Wall Street scandals take toll on Bush
GOP trembles as election nears; tumbling stock

Washington -- It was about the time President Bush started speaking about corporate accountability last week that the stock market began a steep decline.

Now, a week into a plunge that has brought stock prices down to 1997 levels,

Bush is finding his own poll numbers tumbling in the same direction.

In a political confluence from hell, the president and a handful of top administration officials are facing questions about their personal corporate transactions that made them very wealthy men at precisely the time when millions of Americans are receiving quarterly statements that report devastating losses in their retirement and stock portfolios.

With the 2002 election less than four months away, whether the White House has the ability to restore confidence in the markets is an enormous concern for Republican lawmakers who had been counting on the president's wartime popularity to shore up their slim majority in the House and challenge the Democrats' one-seat advantage in the Senate.

"Two out of three likely voters tell us that they have an IRA or a 401(k)," said independent pollster John Zogby, whose survey over the weekend found unmistakable signs of erosion in the president's popularity.

"One look at their quarterly report and there goes confidence in the economy and the government. . . . This issue is THE issue," Zogby said.

A poll conducted over the weekend for the nonpartisan Cook Political Report found just 42 percent of registered voters said they would definitely vote to re-elect Bush, down from 54 percent earlier this year.