It seems like just a very short while ago that I was writing about Al Gore, and what would happen to motorized off-highway recreation and multiple use in general if he were elected president. Thankfully we have not experienced what I predicted would be the result of Gore winning the election, because if he had won here's a short look at what we would be facing:

? Continued abuse of the Antiquities Act resulting in more land grabs and millions more acres of public land off-limits to OHVs.
? Enactment of the Klinton Roadless Conspiracy, otherwise known as the Roadless Initiative, that would have turned millions of acres of national forest into de facto wilderness.
? "?a coordinated global program to accomplish the strategic goal of completely eliminating the internal combustion engine over, say, a twenty-five-year period." (from "Earth in the Balance" by Al Gore)
? Junk Science-"When we seek to artificially enhance our capacity to acquire what we need from the earth, we do so at the direct expense of the earth's ability to provide naturally what we are seeking. We frequently ignore the impact of our technological alchemy on natural processes. When we manufacture millions of internal combustion engines and automate the conversion of oxygen to CO2, we interfere with the earth's ability to cleanse itself of the impurities that are normally removed from the atmosphere." (from "Earth in the Balance")
? Loss of our sovereignty by such means as the Kyoto Treaty and the UN's Biodiversity Preserves.

Instead, what we have had for the last 3 ? years is a President that has injected common sense back into the management of our public lands and the environment in general. The liberal left (aka Democrats) have attempted to demonize the President when it comes to issues concerning our environment, because up until President Bush's election common sense was nowhere to be found and decisions concerning the environment and public lands were being made by the White House "Environmentalist in Chief" Gore and his cronies in The Wilderness Society, the Sierra Club, the Earthjustice Institute and other radical environmental organizations.

President Bush's record on the environment is actually nothing like the left would like you to believe. "Bush hating" has become quite fashionable for Democrats and other far left whackos, and part of the hatred spin is spinning his environmental record. What the President has accomplished or is in the process of accomplishing in the past 3 ? years is not what the environmental extremists are putting forth. Here's a short list of what has been accomplished under the current administration:

? Refusal to be bullied by the UN into signing the Kyoto Treaty. This treaty is a disaster for the leading industrialized nations, it is a thinly veiled attempt to bring the industrialized nations down to a lower standard more on par with third world countries, just another globalization tactic.
? Demanding exceptions to the 1987 Montreal Protocol. What worked when President Reagan signed the agreement in 1987 doesn't always work in 2004.
? The Healthy Forests Initiative. This was fought hard by many Democrats who finally had to succumb to public opinion, reality and sound science to let this much needed legislation pass. Instead of locking up our forests like the previous administration seemed determined to do, President Bush is protecting our forests.
? Reversed the phase out of snowmobiles in Yellowstone, a plan that was based on ideology rather than sound science. Since President Bush reversed this plan it has been in and out of the courts for over a year, going back and forth on implementation and being put on hold.
? Reduction of spending on environmental programs by 5.9%. The environmental extremists would like you to believe that this is horrible, an attack on the environment. But, like many of the other decisions by the Bush administration what this actually has done is to bring sound science back into the making of decisions, and by doing so it has reduced the cost of doing business. One of the biggest offenders of putting forth ideology rather than sound science has been the EPA, their science budget is being slashed accordingly.
? The President's commitment to developing alternative fuel sources, including his $1.2 billion hydrogen fuel initiative.
? A $4.4 billion commitment to study and fight global climate change. This replaces misguided agreements such as Kyoto with sound science.
? Putting the Roadless Initiative on hold indefinitely. There have been several attempts by Democrat Senators and Representatives to revive this rule that would create millions of acres of de facto wilderness. All attempts, including codifying and attaching it as a rider to other bills have never made it out of committee, Congress and the people know that this legacy of the Klinton years was created in an "environmental vacuum" and as written has absolutely no chance of ever being passed.

So, are you better off today? The answer is obviously yes on several levels. First of all you have a President replacing ideological and agenda driven decision making with decisions based on scientific fact. Second, we are having our public lands protected and used to the advantage of the American public rather than locking them up for an elitist few. And finally, and probably most obviously, we have not been subjected to another four years of decisions made behind closed doors, public input that is a sham of just going through the motions with a pre-determined outcome, and an administration with an agenda that is contrary to wise and multiple use of our public lands.

We have now seen what we could have been facing and what we actually have experienced over the last 3 ? years. But, President Bush is now at the very beginning of what is going to prove to be a very long and tough campaign against his Democratic opponent John Kerry and the non-sensical Bush haters. Next month we will take a look at Senator Kerry, the most liberal Senator in the United States Senate, and what we will be facing if he somehow manages to defeat George Bush in November.