ALL ABOUT IRAQ

In a speech that offered a minimum of new ideas about governing, President George Bush clearly announced his agenda Tuesday as he faced a Democratic majority in Congress for the first time. Under these proposals and despite the talk of bipartisanship, the conflicts between his administration and Congress already are apparent.

Most notable in the State of the Union address was the president’s emphasis on the war in Iraq. This is understandable because of the U.S. commitment to it and the administration’s serious mistakes in carrying it out. The president Tuesday defended his call for a surge of more than 20,000 troops, but that number is less important than what it represents – expanded involvement in a war where progress is elusive, the goal is defined broadly, and victory, if it is to come at all, could be years away.

Just the day before, three more Republican senators – John Warner, Susan Collins, and Norm Coleman – urged the president to seek an alternative to the surge. They have joined Sens. Olympia Snowe and Chuck Hagel in opposition. Applause during the section of the president’s speech on the surge was thin. In the Democratic rebuttal, Sen. Jim Webb spoke to the urge of many Americans, according to polls, who would favor seeking a regional solution and a measured withdrawal from Iraq that causes the least carnage.

The president’s attention on those Americans lacking health insurance was welcome. His plans for equity for tax deductions, providing savings for those who get coverage through work and those that buy for themselves in the open market, look like simple fairness on their surface, but they create strong incentives to move many more people into the individual market, without the power of group negotiation. It would beef up health savings accounts and catastrophic coverage but do nothing to reduce the cost of insurance products.

A second part of his health plan would provide a federal subsidy to states that make private health insurance available to all their citizens. That too is fine in theory, but the only identified source of funding for this so far has been the Medicaid disproportionate share hospital payment, a crucial account to keep hospitals going and not one Congress is likely to touch.

The other major domestic topic for the president was energy, and it was encouraging to hear him advocate for higher corporate average fuel economy standards. The Senate has a tougher bill – sponsored by Sens. Snowe and Collins – that would provide an even more effective break from what President Bush calls the nation’s addiction to oil. He should support it.

As much as the president talked about domestic issues and some of his successful international aid programs, the topic for the day, as it is nearly every day in Washington, was Iraq. With little new to offer, the president seems to be angling for more time for the Iraqi government to meet its responsibilities and more time for his own administration to pass the problem to the next president. Congress seems in no mood to let that happen.