It’s going to take nothing short of magic – a very convincing illusion – for George W Bush to now steer the focus away from the corruption in his administration back to his big agenda issues for this term. Perhaps he should enlist David Copperfield to replace Karl Rove.

With the indictments of Scooter Libby and Tom DeLay, the investigation of Bill Frist, the withdrawal of the nomination of Harriet Miers after a massive implosion of the Republican Party’s base, an illegal war that is out of control, a pro-torture Vice President and the absolute inability to even utter one regret over any of it, this is more than just a “culture of corruption”. It’s a culture of lies. Corruption seems like far too gentle a word at this point for what the Bush administration has been perpetuating since it took over the White House.

While the Republicans will try furiously to refocus the American public’s attention back to Bush’s domestic agenda again this week, that same public is still reeling from what congress and the WH have wrought the past few months as a result of that agenda: a bankruptcy bill that will harm millions and protect the credit card companies, pandering to the gun companies by protecting them from lawsuits, cutting back on food stamps, proposing cutbacks to Medicaid and Medicare, the lack of a viable energy policy, the continual mismanagement of hurricane relief efforts, the flip-flop on the Davis-Bacon Act and the ongoing inability to manage the war in Iraq.

This is a failed presidency.

One only had to watch Bush’s statement to the press on Friday about the Libby indictments to see that he had lost that look of steely determination that has been his hallmark as the “war president”. He looked defeated – not defiant. That’s what happens to a man who refuses to allow anything but good news from the lips of his closest advisors to penetrate his daily reality. He has lost control of the message to an extent that we can be sure he never envisioned due to his stubborn insistence that he never makes mistakes.

The only way such a man can move ahead is to continue to deny reality by attempting once again to push his social security “reforms”, his war on terror campaign and his meme that “freedom is on the march” while carrying an approval rating hovering around 40%. It hasn’t worked before and it won’t work now.

Bush also faces the dilemma of again having to nominate a new candidate to the Supreme Court to replace the failed Miers candidacy. His only safe bet is to nominate a moderate who is clearly conservative. If he chooses to give his fundie base the red meat they’ve been salivating for, he risks another major battle with the end result being the use of the nuclear option in the Senate. He may believe he can afford that fight, and his base may believe it as well, but if he thinks things around him are ugly now – just wait until the Democrats bring down the hammer on that strategy.

It’s obviously going to take more than the power of a master illusionist like David Copperfield, who is quite capable of making real elephants disappear, to take away the stench that emanates from this White House. It’s going to take more than the business-as-usual right-wing smear machine to change things as well. What else does Bush have up his sleeve and, in the end, will he be able to pull off the trick without a hitch? He has a very cynical audience to convince and they will be watching his every move knowing what magic really is: just one big illusion.