Remember when everything was looking up? When the government was running at a surplus, pollution was disappearing, peace was breaking out in the Middle East and Northern Ireland, and the Bridge to the Twenty-First Century was strung with highspeed Internet cable and paved with 401(k) gold?

Well, so ,much for the future. Michael Moore, the award-winning provocateur behind ROGER & ME and the bestseller DOWNSIZE THIS!, now returns to size up the new century -- and that big, ugly special-interest group that's laying waste to the world as we know it: stupid white men. Whether he's calling for United Nations action to overthrow The Bush Family Junta, calling on African-Americans to place WHITES ONLY signs over the entrances of unfriendly businesses, or praying that Jesse Helms will get kissed by a man, STUPID WHITE MEN is Mike's Manifesto on Malfeasance and Mediocrity. Among his targets:

• George W.: THE THIEF-IN-CHIEF A TRESPASSER ON FEDERAL LAND, A SQUATTER lN THE OVAL OFFICE. SEND IN THE MARINES!
• Bill Clinton: ONE OF THE BEST REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTS WE'VE EVER HAD.
• The Idiot Nation: A FRIGGIN' STAIN ON A BLUE DRESS. THAT'S WHAT CAPTURED OUR ATTENTION IN THE NINETIES-ALONG WITH SLOW-MOVING BRONCOS, SIX-YEAR-OLD STRANGLED BEAUTY QUEENS, AND HUGH GRANT'S DATING HABITS.
• Corporate America: THERE IS NO RECESSION, MY FRIENDS. NO DOWNTURN, NO HARD TIMES. THE RIC# ARE WALLOWING IN LOOT-AND NOW THEY WANT TO MAKE SURE YOU DON'T COME A-LOOKIN' FOR YOUR PIECE OF THE PIE.

The polls indicate that 60 percent of Americans are "upset or angry" about this land in which we now live -- a land where crooked courts select the president and money rules the day. So if you're feeling the same way and you're wondering what's going to give out first -- the economy, Dick Cheney's pacemaker, or your new VW Beetle -- here's the book for you.