Bush Faces Tough Times
Recently, President Bush has had some high-profile failures.
July 7, 2007 — -- The week has been a long and difficult one for President George W. Bush. From the uproar over his decision to commute Scooter Libby's sentence to new criticism over the war, he has faced increased pressure from friends and foes.
Another Republican Senator defected on Iraq.
"I am calling for a new strategy that will move our troops out of combat and on the path to continuing home," said Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M.
A week earlier, his last major domestic imitative, immigration reform, died in the Senate.
"A lot of us worked hard to see if we couldn't find a common ground. It didn't work," Bush said.
With only 18 months left in his tenure, not much has worked for the president lately, and it may not get any better.
"There is a sense that this president has nowhere to go but further down," said Brookings Institution senior fellow Thomas Mann.
Republican pollster David Winston said Bush clearly is thinking about his legacy and he is not in the place he thought he would be in his seventh year.
"His legacy is now tied inextricably to Iraq," Winston said.
And congressional Democrats have promised to turn up the heat again when they return next week.
"We have many arrows in our quiver," said House speaker Nancy Pelosi. "We are sharpening them, including taking a bill to the floor in July to authorize the redeployment of troops out of Iraq."
Facing critics on the left and right, President Bush hopes history will prove kinder.
"He's someone who got defined by events, big events," Winston said. "Katrina was a huge deal. 9/11 was obviously an overwhelming deal."
Even his 61st birthday Friday, which he celebrated quietly at Camp David, couldn't provide much distraction.
It is a striking decline for a president who once flaunted his political capital and promised to change the tone in Washington.
So far, Democrats have been unsuccessful in their attempts to set a deadline for troop withdrawal. But with three more Republican senators coming out against the president's Iraq policy in just the past two weeks, Democrats are getting closer to the 60 votes they need to override a presidential veto.