George W. Bush came out of the closet last week.
 Actually, he came out of the woods.

 On the verdant shores of a salmon stream in Washington state, the Republican
 presidential nominee proclaimed himself an ardent en-vi-ron-ment-al-ist.
 This must have been a shock to the folks of Texas, where their governor has
 kept his tree-hugging passions a closely guarded secret.

 Also stunned by the revelation, we may presume, are the executives of all
 those polluting industries who have donated so heavily to Bush's campaign.
 After watching his performance in Texas, they, too, assumed he was more
 sympathetic to smokestacks than sequoias.

 Not so, says Suddenly Green George.

 Strolling the woods of Washington, he waxed lyrical about nature while
 attacking the Clinton administration for neglecting our national treasures.

 Said Bush: ``For eight years this administration has talked of
 environmentalism while our national parks are crumbling.''
 He said he wants an extra $3.75 billion over five years to spruce up
 trammelled popular parks such as Yellowstone.

 But hold on. A GOP candidate who advocates spending more money
 to preserve natural habitats? Incredible.

 More like unbelievable, says the Sierra Club and other environmental groups.
 You can't blame them for being skeptical.
 With Bush's record, it isn't easy being green.

 Texas spends less on its parks than almost any other state. And under Clinton,
 more money has been allocated for national parks than when Bush's own father
 was in the White House.

 Ironically, the father of the modern park system was a Republican, Teddy
 Roosevelt, who bucked Congress and set aside extraordinary wilderness --
 including 16 million acres of forests -- for preservation.

 Only one other president has set aside more land in the lower 48, and that's
 Clinton. Every step of the way he has been fought and vilified by Republicans
 shilling for powerful mining, timber and cattle interests.

 Clinton has designated 11 new or expanded national monuments comprising more
 than 3.6 million acres, most of it out West. Most impressively, he is seeking
 to protect about 43 million acres of forest from logging and mineral
 excavation by designating them as ``roadless.''

 That means our tax dollars won't be spent building free roads for the timber
 companies so they can clear-cut entire mountainsides that we -- all of us -- own.
 Among the rabid opponents of the administration's preservation campaign is the
 newly self-outed environmentalist, George W. Bush.

 He blasted the ``roadless'' wilderness plan as a ``Clinton-Gore land grab'' and he's right
-- it would grab some public land away from the special interests who've been raping it
 on the cheap for decades, and instead save it for the benefit of all the people.
 Yet Bush insists he would be an environmentally conscious president who
 would persuade industry to help save the planet.

 For example, while Al Gore adamantly opposes oil drilling in the unspoiled
 Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Bush says the region's underground resources
 can be tapped in ``an environmentally sensitive way.''

 ha ha

 Even his pro-business brother, Jeb, doesn't hold that much faith in the oil
 companies. The Florida governor has strongly supported a ban on offshore
 drilling in coastal waters of the Gulf Mexico and the Keys.

 In an interview with Audubon magazine, George W. said his ``greatest
 contribution to the environment'' will be a ``new and lasting partnership
 between the federal and state governments, local communities and private
 landowners to conserve our precious resources for future generations.''

 In Texas, he said, environmental challenges were solved ``not by antagonizing
 people, but by inviting them to become part of the solution.''

 (Editor's question: The Solution?)

 
 Bush believes industries should be allowed to regulate themselves, which seldom works.
 Big Sugar cheerfully used the Everglades as a cesspit for half a century, changing its ways
 only in the face of public fury and a potential loss of lucrative U.S. price supports.

 But there he stood last week by the tumbling waters, the new green Bush,
 saying we can dam our rivers and still have abundant salmon.

 If only the darn things would learn to jump higher.
 Try to be part of the solution, you know, instead of the problem.