Bush faces final State of the Union

WASHINGTON (AFP) — US President George W. Bush delivers his final State of the Union speech Monday, its agenda-setting powers diluted by pressing, unfinished business abroad and the fight to succeed him at home.

With not quite 12 months left in his term, the deeply unpopular president is slated to revive a few bold ideas -- like his May 2007 call to double US funding to battle AIDS -- and argue that US-led forces are winning in Iraq.

But he faces a US economy in crisis; the uncertain fate of his suddenly personal, late-game Middle East peace drive; a struggle over ending North Korea's nuclear programs; and tensions with Iran over its atomic ambitions.

"I will report that over the last seven years, we've made great progress on important issues at home and abroad. I will also report that we have unfinished business before us, and we must work together," he said Saturday.

He will urge lawmakers to approve a proposed US economic stimulus package hoped-for by mid-February; make permanent his giant tax cuts, which expire in 2010; and approve free trade pacts with Colombia, Panama, and South Korea.

Bush is also expected to call on the US Congress to renew his signature education reform law, approve a controversial law allowing warrantless spying on US citizens, and curb its appetite for costly pet projects.

Bush told the USA Today newspaper in an interview Thursday that he would would not wax sentimental over his time in office, partly because "we've got so much going on" that there is little time to dwell on the past.

"Look at the world -- you've got Iraq, Iran, Middle Eastern peace opportunities, North Korea, Sudan, Burma. This is a world that is full of opportunities to spread freedom and hope and opportunity," he said.

But spokeswoman Dana Perino acknowledged a day later that "it is unrealistic" to expect lawmakers to bring Bush's calls for overhauling immigration policy and pension programs back from the dead.

The speech comes not quite three months after the president helped revive Middle East peace talks, and about three weeks after he visited the region in hopes of promoting an agreement to create a Palestinian state by late 2008.

For years, Bush has battled charges of keeping the peace process at arm's length by saying he was the first sitting US president to call for such a state -- but aides say he wants to be able to point to more than words before his term runs out.

Bush, whose time in office was shaped by the September 11, 2001 attacks by Osama bin Laden's Al-Qaeda network, is unlikely to address the fact that the terrorist mastermind he vowed to capture "dead or alive" is still at large.

And six years after Bush used the same forum to declare Iran, North Korea, and Saddam Hussein's Iraq an "axis of evil," all three countries are still source of major headaches.

In Iraq, Bush's decision to "surge" roughly 30,000 more US troops to the front lines has helped tamp violence down to roughly 2005 levels, but has failed to achieve the policy's two major goals: Political reconciliation and Iraqi security forces taking responsibility for their country by November 2007.

Democrats opposed to the war have watched with alarm as the White House has declared plans to seal a long-term strategic relationship with Iraq by July -- well before the November elections that will decide Bush's successor.

North Korea missed a December 31 deadline to fully disclose its nuclear activities, forcing the White House to quell an unprecedented public insurrection against Bush's diplomatic approach.

US officials worry that Pyongyang may be looking to run out the clock before Bush's successor takes over in January 2009, gambling that the new president will offer the Stalinist state a better deal.

And Iran has continued to resist UN sanctions and global pressure to end uranium enrichment, while Washington has struggled to keep diplomatic partners, especially China and Russia, on board with its confrontational approach.

Bush is expected to travel extensively overseas in 2008, notably next month when he spotlights his anti-AIDS strategy with a trip to Benin, Tanzania, Rwanda, Ghana, and Liberia.
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