Burning Bush

THREE months ago, George Bush's fledgling administration dropped two public-relations bricks over the issue of global warming. First, Mr Bush refused to stand by his campaign pledge to regulate emissions of carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas that is widely believed to be a big cause of global warming. That sparked a backlash from American environmentalist groups. Second, he annoyed a lot of people overseas by trumpeting, in undiplomatic terms, his long-standing opposition to the Kyoto Protocol. This is a United Nations treaty agreed to (though not yet much ratified) by most industrialised countries, that calls for binding cuts in greenhouse-gas emissions.