If the hot-tempered Senator John McCain of Arizona becomes the next president of the United States, his White House staff and the world had better look out.
First, however, he has to win the Republican nomination and then beat Vice-President Al Gore or former Senator Bill Bradley in the election next November.
Just a few months ago, McCain was seen as an also-ran against Governor George W. Bush for the Republican nomination. But Bush, even with his $65 million war chest, now has a serious fight on his hands in the country's first primary in New Hampshire. McCain has cut Bush's once huge opinion poll lead in the granite state and the two men are now neck and neck.
A McCain win in New Hampshire next February would be humiliating for Bush, who has been regarded as unstoppable, but would not necessarily be fatal. Bush is still well ahead of McCain in national polls but is seen as a lightweight in foreign policy who is over-dependent on advisers.
For McCain, the former navy pilot who was shot down over North Vietmam in 1967, a win in New Hampshire would be the perfect take-off for his campaign for the White House.
With his war hero background and courageous positions on electoral finance reform and against the tobacco lobby, McCain is generating an excitement about his campaign which has the hardboiled media in an admiring swoon. Even the stories about his legendary temper have made the 63-year-old candidate more interesting.
Unlike Bush, whose aides carefully screen media access, McCain talks incessantly to reporters and on the record. In bantering exchanges on his campaign bus he calls them "jerks" and "bastards", while they warn him when his comments on other politicians and off-colour jokes go too far. They love him.
Badly injured when ejecting from his A-4 Skyhawk, he then spent five years in prison in Hanoi, where he was tortured, starved and almost died from his untreated wounds. When his captors learned that he was the son of the admiral in command of the naval force in south-east Asia, they offered to release him as part of an exchange but he refused because other US prisoners had been in captivity longer.
He came home five years later a cripple and even today he cannot raise his arms above his head. This is the kind of hero that many in a disillusioned America long for and who makes other politicians seem colourless.
Yet in many ways he is even more conservative than Barry Goldwater, whose Senate seat he won when that arch-conservative retired in 1986. McCain, who claims Scottish ancestry, has an anti-gay record, opposes stricter gun controls, is anti-abortion and lobbies vigorously for the death penalty and against environmental regulations. And yet for the mainly liberal media, he seems to walk on water.
He treated his first wife badly by running about with other women when he returned from captivity. She had been badly injured in a car accident but kept it from him when in prison. He freely admits his bad behaviour and is now remarried to the heiress of a beer company. She has had to be treated for addiction to pain-killers following surgery.
McCain has angered fellow Republicans in Congress by backing proposals to end abuses in campaign finance. He also wants stricter anti-smoking laws, unlike many Republicans who receive large funding from tobacco companies.
Some of his fellow senators are accused of starting a "whispering campaign" suggesting that he is unfit to be president because the trauma he suffered as a prisoner of war made him "cuckoo" or "unstable". The leading newspaper in his own state of Arizona has questioned whether he "has the temperament and the political approach and skills we want in the next president of the United States".
McCain replied by releasing 1,500 pages of his medical records cataloguing his numerous broken bones, skin cancers and even "herpetic lesions" on his genitals but also confirming that there is no sign of a psychological disorder. The doctors refer to his emotional excitability, but his IQ of 133 would make him among the more intelligent of presidents.
McCain disarms criticism by making jokes about his temper. Voters do not seem put off by the idea of a president who can make his underlings hop. President Clinton is noted for his temper and Eisenhower could also fly off the handle.
It is clear that the Republican establishment sees Governor Bush as its best hope to win back the White House which his father lost to Bill Clinton in 1992. Until recently John McCain was not seen as a serious contender for the Republican nomination but his gutsy campaigning and Vietnam war record are making Bush appear bland.
McCain campaigns for a stronger military, lower taxes, more independence for local schools and the safeguarding of social security. Bush is saying much the same, so personality will be a big factor when voters decide.
The betting is still on Bush winning the nomination and the polls show him beating Gore or Bradley next November. McCain has ruled out joining a Bush ticket as a vice-presidential candidate but he would consider serving in his Cabinet as a secretary of state or of defence.