WASHINGTON - President Bush is flush with opportunity. He's riding high in the polls, his party controls both chambers of Congress, and his Democratic critics are struggling to find a coherent message.
Once Congress convenes next month, the president will throw his weight behind an ambitious agenda. His top priorities include reforming welfare, Medicare and Social Security, opening federal funding to religious groups, and carrying out new and deeper tax cuts.
Today in Philadelphia, Bush will give his first speech in months dedicated solely to domestic policy - a sign that he learned from the mistake of his father, who ignored issues at home as he waged a war abroad.
Yet Bush's bid to shape federal policy and lay the groundwork for re-election also carries political risk. Polls show that his domestic agenda is not as widely appealing as his foreign policy and his personal qualities are.
So each time Bush proposes a change to Medicare or Social Security, he could turn off voters. He also risks becoming too closely associated with conservative causes that are unpopular with moderate voters.
"Elections for president are won in the center," said George Edwards, a presidential scholar at Texas A&M; University. "So the more he can get what he wants without being out front on divisive issues, the better. He has got to manage the [conservatives] in his party so they don't define him, but also take care of some things the American people care about."
But conservatives, smelling opportunity, view the Republican grip on Congress and Bush's high approval ratings as their best shot in years to win passage of cherished ideas, such as abortion restrictions and tax relief more far-reaching than even Bush has sought.
"Bush now has the honeymoon he never had," said Stephen Moore of the conservative Club for Growth.
The president, Moore said, would be wise to brush aside Democratic charges that he favors tax relief for the rich and to embrace conservative programs while stressing that they benefit many Americans.
Bush put that strategy to effective use last year when he pushed through his $1.3 trillion tax cut, a pet issue for conservatives that the president cast as a boon for ordinary taxpayers.
"Bush can speak with a moderate voice but actually advance conservative ideas," Moore said. "He uses soothing, comforting rhetoric but has advanced a Reagan-ite agenda. The key is not to use in-your-face, Newt Gingrich rhetoric but to still advance the ball."
White House officials say Bush's dominant priorities in his second two years will be the war on terrorism - which, they argue, encompasses the confrontation with Iraq - and the economy.
Certainly, the health of the economy and the outcome and aftermath of a war could each alone, or together, decide Bush's fate in the 2004 election.
Still, aides say, he will lobby for bold action by Congress in other areas, too. And the Republicans' two-seat edge in the Senate, however slight, means his agenda stands an improved chance of passage.
"We are excited that we can get some of our unfinished business done in a timely manner," said Margaret Spellings, Bush's top domestic policy advisor.
At the top of his list is a tax-relief plan that Bush will frame as a stimulus for the sluggish economy. He will likely seek to accelerate some breaks in last year's tax cut and also add new ones. They include a cut in the taxes that investors and companies pay on corporate dividends.
Aides say Bush will also renew his effort to add a prescription drug benefit to Medicare. The idea is popular, though there is disagreement over how it should be done. Democrats favor having the government deliver the benefit. Republicans would have private companies do it.
In Philadelphia today, Bush will push for his plan to offer federal aid to religious groups that provide social services. A measure to enact that plan stalled in the Senate last year.
The bill focuses on encouraging donations to charities and on making federal money available to religious groups. Its passage would hand the president a personal victory.
Bush, aides say, will also press for reforms of the 1996 welfare overhaul. He has proposed stricter rules on how fast recipients must begin working. Democrats warn that the move would derail state programs that train people before they enter the work force.
Bush also plans to open a fresh debate on Social Security and his stance that younger workers should have the flexibility to invest a portion of their payroll taxes in stocks and bonds.
Democrats contend that this change would drain money from the program and leave workers' retirement vulnerable to the volatile stock market.
With all these priorities, Bush will raise expectations of achievement. A president does not want to run for re-election with few solid accomplishments to show - especially when his party controls Congress and he can't easily blame the opposition for failures.
Democrats will be happy to link Bush with the conservative leadership in Congress, whose backing for bills that benefit corporations, open sensitive lands to drilling and restrict abortions runs counter to many voters' priorities.
Many Bush critics concede that he is a deft communicator with a knack for painting issues in ways that make his positions sound widely appealing. Critics say they were disarmed, for example, when Bush, in campaigning for Republicans in the midterm elections, portrayed his Social Security plan as a way to give younger workers control over their retirement.
Looking for ammunition
Skeptics insist that once Bush or his Republican allies disclose details of how workers would invest their withholdings, they'll have the ammunition they need to warn voters about the perils of tampering with Social Security in that way.
"Really, if the White House or Republican leaders were to put a proposal together, it's the best thing that could happen to us," said Hans Reimer of the Campaign for America's Future, which favors reforming Social Security but opposes private investment accounts.
"The more they push the legislation and get specific about what they mean, the better off we'll be," Reimer said. "What was bad for us was the [midterm] elections, where there were no specific proposals. We need things they can't talk about effectively."
One battle that Democrats think they could win is over whether to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska to oil drilling, an option included in Bush's energy plan, which could be taken up next year.
Most Americans oppose opening the sensitive refuge. Democrats say Bush would be over-reaching - to their advantage - if he pushed the idea too hard.
At the same time, one Democratic aide in Congress, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Democrats fear that soaring oil prices - for example, in case of war in Iraq - could benefit Bush. He could then make the case that the United States must find more sources of oil at home.
"If there is some calamity that results in the price of oil going to 50 bucks a barrel, it could change things," the aide said.
This source said Democrats believe that they have the votes, at least for now, to bar drilling in the wildlife refuge.
Some Bush loyalists say his best strategy for re-election would be to lobby for a few issues that appeal to swing voters but to otherwise focus on the economy and foreign policy.
"You'll see four or five priorities aimed at 270 electoral votes," Tom Korologos, a longtime Republican lobbyist, said, referring to the number needed to win a presidential election. "We don't need some pie-in-the-sky litany of issues from him."
Some Bush critics, though, say they envision a president, brimming with confidence, who will aggressively expand his agenda. Already, for example, Bush has loosened Clean Air Act rules for old industrial plants - a move that would benefit polluting industries - without discussing it publicly.
Abortion a key topic
Among the top concerns of those critics is abortion. Kate Michelman, president of the National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action League (NARAL), said she expects Bush to make no speeches about abortion but to sign a handful of abortion-related bills moving in Congress if they reach his desk.
They include legislation to ban a late-term procedure that opponents call "partial-birth abortion," to toughen rules on out-of-state abortions and to limit hospitals from counseling patients about abortion.
She argued that the White House will likely "march steadily toward the goal of making abortion illegal with a series of low-visibility moves."
Spellings, Bush's domestic policy adviser, said abortion would not be among Bush's top priorities. But if Republicans in Congress fulfilled their pledge to pass a law, for instance, outlawing "partial-birth" abortions, the president, Spellings said, would back it.