JEEEZZZUUSS, MR. PRESIDENT

More than half the people of the United States don't understand that we're at war and fighting for the survival of our civilization.

The reason for this is that our President does not behave as though he means it. He talks the talk, and walks the walk in his policies, but as a leader, his behavior lacks the seriousness of a warfighter.

After years of unremitting attacks from liars like Joe Wilson and the New York Times, he still cannot fight back. He answers are coherent, and his words are genuine, but a fighter fights back.

Here's Mr. Bush making nice with one of the nastiest public figures in Washington....the Michael Moore of the White House press corps, Helen Thomas. Jeezzzus Mr. President....she needs to be shunned, not kissyfaced.

As a consequence of squishy-nice tolerance of his tormentors, the President may have lost the moment in terms of continuing our long term defence.

Mark Steyn writes

If you go back to September 2001, it's amazing how much the administration made happen in just a short space of time: For example, within days it had secured agreement with the Russians on using military bases in former Soviet Central Asia for intervention in Afghanistan. That, too, must have been quite a phone call. Moscow surely knew that any successful Afghan expedition would only cast their own failures there in an even worse light -- especially if the Americans did it out of the Russians' old bases. And yet it happened.

Five years on, the United States seems to be back in the quagmire of perpetual interminable U.N.-brokered EU-led multilateral dithering, on Iran and much else. The administration that turned Musharraf in nothing flat now offers carrots to Ahmadinejad. After the Taliban fell, the region's autocrats and dictators wondered: Who's next? Now they figure it's a pretty safe bet that nobody is.

What's the difference between September 2001 and now? It's not that anyone "liked" America or that, as the Democrats like to suggest, the country had the world's "sympathy.'' Pakistani generals and the Kremlin don't cave to your demands because they "sympathize.'' They go along because you've succeeded in impressing upon them that they've no choice. Musharraf and Co. weren't scared by America's power but by the fact that America, in the rubble of 9/11, had belatedly found the will to use that power. It is notionally at least as powerful today, but in terms of will we're back to Sept. 10: Nobody thinks America is prepared to use its power. And so Nasrallah and Ahmadinejad and wannabe "strong horses" like Baby Assad cock their snooks with impunity.

...Nitwit Democrats think anything that can be passed off as a failure in Iraq will somehow diminish only Bush and the neocons. In reality -- a concept with which Democrats seem only dimly acquainted -- it would diminish the nation, and all but certainly end the American moment. In late September 2001 the administration succeeded in teaching a critical lesson to tough hombres like Musharraf and Putin: In a scary world, America can be scarier. But it's all a long time ago now.

There may be a way to recover, but it'll take an agressive and combative attitude at home and abroad. The U.N. needs to be ignored....as do the French...and our "friends" the Chinese and Russians need to be made to understand that unless they work with us, we're going to mess up their sandbox, too.

War is hardball. But hardball across the board doesn't seem to be Mr. Bush's forte.

And we'll be the losers for it.