As a college student, there is nothing more integral to my survival than Wal-Mart. Stepping through the automatic door entrance is like stepping through the pearly gates: I feel like I'm in a college consumer's heaven. While I usually opt to purchase box upon box of S'more Pop-Tarts, if I felt so inclined, I could buy everything necessary for a duck-hunting trip, or buy the materials and sew myself a beautiful evening gown.

Not that I go duck hunting or sew myself evening gowns, but at Wal-Mart, all of these possibilities are open. Of course, the magic of Wal-mart doesn't end with its immense product selection.

As we've all seen in the commercials, a floating yellow smiley face whisks around the store and is continuously "rolling back" prices. I love that little fella! As it merrily whistles "Happy Days Are Here Again," it cares about nothing except for pleasing customers through the graciousness of the rollback.

Our freshly inaugurated president, The "Kegmeister" George W. Bush, seems to be equally impressed with that joyous little yellow face. He too can likely be heard whistling a chipper tune as he dances through his new home at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

Perhaps influenced directly by our little yellow smiley-faced friend, President Bush feels that the rollback will lead him to be loved by the American people.

Instead of price-rollbacks, as is the practice of the Wal-Mart smiley face, Mr. Bush believes that policy-rollbacks are the way to go.

Unfortunately for Mr. Bush, he possesses none of the charm nor intelligence of the floating smiley face, and his policy rollbacks provide nothing more than a headache for the American people.

Bush is the antithesis of the floating yellow smiley face. I picture the Kegmeister's head, smeared with his stupid "Oh Golly!" grin, floating around the country and seeing what he can roll back to make things comply with his hollow vision of what is best for America.

The Bush rollbacks begin with his decision to overturn several of the policy initiatives made by former President Clinton during his final days in office. With less than two weeks left in his term, Clinton had designated nearly 60 million acres of national forests as off limit to any sort of development.

This unprecedented move was made after years of research into the matter, and has been compared to Teddy Roosevelt's creation of the national forest system.

But Bubba and Dubya don't see eye to eye when it comes to these trees.

In his first interview after the election, Bush stated he feels that Clinton's forest initiatives trampled on the rights of local people to determine how the forests should be handled.

By local people, he means the timber companies that now have restricted access to these national forests. So in other words, he doesn't think it's fair that loggers don't have free run over the protected forestlands. He plans to roll back the scope of Clinton's forest initiatives as one of his first acts in office, so that toothpicks can once again be made out of protected old growth forests.

Those trees falling in the woods aren't the only things that will be making a sound. Expect to hear quite a din from our friends in Russia and China as the Bush Rollback comes across missile defense policy. Remember that missile defense system that was tested last summer and failed miserably at both of its two test runs? Well, the Kegmeister sure wants to build us one of them suckers!

The construction of a missile defense system would be quite a rollback in foreign policy. First of all, such a system is simply not possible with the technology that we have today.

Besides that, an overture on our part to build such a system would break the 1972 Antiballistic Missile Treaty with Russia, which could be construed as an aggressive act on our part.

Also, because China could view any missile shield as a direct threat to the viability of its small stockpile of long-range missiles, and because China is unfettered by any sort of arms limitation with Washington, they may use this opportunity to begin building a vast number of new intercontinental missiles.

We could be rolled right back into the middle of cold war-style arms race.

The Bush Rollback on the foreign front doesn't end there. Bush plans to cut off all aid to organizations that offer abortions in overseas countries. This rollback is especially damaging, because the other services that these organizations offer, such as safe-sex education and birth control, are invaluable tools at preventing what could be the defining tragedy of the 21st Century: the epidemic spread of AIDS throughout third-world countries.

For the next four years, Bush will be floating through the White House like a demented version of the yellow smiley face, all the while whistling and rolling back policies. Exactly how dire will the consequences of his rollbacks be? It really depends on the type of opposition that meets him from popular opinion and in the halls of Congress.

One thing, however, is certain. If things get too bad, we can all huddle together in the eternal paradise of our local Wal-Mart Superstore.