WHALES PAYING FOR "BUSH" ATROCITIES

Before he left office, President Bush signed a series of regulations threatening environmental harm on a staggering scale. One of them was military sonar training up and down the US coastline from North Carolina to the Bahamas, Hawaii to Washington State and Alaska. The Navy claims that these sonar experiments (recently upheld by the predominantly right wing US Supreme Court) just annoy whales and dolphins. In actuality, the injuries extend beyond just hearing damage and mass stranding and death into adversely affecting their feeding, breeding, migrating, communicating and finding mates.

One bright development in an otherwise tragic and uncertain future for whales was the recent report that a record 39 new North Atlantic right whales were born this year off the coast of Florida and Georgia. But unless President Obama reverses the Bush atrocities, the number of mass whale and dolphin deaths will continue to grow, and that includes the North Atlantic right whales. Only 400 remain, making them one of the most severely endangered.