United States: Bush has tougher foes to defeat

Cast your mind back to a year ago. A callow and untested Texan was preparing to enter the White House. His mandate was wafer thin: a disputed victory in Florida that gave him just enough electoral college votes to win, despite having lost the national popular vote to the Democrat Al Gore by 537,000. A president's power lies, above all, in foreign affairs, yet no president in recent memory had come to office knowing less of the world beyond the United States. Beyond the immediate circle of the faithful, expectations were, to put it mildly, not high – and George W Bush did not exceed them.

Since then the US, the world and Mr Bush have been transformed. September 11 may or may not prove a watershed in 21st-century history, but it certainly was one in his conduct of his country's highest office.

Until that hauntingly beautiful and unforgettably dreadful day, the Bush presidency was shaping up to be a repeat of the six-year Bush governorship of Texas, only on a larger canvas. The philosophy was hands-off, laissez-faire, business-friendly and unashamedly America-first. Bush himself seemed almost disengaged. Having won the supreme prize, he seemed to have little idea what to do with it, beyond turning Washington's back on a dozen major international treaties.

His approach was that of the chairman of the board, as if running the country was like running the Texas Rangers baseball franchise of which he was once managing partner. The campaigning Bush marketed himself as a "compassionate conservative". In office, he was a plain old Texas conservative, a straight-talking born-again Christian. An increasingly unilateralist US lived out the last months of the Clinton era complacency oblivious to the concerns of the world outside.

Then came the monstrous events of 11 September. At first it seemed as if Bush would be overwhelmed by the crisis. He only returned to Washington on the evening of the fateful day, and for 48 hours manifestly struggled to come to grips with what had happened. But on the Friday following the attacks he went to New York and stood on top of the smouldering rubble of ground zero. He borrowed a fireman's bullhorn and told the world that "the people who knocked these buildings down will hear from all of us soon".

Bush had caught the national mood, and has not let go of it since. He has grown into the job, and become comfortable with its demands. The famous "bubble" of the presidency has snapped tight around him. He is focussed as never before – and fitter too. He has lost weight, and 30 to 45 minutes of jogging each morning have got his time for a mile down to barely seven minutes.

In the best family tradition, he still regularly puts the English language through a shredding machine. But what comes out expresses what the US wants to hear. Supercilious foreigners may mock them, but the the Wild West "smoke-'em-out", "wanted-dead-or-alive" metaphors have captured the nature of the hunt for Osama bin Laden and his followers. To an extent that few would have predicted, but that even his political foes now acknowledge, the 43rd President has impressed both Americans and foreign countries with his handling of the war. He has talked tough (notably against Iraq) but acted in a considered fashion.

A constant from the start, and the glue that holds this presidency together, has been a super-disciplined White House, arguably more hermetic and "on message" than any since Nixon. There have been no unintended leaks, and none of the public sniping that marked earlier administrations. Yes, there has been some disagreement on the course of the war, notably between Colin Powell at the State Department and Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz at the Pentagon. But you would hardly guess it from the headlines.

Bush's managerial skills have played a major part. He is an easy man to underrate. In his very different fashion, he can be as persuasive as Bill Clinton. Unlike many presidents, he knows how to delegate. In Karl Rove and Karen Hughes, trusted lieutenants from the campaign, he has two key advisers of a loyalty and discretion (though not, it must be stressed, a readiness to break the law) to match Bob Haldeman and John Erlichman. He watched in dismay the bickering and in-fighting on domestic policy as his father's presidency disintegrated, barely 18 months after the Gulf War. No one knows better than George W Bush how fast a 90 per cent approval rating can disappear.

But the "Afghanistan effect" will wear off. Post-11 September bipartisanship is already fraying badly, as the endless arguing between the White House and Congressional Democrats over a stimulus package shows. Mr Bush can prosecute a war with barely a murmur of disapproval, but as the stalled economic measures underscore, his domestic power has tight limits.

He has been fortunate, too. The terror attacks and the war have virtually obliterated everything else on the news radar screen, among them the Enron scandal. In normal times, the biggest business collapse in history – of a Texas company that made big contributions to the Republican Party and had personal ties with some of Bush's advisers – would have been fiercely scrutinised. Instead, Ari Fleischer, the White House spokesman, has scarcely been questioned on the subject.

In fact, normality is edging back. After the brief interlude of coalition-building for the anti-terror campaign, unilateralism is alive and well. In recent weeks, the Bush Administration has poured scorn on the proposed International Criminal Court, blocked revision of a germ warfare treaty, and pulled out of the 1972 ABM treaty, widely regarded as the cornerstone of nuclear arms control. September 11 has only stepped up its enthusiasm for missile defence, despite the scepticism of most of the rest of the world. Politics, in short, is returning to business as usual.

The first test of Bush's staying power comes with mid-term elections in November, with the Republicans defending a 222-213 majority in the House and attempting to reverse the 51-49 Democrat majority in the Senate. Two years later comes the Big One. Right now Bush beats any potential Democratic challenger in his bid for a second term.

But in political terms, 2004 is an eternity away. Skilful politician though he is, even Bush cannot defy reality. A stubborn economy may prove a more obdurate foe than the Taliban and al-Qaida. America's last recession – and the impression that the then White House occupant did not greatly care about it – brought down Bush the father. The current recession, if it lingers, could be the undoing of the Republicans next year and upset the calculations of Bush the son for 2004.