President Bush draws the curtain on the administration's energy policy tomorrow, but there's not much anxious anticipation. This remarkably non-leaky White House has done a pretty good job drib-drabbing out the whole policy, so much so that you'll be forgiven if you feel you've read the same story about what's in the plan 10 different times. Muckraker, however, has caught wind of a key memo that wasn't supposed to be leaked, one that lays out how the administration intends to pitch the plan to the American public without getting burned. All signs point to the memo's author being none other …

It has been a busy few months of cutting costs, stifling regulations, and limiting government's reach for George W. Bush and his business allies. Now that Bush has halted U.S. efforts to solve global warming, sidelined rules to protect 60 million acres of wilderness, suspended new limits on arsenic in drinking water, and supported new drilling in the Arctic, the world as viewed from industrial front offices certainly looks like a safer place. Coastal-plain sailing for industry? Photo: Alaska Wilderness League. For conservation advocates in the states, though, the president's campaign to reverse sound environmental policy is all too familiar. …

First, the facts. The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge covers about 19 million acres in northeastern Alaska, almost all north of the Arctic Circle. It was created in 1980 by the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, which renamed and more than doubled the size of an existing wildlife range, designated about 8 million acres within the refuge as wilderness, and prohibited oil and gas production in the refuge unless authorized by Congress. Caribou on the coastal plain. Photo: Alaska Wilderness League. The Arctic Refuge provides essential and unique habitat for more than 250 animal species, including polar bears, caribou, wolves, …

Christie -- Heard they hammered you in Montreal about the Kyoto thing. Don't let it get you down, Whitman! They're foreigners, these people, and foreigners feed on confrontation. It's cultural. Did you see that recent French or German movie, in black and white? Cultural. Good of you to leave the conference early. I take it you got some free sandwiches first? (Heh heh!) I like sandwiches. Call it the Green House. To answer your question, the White House isn't currently offering an alternative to Kyoto Protocol, if that is indeed what it's called. We don't get paid to sit around …

Christie Todd Whitman. When it comes to listing body blows inflicted on the environmental movement by the Bush administration in recent days, it's hard to know where to start. Pick up the paper any day of the week and you'll likely find a fresh slap in the face of U.S. EPA "Administrator" Christie Todd Whitman. A backtrack on arsenic standards here, a promise to drill in Alaska there. An Energy secretary quoting the industry-funded Greening Earth Society. National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice and then others in the White House sticking a fork in Kyoto because it's "dead." And who's that …

  Re: The Noble Citizen Dear Editor: This is the first time in my life that I've felt moved to cry upon hearing that someone I didn't know personally had died. I feel that I've come to know Donella Meadows in the past couple of years. Many times I have praised her writing, her clear thinking, and her easy style; I regularly sent her articles to my friends. I will miss knowing that she's there, working and speaking for all of us who are less eloquent. Thank you for the article telling me more about her as a person. Mary …

Democrats say that President Bush's recent moves to roll back environmental protections have given them their first rallying point since Bush took office. "We believe that George W. Bush has declared war on the environment," said Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) last week. Mark Mellman, a leading Democratic pollster, said, "I think Bush is in the process of creating a political disaster for himself." Environmental groups are beginning to run radio and TV ads around the country criticizing Bush's plans to drill for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and calling attention to the president's broken promise to regulate carbon …