Iraq casts shadow on US election

Washington: Running out of time and influence, US President George W Bush faces a rough road in the twilight of his presidency regardless of which party wins control of Congress in Tuesday's elections.

Already a huge headache, the Iraq war hangs over Bush as the dominant issue for the remainder of his presidency.

Even before this year's elections, big-name Republican senators such as Virginia's John Warner to Texas' Kay Bailey Hutchison were questioning Bush's approach to Iraq, which this month will eclipse World War II in the length of US involvement.

The once-unshakable loyalty of congressional Republicans is weakening. After marching in lockstep with the White House for six years, Republican lawmakers are looking at the political calendar and thinking about their futures rather than Bush's legacy in his last two years in office.

Republicans are in a sour mood, scarred by corruption scandals, held in low esteem by voters and divided over issues from budget deficits to immigration policy.

Many of the party's candidates shunned Bush in their campaigns for Tuesday's elections, fearing the association would hurt rather than help them.

Prohibited by the Constitution from serving more than two terms, Bush is what is called in American politics a ''lame duck.'' He is timeserving under term limits that will remove him from real political power at a definite time.

With the end of the congressional elections and the opening of the 2008 presidential race, Republicans as well as Democrats will be telling the country how they would do things differently from Bush.

If Democrats should take the House of Representatives or the Senate, Bush's problems would get worse.

Shut out of power for a dozen years and bitter at Bush for ignoring them, Democrats would demand a role in setting the nation's agenda and throw up roadblocks to the president's plans.

Pressuring Bush on Iraq, Democrats would have subpoena powers to investigate the president's conduct of the war and to demand accountability.

The White House also could get snarled in Democrats-run investigations of issues ranging from Vice President Dick Cheney's secret energy policy deliberations to White House links with Republican corruption scandals.