Pluto IS a planet. That fact cannot be changed by a dictate of four percent of the IAU, most of whom are not planetary scientists. I urge anyone who believes that Pluto and all dwarf planets should be reclassified as a subclass of planets to visit http://www.dwarfplanetsrplanets2.com for contact information to email the IAU and its president, asking them to reopen this issue at this year's General Assembly.
I agree that it wasn't handled well by the IAU. But once a Kuiper Belt object had been found that was larger than Pluto, something had to be done. I'm comfortable with calling anything that orbits a star and has enough mass to be basically a sphere a planet. I think calling it a dwarf planet was a reasonable classification.
Sometimes, it's better to do nothing than to take an action that will make things worse, which is what I believe the IAU vote did.
This doesn't have to be so difficult. A round object slightly larger than Pluto orbiting in the Kuiper Belt is a planet. Dwarf planet would be reasonable as a new classification, but only if it is made a new subcategory of planet that describes small planets that are not gravitationally dominant. Passing a resolution that declares dwarf planets not planets at all is an example of the "cure" being worse than the "disease."
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This doesn't have to be so difficult. A round object slightly larger than Pluto orbiting in the Kuiper Belt is a planet. Dwarf planet would be reasonable as a new classification, but only if it is made a new subcategory of planet that describes small planets that are not gravitationally dominant. Passing a resolution that declares dwarf planets not planets at all is an example of the "cure" being worse than the "disease."