BRITAIN: They may be unable to effect a fundamental shift in US attitudes to climate change, but there are currently just two men making the political weather in Britain: Tony Blair and Gordon Brown.
And their partnership in the cause of debt forgiveness, the doubling of aid and trade justice for Africa would suggest that the G8 summit, in their terms at least, cannot result in failure.
Not that the prime minister's aides are taking anything for granted. Blair will certainly not proclaim the Gleneagles gathering a success until the final communiqué is published on Friday afternoon.
Prudent commentators also allow that Blair, again flying high on the international circuit, could find himself crash-landed by that point - not least if the truculence of French president Jacques Chirac is increased by a surprise London victory over Paris in the contest to stage the 2012 Olympics.
Blair will know the result of the Singapore vote as he arrives in Scotland at lunchtime today. It will be some hours before he has a first opportunity to gauge the mood of the late-arriving French president.
The British appetite for Olympic victory over the French has been fuelled by Chirac's reported comments about British cuisine, mad cows and haggis.
Some British officials may be secretly tempted by the notion that the greater world good might be served if Paris wins the vote. But with Blair reportedly boiling about the president's joking asides to Vladimir Putin and Gerhard Schröder, the Sun yesterday set the scene for a potentially bitter fallout.
And it would indeed seem incredible that a decision about the Olympics, no matter how hotly contested, could seriously impinge on the attitude of world leaders to an issue which captured the imagination of billions of viewers who watched Saturday's global Live8 concerts.
The French, moreover, appear happy to pay, at least in terms of aid and debt cancellation. We may be reasonably certain, however, that Blair will not be prepared to pay any attendant price in terms of isolating Bush over climate change and the Kyoto treaty.
While many might wish it otherwise, that is not how this prime minister conducts business with the White House. We can also rest assured Blair does not approach his relationship with Chirac on the basis - to borrow a phrase - of a "quid pro quo".
It was inevitable that Bush's depiction of his relationship with Blair in those terms would be interpreted as a warning that the prime minister could expect no special favours this week.
However, again much to the chagrin of many of his own supporters, this is precisely how Blair has previously cast "the special relationship", not least during the war when many expected him to press for a bigger British share of lucrative contracts for the rebuilding of Iraq.
Moreover, Bush was hardly springing a surprise on London by renewing his opposition to Kyoto.
On the contrary, the president's acknowledgment that climate change is "to some extent" a man-made problem is interpreted by some as evidence of tacit US support for Mr Blair's attempt to "leapfrog the theology" about the science and concentrate on "practical" outcomes.
On the big African issue - trade and, in particular, agricultural subsidies - Blair likewise has no difficulty with the president's suggestion that he will cut US farm subsidies if the EU is prepared to follow suit.
Blair and Brown apparently accept that the best that can be achieved now is "momentum" on the way to the UN summit and then the World Trade Organisation negotiations in December.
However, if remaining doubts are removed about the proposed doubling of aid by 2010, the combined debt/aid package should enable Blair and Brown to claim a powerful boost to what the chancellor has prudently reminded people will be the work of a lifetime, rather than a week in the life of the G8.
The obvious risk is that agreements already negotiated are discounted, and that Make Poverty History campaigners will give the thumbs-down to the final communiqué.
Bob Geldof joined others yesterday in suggesting that the desired deal was some way off - again warning of the risk of "grotesque failure".
However, if Geldof is now the people's tribune, Downing Street will be hoping the proper interpretation of his words means he will not end up pointing the accusing finger at Blair and Brown.
While acknowledging the potential for "great" decisions, he was reported as saying: "But I do not think they are anywhere near. Certainly the British negotiators are right up to the wire trying to get a deal done. But I am not sure the others want to do it."
If "the others" are deemed to fail, Blair and Brown will be sheltered by domestic political consensus and credited for risking so much in making Africa the priority of this G8 in the first place.