In the first paragraph of President George Bush’s Web page on environmental issues, he states that in the past four years our air and water have become cleaner, the national parks have been better managed and funded, and that the president has proposed new initiatives and sought serious funding of technology for environmental improvement. This is simply just not the truth.

Under President Bush, regulations on coal-burning power plants have been drastically rolled back or not enforced. The EPA simply does not act. President Bush is currently pushing to have mercury emissions removed from Clean Air Act jurisdiction. Every year, about 630,000 babies are born in the United States to mothers who have been exposed to unsafe mercury levels.

Under President Bush, funding cuts and the EPA’s failure to collect penalties from polluters have bankrupted the Superfund program, which (theoretically) forces industry to pay most of the cost for pollution cleanups. Taxpayers will fund 80 percent of the program in 2004, and all Superfund cleanups in 2005.

President Bush has fought to allow the oil industry to drill in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, as well as in protected national parks, monuments and public lands in the Rocky Mountains.

Four years along we see no progress on fuel efficiency or renewable energy. Meanwhile, President Bush is filling the Strategic Oil Reserve, driving up prices. Still no relief is coming from his Saudi friends, whom he assured us he could influence.

On the other hand, John Kerry proposes providing research grants and tax credits for those developing new technologies and cleaner energy sources. He further proposes to end our dependence on the OPEC cartel and our entanglement with the unstable nations its dictatorial governments rule by working with Canada and Mexico in further developing a more productive North American oil industry.

Under a Kerry administration, air and water quality standards would once again be enforced rather than weakened, public lands would be closed to private profiteering, and America would return to the otherwise uninterrupted trend of improving environmental quality our nation has experienced since Richard Nixon and a Democratic congress worked together to form the EPA.

John Kerry has what it takes to stand up for environmental rights. Don’t just take our word for it. See for yourself at www.johnkerry.com and make plans to attend our meetings at 5 p.m. Thursdays in the UC.