President Bush's Final Foreign Farewell

Bush Soon Will Yield to Obama

President George W. Bush, center, stands on the podium, surrounded by Thailand's Prime Minister...

President George W. Bush, center, stands on the podium, surrounded by Thailand's Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat, background left, South Korea's President Lee Myung-bak, foreground left, Philippines' President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo and Vietnam's President Nguyen Minh Triet, right, after the official group photo of 16th summit of the Asian Pacific Economic Cooperation, APEC, in Lima, Peru, Sunday, Nov. 23, 2008.

(Lawrence Jackson/AP Photo )

James Baker, the former secretary of state and secretary of the treasury, is pushing for some joint action now to stop the financial bleeding.

"Nothing would do more to create confidence and eliminate the fear and anxiety that's out there, particularly in financial markets, than to see the incoming president and the outgoing president get together on some sort of a proposal or a program," Baker said on NBC's "Meet the Press."

All the APEC nations are also considering more infrastructure spending back home, but for Bush that's not an option. The next budget will be in a new president's hands.

On two occasions in Lima, he publicly joked about his upcoming "forced retirement."

Bush spent much of the summit on the sidelines, saying his goodbyes. But he also set the stage for his successor, meeting with Presidents Hu Jintao of China and Russia's Dmitry Medvedev -- two world leaders who will be key players in a Barack Obama presidency.

Summits for 2009 are already scheduled. President-elect Obama will have a scant few months in office before his first foreign travel, likely to Europe in early April. By then, he and many economists believe the financial crisis will be even worse.