Iraq spells trouble for Bush

By Matt Frei BBC Washington correspondent

The rain whipped the grey slab of the UN Plaza on New York's East River; it was far more vicious than anything Hurricane Isabel had dished up a week before.

Delegates, diplomats and ministers abandoned protocol and joined the stampede of journalists charging for cover in one of the white marquee tents that had been set up for security checks.

President Bush faced an uncomfortable time at the UN

Despite the dousing though, the mood was upbeat. Thousands had converged on the UN to see how President George W Bush would perform in front of an audience that was at best sceptical, at worst hostile.

Mr Bush remained bone dry that morning but I have rarely seen him look so ill at ease. This man, who can crack a smile as broad as a watermelon, barely showed the whites of his teeth.

During the speech he incessantly tapped the side of the lectern with his fingers.

The last time he sat on the high backed chair of the general assembly - more of a throne in fact - on which speakers are placed before and after their speech, he looked like a patriarch who was holding a wayward family to account. This time he came across as a fidgety schoolboy, anxious to leave.

Like father like son?

Ironically it is President Bush who needs the UN these days, more than they need him.

He wants a resolution on Iraq, he wants money and troops. In fact, anything that makes ordinary Americans feel that they are not alone in sorting out Iraq.

In times of trouble, even the world's only super power needs friends, and these, let's face it, are troubling times for Mr Bush. Even senior republicans are wondering out loud if this president could follow all too closely in his father's footsteps, and serve for only one term.

Six months ago the question would have seemed churlish, four months ago the swelling band of democrats challenging Mr Bush looked like a troop of no hopers. Now the latest opinion poll, conducted by Gallup, even has the president losing - yes losing - to the square-jawed former General Wesley Clark.

Wesley Clark could challenge Bush on security issues

First some perspective - yes President Bush's approval rate has slipped to 50% from 75% just after Saddam Hussein's statue was toppled. But at this stage in his presidency he is still looking more popular than Bill Clinton, Jimmy Carter, Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford and even Ronald Reagan.

There are only two presidents who fared better in the polls. John F Kennedy, who was of course assassinated shortly afterwards, and Mr Bush's father who scored an amazing 68% and then stormed on to lose the election.

The conclusion is that these are very early days. The polls are interesting but inconclusive.

Nevertheless the White House is getting nervous. They always knew the economy was going to be a problem and there is only so much they can do to make Americans feel better off when jobs are still been shed.

But ironically, it is Iraq that has now become the nightmare - it's the war, stupid, you might say.

The war was always meant to be a vote winner. It made the president and America look strong, but the daily drip-drip of US casualties is raising awkward questions.

Here's another irony. I'm convinced that if the same number of soldiers had been killed in the heat of a single battle during the storming of Baghdad at the height of the war, few in this country would have asked: "Is it worth it?"

But five months after Mr Bush hailed Iraq a mission accomplished, the almost daily deaths are like Chinese water torture on the morale of the nation.

And so to the Democrats who hope to unseat George Bush. Most of the 10 candidates who will joist with each other in a televised debate in New York voted in favour of the war last autumn.

Today, they are falling over each other to say that they do not like the way the president has handled things, that they were misled about weapons of mass destruction, there was insufficient planning to deal with the aftermath and so on.

Howard Dean, the diminutive and feisty former governor of Vermont was always opposed to the war and thus occupies the moral high ground almost alone. But he also comes from a famously liberal state that is to America what nouvelle cuisine is to McDonalds.

No, the man who can challenge President Bush on matters of security and war is a candidate so perfect the Democrats would have to invent him if he did not exist. Retired General Wesley Clark - Wes to his friends.

Handsome, fit, straight, good father, loyal husband, four-star General, wounded and decorated in Vietnam, a Rhodes scholar who never even rolled a joint let alone inhale one, a soldier who also taught economics at West Point.

And what is more, like three of the last Democratic presidents, he is a southerner, from Little Rock, Arkansas, home of the Clinton clan who have endorsed him with friends and money.

Long way to go

Now he does worry the Bush camp. But Mr Clark, whom I met when he announced his candidacy, is also famously thin-skinned. More used to giving orders, or receiving them, than to pleading, charming, begging schmoozing - doing all those demeaning things which politicians need to do to get elected.

Mr Clark is so tightly coiled that I thought I might get an electric shock if I moved too close. On paper he may be perfect, but as George W himself might say, don't underestimate charm.

If the lousy polls have done one thing to the Bush camp, they have snuffed out the kind of complacency that sent his father into early retirement.