What's Important

Snippets from the news
• Bush admin bars drilling near Alaska's Lake Teshekpuk in exchange for OK to drill elsewhere.

• Australian kangaroos may be culled after all.

• Obesity contributes to global warming.

• Climate change will lead to barbarization.

• Illinois requires green cleaners in schools.

Conservative Christians launch skeptical climate campaign
Conservative religious leaders have launched a "We Get It!" campaign that just goes to prove that saying something doesn't make it so. The campaign aims to gather a million signatures on a petition opposing climate-change action, with the argument that tackling global warming will hurt the world's poor. "Our stewardship of creation must be based on Biblical principles and factual evidence," says the petition. "We face important environmental challenges, but must be cautious of claims that our planet is in peril from speculative dangers like man-made global warming." The campaign is in large part a response to the Evangelical Climate Initiative, which urges climate-fighting legislation and notes that global warming ain't exactly going to be a party for the impoverished. So far, the We Get It! petition has less than 100 signers, but those include such climate-savvy luminaries as Focus on the Family Chair James Dobson and Sens. James Inhofe and Tom Coburn (both R-Okla.).

sources: Christian Post, The Oklahoman, Baptist Press, CNSNews.com
see also, in Grist: Southern Baptist leaders urge action on climate change

Bush admin debuts final recovery plan for spotted owl
The Bush administration has released a final plan for helping out the northern spotted owl, after a prior plan was deemed to have been watered down by political interference. Critics admit the plan is an improvement over last year's draft -- which relied heavily on, ahem, taking out predator barred owls with shotguns -- but still wish more emphasis had been put on restricting logging in the threatened bird's old-growth forest habitat. "We are definitely concerned this is not going to be sufficient to recover the owl," says Steve Holmer of the American Bird Conservancy. "It does appear to have some pretty significant loopholes." U.S. Fish and Wildlife officials say the spotted owl could be recovered within three decades if all goes well; the recovery plan will be reviewed in 10 years to see whether it's working.

sources: Associated Press, The Columbian, Seattle Post-Intelligencer
straight to the plan: 2008 Final Recovery Plan for the Northern Spotted Owl