US: When George W Bush stood in front of St Louis Cathedral in New Orleans on Thursday evening, he promised to rebuild the city and to help hundreds of thousands of evacuees to put their lives back together.
Mr Bush's speech had another purpose, however - to restore his authority as a strong leader capable of uniting the American people in a time of crisis.
Almost three weeks after Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf coast, the president is still struggling to convince Americans that he is in full command of the crisis.
The initiatives he proposed on Thursday are useful - immediate financial help for unemployed evacuees, subsidies and tax breaks to attract business to New Orleans and its surroundings, and free sites for returning evacuees to build new houses.
They may not be sufficient, however, to restore public confidence in a president most Americans now regard as failing in his leadership role.
A Wall Street Journal opinion poll yesterday showed that Mr Bush is now more unpopular than at any time in his presidency, with more than half of those questioned saying they disapprove of the way he is doing his job.
Other polls show that, even on security and strong leadership - Mr Bush's traditional strengths - he is losing popular support.
The president now faces two major commitments - the occupation of Iraq and the rebuilding of New Orleans - which are not only expensive but are largely beyond his control.
In Iraq, success depends largely on co-operation between Shias, Sunnis and Kurds; in New Orleans, much will depend on the performance of the city's mayor Ray Nagin and Louisiana's inexperienced governor, Kathleen Blanco, who is a Democrat.
Hurricane Katrina has already cost the federal government more than $50 billion (€41 billion) and the final cost is likely to exceed the $200 billion spent on invading and occupying Iraq.
The government deficit is now expected to be much higher than the $333 billion predicted for the year ending 30 September.
Some Republicans, led by Oklahoma Senator Tom Coburn, want the cost of rebuilding New Orleans to be offset by federal spending cuts elsewhere.
Former president Bill Clinton yesterday called for a reversal of Mr Bush's tax cuts for the richest Americans but such a move would almost certainly be an ideological bridge too far for the administration.
For the first time since he took office, Mr Bush has become a political liability to his own party and Republicans facing re-election next year are already starting to tiptoe away from association with him.
In Thursday's speech, the president was careful to massage his political base, referring warmly to the relief work of faith-based groups and stressing the central rose of private enterprise in rebuilding New Orleans.
Mr Bush's small government ideology and aggressive nationalism seem out of place, however, in the aftermath of the hurricane.
For many Americans, the problem in New Orleans was not too much government but too little, leaving those without private resources stranded in the rising floodwaters.
The challenges ahead involve public health, education and the housing of hundreds of thousands of people who have no money to buy their own homes.
Above all, there is no external enemy, no Other, for Mr Bush to unite the nation against.
Indeed, the most dramatic political change effected by Hurricane Katrina has been the return of race and class to the centre of political debate in America.
Seventy per cent of African-Americans believe that the slow federal response to the disaster was racially motivated, a view shared by only a tiny minority of whites.
The pictures from New Orleans reminded those Americans who live in suburban isolation that they share their country with millions of desperately poor people, many of whom are black.
Mr Bush acknowledged the problem in Thursday's speech but did not say what he was planning to do about it.
The president's troubles ought to provide Democrats with an opportunity to seize the political initiative but the party has shown no sign so far of rising to the challenge.
Democratic leaders were quick to blame Mr Bush for the slow federal response to the hurricane and calling for an independent inquiry into what went wrong.
For the most part, Democrats' complaints have sounded like political point-scoring and no opposition politician has yet found a voice that chimes with the somber, new mood in America.