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The view from the Oval Office on Jan. 20, 2009: A nation inrecession, a runaway federal budget deficit, spiraling national debt,two costly and frustrating wars, and the mastermind of the Sept. 11attacks still at large.
Oh, and nearly 50 million Americanslack health insurance, Medicare and Medicaid are eating a growing shareof the federal pie, and Social Security's bankruptcy looms just beyondthe horizon.
So why would anyone want this job?
It's not only today's enormous challenges that will confront the 44thpresident, but also the near-certainty that some still-unknown crisiswill erupt in the next four years.
"It's really the mostdifficult transition since Abraham Lincoln, to be honest with you,"said Paul Light, professor of public service at New York University andan expert in presidential transitions. "Lincoln, between the time hewas elected and inaugurated, witnessed seven states secede from theunion."
Given the urgency of the problems, there may be littletime for a honeymoon. And the difficulties are so numerous that thenext president will have to choose carefully which ones to tacklefirst.
"He is going to have to be very careful about thepriorities he sets," Light said. "You can't just keep throwingpriorities at Congress."
In the closing days of a historicelection campaign, the candidates themselves have framed the contest asa question of readiness to meet these tests.
"The nextadministration is going to be tested, regardless of who it is,"Democrat Barack Obama said recently. "The next administration is goingto inherit a whole host of really big problems."
Speakingrecently on Comedy Central's "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart," Obamatried to answer why he'd want the job at a time like this.
"I actually think this is the time to want to be president," hesaid. "If you went into public service thinking that you could have animpact, now is the time where you could have an impact. ... Every oncein a while you have these big challenges and big problems. It gives anopportunity for us to really move in a new direction."
Republican John McCain also has stressed the difficulties facing the incoming chief executive.
"We know that the next president is likely to inherit a significantrecession," he said. "It means that unemployment is going to be higher.There are going to be greater demands on social services. It means that... dealing with our short-term deficit and our long-term debt is goingto be more difficult."
Indeed, the nation's finances are at a critical point.
The Congressional Budget Office recently projected a $600 billionbudget deficit for the 2009 budget year -- and that was before Congressauthorized the Treasury to spend $700 billion on an economic bailout.
Unemployment is higher than it has stood in five years, with nearly750,000 jobs lost this year. The economy contracted in the lastquarter; if it does so again in October through December, the nationwill officially be in a recession.
The national debt hassurpassed $10 trillion, nearly twice where it stood at the start of theBush administration, and the cost of simply paying the interest on thatdebt next year, $260 billion, will be more than one-third of what willbe spent on national defense. Medicare will cost $414 billion andSocial Security $650 billion, leaving little room for any discretionarycutting of a $3 trillion-plus federal budget that both presidentialcandidates pledge to tame.
The $10 billion going each month towars in Iraq and Afghanistan might be better spent on urgent prioritiesat home, Obama says, but withdrawing U.S. forces from Iraq in the 16months after the election could be a hard promise to keep -- and thewidening conflict in Afghanistan, both candidates agree, demandsstepped-up U.S. engagement.
It seems clear that an economicstimulus plan will stand at the front of the line in the nextpresident's priorities, depending in part on what a lame-duck Congressis able to enact before Inauguration Day.
Norman Ornstein, ananalyst at the American Enterprise Institute, a Washington-based thinktank, is advising the Bush administration on the transfer of power, aproject he says the Bush White House is doing in earnest.
"Part of the motivation is the understanding that this is a wartimetransition, and understanding that it is a vulnerable time and madeeven more vulnerable by the financial meltdown," Ornstein says.
"There is an awful lot on the plate. Not to mention the unknowns."
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