Bush's 'week from hell'

2005-10-30 20:39

Washington - Time magazine says president George W Bush's confidence in his top team of advisers, including all-important vice president Dick Cheney, has fallen sharply in the wake of the CIA leak scandal.

In the wake of Friday's indictment of Cheney's top adviser for lying to a grand jury over the case, Bush's faith in his own top aides Karl Rove and Andrew Card, as well as Cheney, has dropped, Time reported.

"He's lost some of his confidence in the three people he listens to the most," Time quoted an unnamed White House adviser as saying.

"The problem is that the president doesn't want to make changes," the source said.

Cheney, Rove and Card have been key to the successes of the Bush presidency.

But the administration, and Bush personally, sustained several deep blows during the past week, including the dropping of Bush's personal nomination for a supreme court vacancy, the rise to 2 000 of US casualties in Iraq, and the indictment of Cheney chief of staff I Lewis Libby for perjury and obstruction in the CIA leak case.

The case involves the alleged disclosure to journalists by one or more White House aides of the name of an undercover CIA agent.

Time called the past seven days "the week from hell" for Bush, the worst week in his nearly five years as president, and has left him somewhat estranged from key members of his team.

"Above all things, Bush values loyalty, both to his friends and to his own beliefs.

"He does not abandon either easily," Time said.

- SAPA