My theory, The poles melt during summer, respectively. They appear to not be gaining back the same amount each winter.
This may be due to carbon dioxide from so called fossil fuels. Or from natural ice age cycles.
What I would like is pictures from this satellite on the solstice's and equinox's for comparisons.
I'll try to catch it on those dates next year.

The effects of Global warming:
Earthquakes, Tsunami, volcano's, hurricanes.

• Tsunami warnings
  
• WORLD WIDE EARTHQUAKE LOCATOR
  
• The Pacific Northwest Seismograph Network
  
• Earthquake Hazards Program - Northern California
  
• World Volcano's
  
• Hurricane satellite
  
• Hurricane center
  
• GOES WEST

I used to have a cat named Archimedes, It would jump up on the side of the bathtub when I ran the water for my bath, and patiently wait for me to get in the tub and displace the water, then it would bend down and get a drink.

The displaced magma is coming up through the "Ring of Fire" volcanoe's.
So there are these strings of small earthquakes around the tectonic plates as they sink gradually, as the water melts, over the summer.
Where there is a Cul De Sac such as In the Andaman Sea,
The pressure builds up and you get a big quake and tsunami.
Update: 05-31-05 underwater volcano growing in the summit crater
of another larger underwater volcano, Vailulu'u. Near Samoa.
Update: 05-30-05 Barron Island volcano erupts.
Predicted result of December 26 undersea earthquake off Sumatra.
Lag time was 5 months 4 days. Magma moves pretty slow.
I would bet Narcondam will go off soon.
It last erupted in 1991,
That eruption was probably also from global warming, we just hadn't been aware,
of the poles melting, as much at that time. It had been over 100 yrs since their had been any activity before that.
If someone backtracked 6 months, I bet they would find considerable earthquake activity, in that area, before the eruption.

Mt. St. Helens, and other volcanos, spout the displaced magma over the continent, thereby raising the continent as the water raises. Net result for Nature, everything is back to normal.
Of course we little fleas on the dogs back get a little uncomfortable during the process.

Nature operates on feedback systems, to keep things in balance and specific ranges.
Some are simple, some are very complex. Now they think the sea ice in the antartic is getting thicker.
Most of the scary scientific predictions are from science only just discovering one side of a feedback system, and escalating it to extremes, without seeing the other side.

If you stop and think about it. Their is only 100 degrees celsius between a totally frozen world, (Europa) and one where the all the water has boiled away into the atmosphere. (Venus)
Its incredible that the Earth has managed to stay within that range for millions of years.

If my theory is correct: Somebody for their doctorate could compare Ice ages, and Volcanism. There should be a specific time relationship.

Note: Fossil fuels, Coal is a fossil fuel. Oil on the otherhand, I think is a phenomena of magma separating by density and the methane coming up under a seabed, This in turn causes the classic "domes" we find oil in. The methane condenses into oil. It should replace itself over some hypothetical time period. I just don't believe its "dinosaur grease". Maybe some from swamps but that would more likely form coal. More on Oil

We may be using oil faster than its replaced. Or the oil companies are trying to make us think there is a shortage to keep the price up. Standard supply/demand theory. There is an awful lot of capped wells, all over the US.
In either case, we can come up with another type or source of fuel to use for our transportation systems.

Greed is the real problem.

Another factor: If the CO2 from oil is the problem, the forests would normally, process the carbon dioxide back into hydrocarbon mass, and O2. Instead the forest goes for the sunday Times.
THE EARTH IS A LIVING ENTITY, AND HAS FEEDBACK SYSTEMS THAT KEEP IT IN BALANCE.

Like stupenagels, we insist on making paper out of trees, instead of from some yearly crop such as cannabis. This occurred because the newspaper giants owned the forests, and didn't want competition from hemp growers
--- ala yellow press-- outlaw hemp. Now they really have headlines
AAAAAAAAAAAGH GLOBAL WARMING.
Reminds me of the 007 movie "The world is not enough"

A tree grows for a hundred years, a good house would last a hundred years.
This would be appropriate usage. Now we have houses made of sawdust,
that will melt in 5 years, the only thing holding them together is the paint.
Sometimes I wonder if our species is as smart as Archimedes.

-- George W. Bush, regarding the Kyoto accord. in a Washington Post, interview,
First, we would not accept a treaty that would not have been ratified,
nor a treaty that I thought made sense for the country.
April 24, 2001, quoted from Jacob Weinberg, "The Complete Bushisms"

Links:
Milestones in Environmental Protection This Dynamic Planet