With President Bush at a low ebb in popularity, Republicans vying to succeed him are increasingly carving their own identities by distancing themselves from the party's leader for the last six tumultuous years.
For months, the GOP contenders -- and their Democratic counterparts -- have traveled the country in search of money, support and political IOUs, anticipating the most wide-open presidential nominating fight in decades.
On Thursday, the Republican race will gain new prominence when more than 1,500 GOP activists gather in Memphis, Tenn., for three days of politicking and speeches. A highlight will be appearances by several of the party's top presidential hopefuls, including Sen. John McCain of Arizona, an early front-runner for the Republican nod.
There will also be a straw poll of delegates to the Southern and Midwestern Leadership Conference, which is likely to draw wide notice as a test of strength and a gauge of early voter sentiments -- even if similar straw polls have proved meaningless in the past.
With the president termed out of office, Vice President Dick Cheney expected to retire and Florida Gov. Jeb Bush saying he will not run, there probably will be no one carrying the Bush banner into the 2008 campaign. That, along with increased debate over the president's policies, is likely to hasten the arrival of a new Republican era.
None of the candidates now showing interest is expected to flatly repudiate the president, or the overall thrust of his policies. Bush remains highly popular among the GOP rank and file, even as his overall poll ratings sag to the lowest level of his presidency. Still, differentiating themselves from the president is a vital step for White House contenders, observers said.
"You've got to have some distinctions," said Ken Khachigian, a longtime Republican strategist, who is not affiliated with any of the 2008 prospects. "Whether Bush leaves office on a big high or leaves in sort of the way he is now, slogging through a lot of battles, it doesn't matter.... It's the way the seasons work. A little change is good."
McCain, who fiercely contested the GOP nomination in 2000, has had a touch-and-go relationship with Bush since, differing on taxes, campaign finance, gay marriage and the use of torture in fighting terrorism.
But since 2004, when he embraced the president, McCain has been more accommodating -- to the point of being a rare defender of the deal to turn the operation of some U.S. ports over to a United Arab Emirates company.
