The issues are as difficult as ever, but the conditions are likely to be more conducive to agreement as President Bush attends his eighth and final economic summit of industrial democracies. The annual Group of Eight meeting, which begins Monday on the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido, comes amid economic turmoil in most of the member nations, as well as political uncertainty for many of the leaders. Oil prices are hitting new record highs and worries about inflation are mounting. Like the United States, most of the nation's major trading partners are experiencing slow growth and market declines. And Bush isn't the only one suffering low approval ratings. In fact, the president may have more clout at the gathering than his own low approval number - 29 percent in an AP-Ipsos poll conducted in mid-June - and the vast unpopularity of the Iraq war would suggest. For one thing, the just-below-the-surface animosity toward him - based on his Iraq moves and perceived hostility toward what then-Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld derisively described as "old Europe" - is now mostly gone. ...
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