warming, first-hand account of what becoming involved in the Books For Soldiers program really means to both the troops and to those who support them, check out this Daily Kos diary from someone who knows: The Story of a Flag

 

by Terri Buchman

by Terri Buchman

The New York Times has an excellent blog called Dot Earth that is dedicated to discussing issues related to the environment, energy policy, endangered species and habitats, and global warming. The blog, written by Andrew C. Revkin, reported on the decision yesterday by the Interior Department, under Secretary Dick Kempthorne, to place the polar bears on this list of threatened species:

Three years after environmental groups sued to force the Interior Department to consider protecting polar bears under the Endangered Species Act, the Bush administration today listed the species as threatened — on track to be endangered by midcentury because of shrinking summer sea ice in a warming Arctic.

But the administration shaped its decision in a way that does not force restrictions on emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, even though scientists have said the building greenhouse effect is the main influence driving up global temperatures. Administration officials added that existing protections of the bear, under the Marine Mammal Protection Act, were stringent and sufficient. And they also made clear that oil and gas exploration and extraction showed no evidence of harming the bears and would not be hindered by the decision.

Senator Kerry has been a long-time advocate in the Senate on this issue . He advocated for adding the polar bears to the list of threatened species, wrote a letter that was signed by ten other US Senators to delay a 30 million-acre oil and gas lease sale in Alaska’s Chukchi Sea, and wrote to Secretary Kempthorne to urge action to add the polar bears to the list of threatened species before the deadline for doing so expired.

Senator Kerry added a comment to the Dot Earth blog yesterday commenting on the Interior Department decision:

Today’s announcement was one big step towards confronting the reality of what climate change is doing to some of the world’s most endangered creatures living in some of our most fragile ecosystems. The polar bear has become the mascot of all we could lose to climate change and it is critical that we fight to save this species even as we wage a larger battle against global warming. Between one-sixth and one-fifth of the world’s polar bears live on the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas. Last summer, government scientists predicted that, as a result of climate change, polar bears may disappear from the U.S. and its waters entirely by 2050 – and that estimate doesn’t even take into account potential effects from new oil and gas activities.

So the question is – where do we go next? The clock is ticking. The next step is to secure the long-term survival of the species by ensuring that the polar bear habitat in the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas is protected from the threat of oil and gas drilling. Here’s where the rubber hits the road: even while the Interior Department was slowly taking steps to give these bears ESA protection, the Bush Administration opened almost 30 million acres of polar bear habitat to oil and gas exploration, a move that by their own admission threaten polar bears. Again, don’t take my word for it: MMS itself acknowledged in its Final Environmental Impact Statement on Lease Sale 193 that oil and gas development will harass and ultimately even kill polar bears. Already, massive amounts of seismic activity are being planned for this summer in both the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas.

Yes, today was a victory – but it’s up to all of us and some good old fashioned activism to make sure it’s not a pyrrhic one. I will fight hard to pass legislation I introduced early earlier this year in the Senate, which would halt all exploration activity in the Beaufort and Chukcki Seas at least until we better understand the full impact of drilling on the polar bear and other imperiled species.

- Posted by Senator John Kerry