Polar bears are dying and will soon be wiped out entirely if we don't take immediate action to curb global warming. One of George W. Bush's 11th-hour decisions greatly weakened protections for the polar bear and other species under the Endangered Species Act by issuing regulations reducing protections for the polar bear and exempting greenhouse gas emissions -- the number-one threat to the bear -- from regulation.

Congress, however, just passed special legislation granting President Barack Obama's Interior Secretary Ken Salazar 60 days to revoke the damaging Bush regulations with the stroke of a pen

Global warming is rapidly melting the sea ice polar bears depend on. Accounts of bears starving and drowning are on the rise as they are forced to swim farther and farther to reach the solid ice they need for hunting and resting. Those trapped on land hundreds of miles from the nearest ice are often shot as they wander, starving, near villages.