We're Doomed.

As if the economic news weren't cheery enough, here's an update on what we're doing to the other denizens of our world, as reported in an article entitled One in Four Mammals Threatened, Study Finds, which appears in today's New York Times.

A fun-nugget of all the super-cool stuff We Of The Superior Intelligence have wrought:

An “extinction crisis” is under way, with one in four mammals in danger of disappearing because of habitat loss, hunting and climate change, a leading global conservation body warned on Monday.

“Within our lifetime, hundreds of species could be lost as a result of our own actions,” said Julia Marton-Lefèvre, the director general of the International Union for Conservation of Nature, an international network of campaign groups, governments, scientists and other experts.

She called the findings “a frightening sign of what is happening to the ecosystems where they live.”

Ecosystems in which we, too, live, by the way.

Of course, given all the deregulated chickens (and swine) coming home to roost these days, it should also be noted that 3 in 4 humans (or more) are threatened, too.

And speaking of humans (sort of), whatever will the likes of Dick Cheney and Sarah Palin find to shoot at if all the mammals go belly up, having been "drill, baby, drilled" out of hearth and home?