Three years separate President George Bush's deeply moving address to the U.N. General Assembly in the aftermath of 9/11 and his annual speech in the same marble auditorium Tuesday, but there's a geological age between the two appearances. The first speech produced an outpouring of sympathy for a battered and shaken nation: this week's showed the extent of alienation between George Bush's America and the rest of the world.

Italian commentator Vittorio Zucconi, writing in La Repubblica, said we are experiencing a new ice age in international relations with the United States on one side and the rest of the international community on the other. He said Bush's speech was a classic example of the fatal flaw in his presidency, which is at once myopic and ideological and has inflicted devastating damage on the image of America.

The 191 heads of state, government leaders, and foreign ministers listened in stony silence and then gave the president a polite ovation lasting barely 20 seconds. When the president proposed a new U.N.-administered fund to help the advancement of democracy, the delegates sat on their hands. Even his warning to Israel to halt its daily humiliations of the Palestinians -- normally a crowd pleaser in the United Nations -- failed to get a reaction.

Several delegates said later that they liked the emphasis on promoting liberty and freedom in countries where neither exists, but were greatly disappointed by Bush's lack of candor, his refusal to admit that mistakes had been made in the management of the Iraqi occupation and by what Sen. Joe Biden of Delaware, the ranking Democratic member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, later called Bush's disconnect -- the ability to disregard what is really happening.

And what was really happening, included the slaying of two U.S. civilian hostages within 48 hours of each other -- one of them on the very day of the Bush speech -- and the senseless killing and mayhem that are the reality of daily life in Iraq.

Yet the president put an almost cheerful spin on the turmoil, forecasting success in stopping the violence and in sticking to the January deadline for national elections. The glib, simplistic level of the Iraq portion of his speech was almost insulting, considering his audience, remarked one Western diplomat who was present. The French newspaper Le Monde Wednesday quoted an African official as saying, (Bush) gives us lessons, but he doesn't apply them himself.

The fact that Bush's speech seemed more tailored to a U.S. audience in an election year than to the United Nations seemed obvious to all, but the extent of the freeze was defined prior to the president's speech by U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan's surprisingly tough, eloquent address opening the 59th session of the General Assembly. When Annan warned that the rule of law was at risk around the world, many members of his audience doubtless remembered that last week he had called the Iraq war illegal -- at least as far as the U.N. Security Council was concerned.

Annan's list of recent situations that violated the rule of law included the killing of children in the terrorist attack on the Russian school, the atrocities at Darfur, the violence in Iraq, and Iraqi prisoners disgracefuly abused-- a reference to the Abu Ghraib prison. Those who seek to bestow legitimacy must themselves embody it, and those who invoke international law must themselves submit to it, Annan said.

An applause meter would have gone haywire registering the standing ovation Annan received at the end of his remarks. It was a clear indication of where the delegates' sympathies were -- and where they were not. And not the only one. Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero's speech, including his defense of his decision to withdraw Spain's troops from the U.S.-led Iraq coaliton, was given another standing ovation.

One of the secretary general's aides said later that Annan did not have the Bush administration particularly in mind in his address, but was expressing a general concern. At the lunch following the speeches, the atmosphere was cordial, with Bush and Annan exchanging friendly toasts. Still observers pointed out that what Annan's audience heard counted more than what he may or may not have intended.

As for Bush's address, In normal times, a speech like that would have been applauded, remarked the African official to Le Monde. But in the new ice age, the references to freedom and liberty seemed to many to fall of deaf ears.

To melt the ice, Zucconi wrote in his article, largely echoing European sentiment, would take an American president who was credible and admired. He would be able to reconnect the lines of communication. Bush is not a man capable of doing it.