WASHINGTON, February 1, 2006 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - President George W. Bush's once bold agenda has given way to harsher realities and a more cautious tone after a year of setbacks and declining poll numbers, US media said Wednesday, February 1.

Bush's annual State of the Union speech Tuesday, January 31, revealed a weakened president shying away from the aggressive stance he adopted in years past, according to US analysts and observers.

"He sound more subdued than triumphant, more realistic than grandiose," the Washington Post wrote in an editorial.

The newspaper said that "his caution was not merely a contrast to the swashbuckling style of the past but an outgrowth of it."

Large tax cuts, an expensive prescription drug benefit and the troubled, costly US occupation of Iraq have "narrowed the president's options," the Post wrote.

Bush declared "the state of our union is strong and together we will make it stronger." But Democrats said Bush was living in a fantasyland.

"It just wasn't credible to hear him talk about making America more secure and honoring our troops or making America energy independent or making health care more affordable without hearing him explain why he's done just the opposite for the last five years," said Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev.

"Our country is ready for change and a new direction," Democratic Party head Howard Dean said.

"It was not a speech of surprises," said Hess.

Analysts further say that Bush gave no ground in promoting an aggressive US foreign policy, but his State of the Union speech spotlighted US problems overseas more than successes.

"It was not a speech of surprises," Stephen Hess, political analyst with the Washington-based Brookings Institution, told AFP.

The US leader who went before Congress Tuesday was not the same politician who took the podium a year ago flush from his convincing re-election victory for a second four-year term, he added.

Bush's popularity ratings were then above 50 percent and he was riding the crest of his global campaign to wipe out tyranny. Now his ratings barely make 40 percent, with 60 percent of Americans opposed to his policies in Iraq.

A year ago Bush was speaking about a "new phase" in Iraqi operations, transferring more responsibility to the Iraqis. On Tuesday he had little more to report and again ruled out a timetable for the withdrawal of US troops.

Rejecting calls for the withdrawal of troops from Iraq, Bush said, "There is no peace in retreat." He also slapped at those who complain he took the country to war on the erroneous grounds that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction.

"Hindsight alone is not wisdom," Bush said. "And second-guessing is not a strategy."

On Middle East democracy, Bush prodded allies Egypt and Saudi Arabia to speed reforms, the same countries he singled out in his speech to Congress last February.

The only new element in his address Tuesday was a new worry -- the victory by the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas in last week's Palestinian elections.

Bush also had no real progress to report in persuading Iran to renounce its suspected ambitions to build a nuclear bomb. So like last year he made a direct appeal to the Iranian people to rise up against their rulers.

North Korea rated only a fleeting reference as one of five countries, along with Syria, Burma, Zimbabwe and Iran, that represented what Bush called "the other half" of a mostly democratic world.

"Our country is ready for change and a new direction," Dean said.

Other pundits and editorial writers focused on Bush's call to end America's dependence on foreign oil, agreeing with his premise but questioning his proposed solution.

In Tuesday's speech, the president, hampered by big budget deficits, offered a modest program. He declared that America must break its long dependence on Mideast oil.

"America is addicted to oil, which is often imported from unstable parts of the world," Bush said.

Referring to Bush's vow to replace 75 percent of oil imports from the Middle East by 2025, the Post said the "deadline is far off, and it's not clear what he intends in practice."

Promoting research into alternative fuels was not enough, the paper said, urging instead a tax on hydrocarbons to allow for a more competitive energy market.

Yet even some of Bush's critics were pleasantly surprised that a former oil man would be willing to push for alternative energy sources.

"For a president who came from the oil business and who still has many friends and backers in the industry, putting this initiative at the top of his agenda took some guts," wrote John Dickerson at the website Slate.

The New York Times said that the two minutes and 15 seconds of Bush's speech devoted to energy independence offered a "grand" goal but lackluster solutions.

"Last night's remarks were woefully insufficient," the paper wrote in an editorial.

"The country's future economic and national security will depend on whether Americans can control their enormous appetite for fossil fuels ... It is the key to everything else."

The Wall Street Journal, a strong advocate of the president's policies, welcomed Bush's call to reform how small business employees can buy health insurance, saying it could help Bush's Republican allies in legislative elections in November.