Something Real To Be Afraid Of

If you are under 40, the Arctic ice cap is now due (at current, accelerating rates of shrinkage) to melt completely within your lifetime. This year saw the fourth massive loss of ice in a row, a loss equal in size to the state of Alaska. From ABC News Online:

Dr Mark Serreze from the NSIDC says he is alarmed that sea ice levels are not fluctuating like they used to.

"I'm flabbergasted, to be honest," he said.

"What we all typically see in the Arctic is we'll have a low sea-ice year, but we'll recover for next year - just natural variability.

"But we're not. Every year has less and less sea-ice."

His NSIDC colleague, Julianne Stroeve, says their satellite observations have been showing that Arctic sea ice is rapidly declining.

"This year in 2005 we reached our all-time minimum since we began the satellite observations in the late 1970s," she said...

"In the past, the temperatures would be cold enough to freeze the ice and the ice would grow again. This last winter, that didn't happen. We had record lows every month since last September, except during May."

Worse yet, Ms Stroeve says "it might not be possible for it to recover any more."

Now ask yourself, what is your government doing with your money? What is your country doing to reduce pollutions that are warming the atmosphere? And finally, what are you doing?