Bush's second act: news analysis: can the president avoid the 'second-term jinx' as he pursues an ambitious, complicated, and risky agenda?

When George W. Bush raises his right hand at noon on January 20 and is sworn into office for a second term, he will begin to pursue a historic--and risky-agenda. It's an agenda far more ambitious and complicated than the one he arrived with in Washington four years ago.

He must win a war to remake Iraq, which has turned out to be a much harder, deadlier task than invading the country and overthrowing its dictator, Saddam Hussein. He has committed to a much broader effort to bring democracy to the rest of the Middle East, a task so huge it could take a generation and require not only suppressing the region's hatreds, but also finding a way to ease out the monarchies that have run places like Saudi Arabia as if they were a family business.

DOMESTIC PRIORITIES

At home, Bush promised during his campaign to overhaul the Social Security system, which is in danger of becoming insolvent as more and more people reach retirement age and qualify for benefits. He says he wants to simplify the complicated federal income tax system. And he proposes to do all this while dealing with a huge federal deficit that makes getting anything done that much harder.

But most important, he must avoid the troubles and scandals that have turned second terms into the Bermuda Triangle of the American presidency. "There are certain patterns that keep showing up in second terms in American history," says Thomas Mann, a scholar at the Brookings Institution in Washington who follows presidents and the problems they run into. "One is hubris--the tendency to believe that your own re-election vindicates everything you did in your first term, even your mistakes. It can lead you to exaggerate your power and overstate your legitimacy."

"The second is scandal," he says. "It's amazing how many second-term presidents have encountered scandal." It happened to President Clinton, who was impeached, and then acquitted by the Senate in 1999, for lying about his relationship with a young intern at the White House. Many experts say the scandal derailed his second term and distracted America when it should have been focusing on the threat of terrorism. It happened to President Reagan, whose administration got mired in the "Iran-contra" affair, which involved a complex, secret deal to send arms to rebels in Nicaragua.

EIGHTEEN-MONTH WINDOW

If Bush is going to make his mark in a second term, he knows he does not have much time. The Constitution says he will serve for four more years, but the reality is that little gets accomplished at the end of a second presidential term. "Eighteen months, maybe two years, that's all we've got," one of his closest aides said aboard Air Force One recently. "Then Washington is focused on the next presidential election, and you can feel the power slowly ebb away."

That helps to explain why Bush moved so quickly to replace many of the key members of his Cabinet--and to nominate some of his most trusted, loyal aides for jobs running the departments of government. He wants them in place by January 20 so that he can race out of the starting blocks as soon as his inaugural speech is finished.

Bush and his aides made little secret of the fact that they were relieved when Colin Powell decided to resign as Secretary of State. Powell, a former general, may have been popular at home and abroad, but in the White House he was considered the administration's most prominent dissident. He warned Bush and the world of what could go wrong in Iraq--telling the President about what he called "the Pottery Barn rule: You break it, you own it"--and he often complained that the President's tactics were worsening America's global image.

By the end of Bush's first term, it seemed as if many of Powell's prognoses proved true, but he was not the kind of team player the President likes to surround himself with. In his place, Bush nominated Condoleezza Rice, his National Security Adviser and one of his closest confidantes.

To help run the war on terror at home, he picked an old friend from Texas, Alberto Gonzales, to become the first Hispanic to serve as Attorney General. Another Texas aide, Margaret Spellings, will become Secretary of Education. She'll continue the job of setting new school performance standards, which have proved controversial.

But the biggest task ahead is clearly Iraq, where the daily bombings and attacks on American troops have made it impossible to stabilize and rebuild the country. Bush has committed to holding an election there on January 30--the first in modern Iraqi history--so that the country can vote on a parliament that will then draft a constitution. With the American death toll in Iraq at more than 1,250, Bush must try to keep support for the war effort at home, already lukewarm at best, from slipping away. "He's got a huge amount of his own prestige riding on the success of this vote," says political scientist Michael O'Hanlon.

'A DECISIVE BLOW TO TERROR'

Bush hopes the vote will also send a signal throughout the Middle East. Many wonder whether the region is capable of sustaining democracy, which is hardly a tradition in the Arab world. Bush responds that many people doubted that Germany and Japan could become democracies after World War II, or that the nations of Eastern Europe could develop into democracies after the Soviet Union disintegrated and no longer dominated them. "The success of liberty there," Bush said in November, "will be a decisive blow to the ideology of terror and a model to reformers and democrats throughout the region."

At home, despite the fact that Republicans control both houses of Congress and the White House, Bush's domestic agenda is hardly guaranteed smooth sailing. Some Democrats are already vowing to fight nominations to the Supreme Court they consider too conservative, should vacancies occur during Bush's term, as seems likely.

But Social Security may turn out to be Bush's biggest challenge, and the most politically explosive. Under the current pay-as-you-go system, a 17-year-old working at McDonald's sends 6.2 percent of his or her weekly earnings (and McDonald's sends another 6.2 percent) to the government in Social Security taxes (FICA, on paychecks), which are used to pay today's beneficiaries, mostly retirees.

But the system, started under President Franklin D. Roosevelt, is on its way to going broke because people are living far longer and more people are qualifying for benefits.

POLITICAL CAPITAL TO SPEND

Under Bush's proposal, workers would have the option of putting some of their FICA taxes into separate, private retirement accounts, and deciding how to invest that money on their own. They would then draw on these private accounts when they retire. But it would cost the government hundreds of billions, maybe even trillions, of dollars in the next decade, to replace the lost tax money in order to pay current beneficiaries.

Does Bush have the power to make all this happen in his second term? He certainly sounds confident. In his first press conference after his re-election, the President said his victory had earned him "political capital" to push through his agenda. "And I intend to spend it," he declared.

Are you generally optimistic
or pessimistic about the next
four years with George W.
Bush as President?

Optimistic     56%
Pessimistic    39%

In the next four years, do you
think George W. Bush's
presidency will bring different
groups of Americans
together, or do you think it
will divide them?

Bring       40%
together
Divide      48%
them,

Note: Table made from bar graph.

SOURCE: THE NEW YORK TIMES/CBS NEWS POLL
11/23/04

TEACHING OBJECTIVES

To help students understand President Bush's foreign policy goals and the domestic-policy goals he wishes to pursue in his second term. In addition, to help students understand the many difficulties the President could face in carrying out his programs, and the "second-term jinx" that often bedevils Presidents.

CRITICAL THINKING: The article identifies what might be Bush's biggest challenges over the next several years. Have students discuss their views of each and how they think the public may view each.

IRAQ: The article reports that Bush hopes that a transition to democracy in Iraq will further his goal of bringing democracy to the rest of the Middle East, an effort that could take a generation. Do students envision American troops still in the Middle East when they are 40 or 45 years old?

(U.S. troops are still in Germany and Japan 55 years after the end of World War II and in South Korea 52 years after a ceasefire there.)

* What must President Bush do to persuade Americans to continue their support for the war in Iraq? Have students discussed the war with their parents? If so, how many parents support the war and how many oppose it?

SOCIAL SECURITY: Students may not be tuned in to the debate. Remind them that even teen workers pay Social Security taxes.

VOTE: After students digest the pro and con argument on Bush's Social Security plan, take a vote. Do they favor the ability to invest on their own? (You might tell them that under the Bush plan, the government must borrow to pay current retirees and the loans must be paid back, perhaps with future taxes the students would pay.)

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

* Did Bush's victory give him the political capital he needs to push his programs through Congress?

* Presidents and the people around them are obviously intelligent, so why do you think the problem of "hubris" appears so often in Presidents' second terms?

WEB WATCH: www.whitehouse.gov /president/gwbbio.html is a brief White House biography of President Bush.

QUIZ 2

Bush's Second Act

1. The most costly and probably most challenging domestic program facing President Bush is

a restructuring Social Security.

b eliminating cost overruns on military contracts.

c enacting school.-violence-prevention initiatives.

d bringing American agriculture to world standards.

2. Brookings Institution scholar Thomas Mann identifies two problems that often plague second-term Presidents. One is scandal. Describe the second problem.--

3. Colin Powell's resignation as Secretary of State was not unwelcome inside the White House because he

a is a Democrat.

b should have warned the President against going to war in Iraq.

c he was a friend of one of the President's political. opponents.

d was considered a dissident in the administration.

4. Bush defends his plans for democracy in the Middle East, reminding critics that other dictatorships became democracies after World War II and the Cord War. Name two of these.

5. A presidential aide lamented that presidential power ebbs after about two years of a second term. What explanation did the aide give for this phenomenon? --

6. One of Bush's greatest foreign-policy challenges is trying to convince two countries not to build nuclear weapons. Which two countries?

a Japan and China.

b France and Germany.

c Iran and North Korea.

d Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

1. (a) restructuring Social Security. 2. believing your reelection vindicates everything you did in your first term. 3. (d) was considered a dissident in the administration. 4. Japan, Germany, countries of Eastern Europe. 5. people in Washington start to look toward the next election. 6. (c) Dan and North Korea.

David E. Sanger is White House correspondent for The New York Times.