George W Bush has succeeded where his father failed, in winning a second term as president. But what will another four years of Dubya mean for the rest of us? Nick Morrison reports.

IT seems he really has been "misunderestimated". George W Bush may be the man who mangles his words and has only a nodding acquaintance with the English language, but he is also the most popular president in history.

The first candidate since 1988 to win a majority of the popular vote, he is also on course to have won with more votes than any other president in history.

It may have been the most bitter and divisive campaign in living memory, and the result may again have gone down to one state, this time Ohio, but Bush's victory over John Kerry is far more emphatic than his disputed triumph over Al Gore four years ago. The difference may be only a percentage point or two, but this time his claim to have a mandate is unquestionable.

And with the election dominated by the twin themes of Iraq and terrorism, the world will be waiting to hear what this mandate means for the President's war on terror.

"The interesting thing is how Bush and his administration view that mandate," says Dr Stephen Hughes, specialist in international studies at Newcastle University. "Does it view it as a mandate to act unilaterally, or a mandate requiring a more multilateral approach?

"We don't know that until the figures come in, but I suspect that little is going to change in the world view of the Bush administration. We will see a continuation of the essentially unilateral approach to the war on terror."

If anything, the expected retirement of Secretary of State Colin Powell, the one committed multilateralist in the administration, will strengthen the position of the hawks, including Vice President Dick Cheney, and the White House's willingness to act outside of the United Nations

In Iraq, this may mean a sustained assault on the insurgent stronghold of Fallujah, but there is also the possibility of opening another front of the war on terror.

The President has promised to use diplomacy to address the nuclear programmes of Iran and North Korea, but both countries are seen as part of the "Axis of Evil" and Bush has also spoken of his desire to transform the Middle East and spread democracy, although presumably not to the United States' chief ally in the region, Saudi Arabia.

This could leave Tony Blair in an even more difficult position than the one he finds himself in as a result of the invasion of Iraq. The Prime Minister may have been coy over whether he prays with the President, but the relationship between the two men may present him with an uncomfortable dilemma.

Blair has put too much effort and invested too much political capital into what is seen at home as an unpopular relationship with Bush simply to abandon it now, but the alternative may be equally unpalatable, says Dr Hughes.

"Blair's argument is that if he's not going to talk to Bush then who is, and that the only way to deal with people like Bush is to talk to them, so he wants to be inside rather than outside like the other European leaders," he says.

"But Tony Blair has spent his political savings. We're in Iraq now, it was not a popular decision, we've had all the controversy over the evidence supporting his decision, and any extension of unilateral action beyond Iraq is going to have serious consequences for the Blair Government.

"I don't think now there is the political will or the political currency to follow the United States into any action beyond what is happening at the moment."

Indeed, while it was widely assumed that Blair was the only member of the Cabinet rooting for Bush, it may be that a Kerry victory would have suited him better.

A defeat for Bush may have allowed the Prime Minister to draw a line under Iraq, something he has been desperately trying, and failing, to do in the run-up to next year's election. As it is, he is likely to go unrewarded for unswerving subservience.

Blair's two objectives for his presidency of the G8 group of nations next year were to tackle global warming and the Middle East peace process. On both counts, Bush is likely to be unhelpful.

The President withdrew from the Kyoto Protocol to cut down on harmful emissions, and there is no sign this stance could change; and British diplomats have despaired at the lack of US engagement on Israel-Palestine, with the much-vaunted road map for peace largely ignored. In short, the Prime Minister's international ambitions appear to be in tatters.

Blair's only hope of salvaging something from this wreckage is that he could argue the Bush administration out of any military action against North Korea and Iran. If he is ignored, he risks being isolated abroad as well as at home.

A saving grace could be that Bush may now turn his attention to domestic issues, says Dr Thom Brooks, lecturer in political thought at Newcastle University. Extending his tax cuts may become a priority, along with opposition to abortion and gay marriage, which would be banned under a Constitutional amendment put forward by the born-again President.

"A lot of the states had referendums on gay marriage, and that hurt Kerry, because it reminded voters that Bush was against it," says Dr Brooks.

Along with the White House, the Republicans have not only retained both houses of Congress, the Senate and the House of Representatives, but have tightened their grips, with their scalps including the Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle, who lost his South Dakota seat.

But while this could give the neo-conservatives in the White House a confidence boost, it could also act as a rein on their excesses, with their influence now diluted by a larger pool. Indeed, Bush may come under pressure to concentrate on what is happening at home, where his record has been less than impressive.

A massive and widening budget deficit, and the worst record on jobs of any president since Herbert Hoover 70 years ago, will not convince many newly-elected Republicans that they stand a good chance of retaining their seats next time.

In this regard, Bush's strength may turn into a weakness. He may have just won the election, but the US Constitution prohibits him from standing again, a factor that will weigh heavily in the minds of other Republican politicians.

"He has got four more years but this is the last term of this president," says Dr Hughes. "If the excesses become too much, it will work against those very people who have been elected on the coat-tails of the global war on terror."

But it is a characteristic of second term presidents that they look towards their place in history, according to Dr Brooks. When Bill Clinton worried about how he would be perceived, he embarked on a massive expansion of federal protected land, largely in the last 48 hours of his presidency.

For George W Bush, whose presidency has been dominated by the war on terror, he may see a decisive victory in this sphere as a suitable epitaph.

"He will begin to get worried about what the rest of the world thinks about him. That is what presidents do," says Dr Brooks. "The question is, will he try to solve the war on terror? Is that going to be his big thing?"

The campaign over, George Bush will now settle back into his White House routine for the next four years. A fanatical exerciser, he will be on the mountain bike and doing his daily work-outs. A recent physical showed he had the resting heartbeat of an athlete at 45 beats per minute. The next four years will determine if he will set the world's pulse racing.