IMPEACH BUSH

WE HAVE reached, at long last, the beginning of the end in Iraq. President Bush is still suggesting that "staying the course" remains an option but he cuts an increasingly isolated, forlorn figure in Washington these days. Were Republican members of Congress to take their constituents' views into account, the majority of conservatives would be seeking a way to end the war now. It is just a matter of time before blood persuades them to reach that conclusion for themselves.

Electoral realities may force their hand. Thanks to gerrymandering and the financial advantages handed to incumbents, no fewer than 98% of sitting members of the House of Representatives are re-elected. It takes a political earthquake to change that, but Republicans worry, in private if not always yet in public, that such an earthquake is coming next November. The Senate offers no comfort either; 21 Republicans face re-election next year, compared with just 12 Democrats.

No wonder Republican senators are searching for a way out of Iraq. Many are calling on Bush to consider a "Plan B" that would provide an alternative to the binary choice of the status quo or full-scale withdrawal from Iraq. Such a scenario envisages thousands of US troops being pulled out next year, but leaving a rump force to provide security and continue to carry the fight to terrorist organisations.

The plan, as proposed by New Mexico Republican Pete Domenici, revisits the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group. Under the compromise proposal, around 60,000 US troops would remain in Iraq to mount counter-terrorist operations and continue training Iraqi police and army units. Politically this makes sense; whether it does so militarily is more doubtful.

Publicly, however, the President is not for turning. On Friday he invited a select group of conservative journalists to the White House to explain his latest thinking. According to Bush, even talking about withdrawing troops is a mistake. "The enemy thinks that we are weak - they're sophisticated people, and they listen to the debate", he said.

Despite insisting that the mission needed to be given more time, Bush acknowledged that domestic concerns were complicating factors. "The ideal world," he said, "is that there would be some bipartisan consensus at some point in time to be there for a while. Can we achieve that? I don't know. It's worth trying. It's worth talking to people about it."

The President will come under increasing pressure from his own party to, in the words of Senator Richard Lugar, find "a more sustainable" policy. Lugar and another respected Republican, former Armed Services Committee chairman John Warner, called on Bush to rethink his position in the light of an interim report that concluded that the Iraqi government was meeting just eight of 18 "benchmarks" considered vital for success in Iraq.

Lugar and Warner want Bush to return to Congress to ask for fresh authorisation for continuing the mission in Iraq. They also propose that Bush outlines plans by October that would include the partial draw-down of forces by the end of this year.

Despite that, Bush's position is secure so long as he remains determined to defy popular opinion and the growing rumbles of concern from within his own party. At present the doubters and dissenters have been unable to raise the 60 votes needed in the Senate to defeat a filibuster. Even if Democrats can convince more wavering Republicans to join them, they are unlikely to collect the 67 votes they would need to override a Presidential veto. "As long as we can sustain a veto, we have got some leverage on this process," said one White House aide.

Even Bush admits, however, that the public is in a rancorous, disillusioned frame of mind. "You know, they're tired of the war," he said on Friday. "There is a war fatigue in America. It's affecting our psychology."

Iraq will be the sole factor when it comes to the business of assessing Bush's legacy. Since his proposals for immigration reform were rejected by a rebellion from his own party, the President's domestic agenda has withered on the vine. Iraq is the be-all-and-end-all of his Presidency. "When it's all said and done... if you ever come down and visit the old, tired me down there in Crawford," he said last Thursday, "I will be able to say: 'I looked in the mirror and made decisions based upon principle, not based upon politics'. And that's important to me."

Yes, well, indeed. Unfortunately you don't get a mulligan in this game.