The president as usual is not exhausting himself. He is making most of the policymakers come to him under the guise of the World Economic Forum conference at Sharm el-Sheikh in Egypt. At Sharm, he can continue to imagine that all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds and that his Middle East policies have proven to be a great success.

The reality, of course, is very different. The half-hearted peace process he and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice concocted at Annapolis late last year has led to nothing and there is not the slightest reason to imagine that it ever will. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas have not even managed to agree on a joint statement. They certainly have not shown the slightest sign of being able to move on to any statement of joint principles. They refused even to meet together with Bush for any joint talks with him. Even Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton could always manage that.

Bush was reduced to going cap in hand to King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia in an unsuccessful plea to lower his country's oil prices. But Bush has given the Saudis no reason during his years of power to take any risks for him. King Abdullah warned Bush repeatedly and in vain not to invade Iraq, not to disband the old Iraqi army, and not to rapidly and massively empower the Shiite majority in Iraq and give them what amounted to absolute power in most of the country, as this would inexorably give Iran an open door into the heart of the world's biggest and best oil reserves. Bush did not listen, and is still reaping the consequences.

The Saudis also warned Bush and Rice and Under Secretary of State Paula Dobriansky not to rashly pursue their crash program in democracy-building throughout the region as this would only empower al-Qaida and the extreme revolutionary Islamists who supported it, and once again their good advice was ignored. It is a little late for Bush to seek their goodwill now.

We have commented before in these columns on the steady, apparently inexorable rise in power of Hezbollah and Hamas. The Hezbollah takeover of much of Beirut on Friday was a grimly appropriate prologue to Bush's visit. The Saudis may be able to do something to ameliorate conditions in southern Lebanon. Bush and his administration appear not to have a clue how to do so.

Bush's trip has been billed as his farewell to the Middle East, but he still has another eight months in power; ample time for more mayhem to ensue.