News item from the other day: Icelandic whalers kill first fin whale.

Can someone tell me why, in the 21st century, we still need to be hunting whales? Look, I’m no tree-hugging, enviro-wacko like these folks (although I will admit to avoiding stepping on ants and letting insects out of the house instead of executing them on the spot), but one would think that between the world’s rapidly-expanding aquaculture industries, new technologies, and an increasing global awareness of the need to better manage our precious and diminishing natural resources, a practice as outdated and unnecessary as whale-hunting would have by now been the stuff of old, fantastic stories told by Jack London and shared by intrepid old salts over a whiskey and a crackling fire.

I remember saying a number of years ago that I could foresee the day when nations would use their navies to protect the oceans from renegade nations that refuse to honor or sign international treaties designed to protect fish stocks and endangered species in the big blue. I sure hope things never get to that point, but when I read about things as senseless as the hunting of whales in this day and age when it’s common wisdom that their numbers need to be protected, it makes you wonder how close we are to that day.