Bush, Climate And The Ticking Clock - BBC

[hatrack]

The minute hand on the Doomsday Clock ticked two minutes closer to midnight last week, as the scientists who run the symbolic timepiece added climate change to the list of threats to civilisation. George W Bush - for all his aides' denials - must feel as if a similar clock is ticking down over his presidency.

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And his own personal popularity is in the cellar, with twice as many Americans disapproving of his performance as approving of it. So his speech had something of the feel of a man grabbing the hands of the clock and trying to hold them still - or even turn them back.

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He spoke in general terms about diversifying America's energy supply, as he does every year - putting fuel in the context of security rather than the environment, as he does every year. There, too, the Democrats look unwilling to let him have his way. And then he devoted much of the rest of his speech to Iraq and what he calls the war on terror.

He struck a curious balance - his tone almost pleading for Congress and the nation to rally behind his unpopular plan to send more troops, but his words refusing to yield anything substantive to his critics.

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http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/6293263.stm