War Casts Heavy Shadow on Lame-Duck President

Dec. 21, 2006 — -- President Bush has shown a renewed interest in engaging Democrats on Capitol Hill, but the president who vowed in 2004 to spend his political capital now appears low on currency.

A skeptical Democratic majority and the pre-eminence of the Iraq War are likely to make bipartisan cooperation difficult if not impossible.

Over the next year, the Bush administration is expected to face stern questions in Congress over the increasingly unpopular war. And with military commanders saying the war could stretch into the next decade, the issue is likely to preoccupy the administration throughout the lame-duck president's final two years in office, fuel critics who seek to replace him in 2008, and overshadow the rest of his agenda.

In a year-end news conference Wednesday, Bush promised to reach out to the Democrats who will control Congress beginning next month.

"I'm looking forward to working with them. You know, there's a lot of attitude here that says, Well, you lost the Congress. Therefore, you're not going to get anything done," Bush said. "I have an interest to get things done, and the Democrat leaders have an interest to get something done."

He urged critical historians to hold their pens.

"Look, everybody's trying to write the history of this administration even before it's over," Bush said. "I'm reading about George Washington still. My attitude is if they're still analyzing No. 1, [No.] 43 ought not to worry about it, and just do what he thinks is right, and make the tough choices necessary."

Democrats on the Hill appear especially critical of Bush's idea for a surge of 30,000 or more additional troops in Iraq.

"I don't think it's a real good idea," Rep. Ike Skelton, the ranking Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee who is expected to chair the panel beginning next month, said yesterday on PBS' "Jim Lehrer Newshour." "Adding to the patrols in the streets? Being more targets for the insurgency, for the sectarian militias? I'm just not sure what purpose they would serve."