President Bush goes before Congress and the American people tomorrow to deliver his State of the Union message in perhaps the weakest political position of his presidency.

With three more years to go in his tenure — Democrats cringe just thinking about it — only 43 percent of Americans approve of the job he is doing, according to a Jan. 20-22 USA Today-CNN-Gallup Poll.

When you break that down by party, it is clear that Bush is only prevented from falling below that mark by the loyal support of his fellow Republicans, who give him 87 percent approval.

Democrats, who find little to like in his management, give him just 13 percent approval.

And independents, people whose opinions generally are governed by the news and their overall impressions of how things are going, rather than party loyalty or ideology, give Bush 29 percent approval.

And it is independents who swing elections.

So with control of Congress at stake in this November's election, majority Republicans, with a weakened leader, have reason to worry. That's part of the reason why this State of the Union message is so important to Bush.

Stephen Hess, a Brookings Institution presidential scholar and professor at George Washington University, says it is a chance for Bush to not only bolster the sagging spirits of congressional Republicans, but also assure the American people that he has plans for solving key problems and is still on top of things.

"His poll numbers suggest that people have a lot of doubts," he said.

Two-thirds of those polled by USA Today said things have gotten worse in the country over the past five years.

And when asked what specifically has gotten worse, 26 percent cited the war in Iraq. But 49 percent cited economic issues, including unemployment, high energy prices and inflation. Five percent said health insurance.

To be sure, Bush will address all of these issues in tomorrow's speech, and some others, too.

For example, he will get a chance to tell as many as 50 million Americans watching television why he approved, and continues to employ, a controversial program to eavesdrop, without a court order, on international calls made into or out of the United States by suspected terrorists.

"As I stand here right now, I can tell the American people the program is legal; it's designed to protect civil liberties; and it's necessary," Bush said last Thursday in a news conference.

Underscoring how critical the State of the Union speech is seen to Bush's fortunes this year, the president's advisers have tried to keep the president in the media and public eye in the week leading up to it. Besides holding a rare news conference, he also made a series of speeches on critical topics such as domestic surveillance and Iraq in the Washington area and in Kansas.

In Kansas, Bush even reverted to an old campaign technique that worked well for him in 2004 when he ran for re-election. He took unscreened questions from the audience for nearly an hour.

Clearly, Bush has much at stake. What can he do to turn things around? His options are limited.

Success in Iraq depends less on what Bush says than on what happens on the ground there.

He has no magic wand to wave that will lower energy and gasoline prices.

Saying he will spend more money on this or that program in education or healthcare or housing is likely to be met by Democratic criticism that it isn't enough, and that they would spend more.

In the end, Americans will be moved not by the detail of what he says, but how he says it. What Bush has to do is convince most people tuning in that he is not only still in charge and unbowed by the problems he faces, but also working steadily to solve them on behalf of the American people.

Like Bill Clinton convinced most Americans in his 1998 State of the Union speech that he was still in control, despite the then-exploding Monica Lewinsky scandal, Bush's task is similar. It is an opportunity he must seize, or face another rough year.

Richard Benedetto is a national political correspondent for Gannett News Service.