Bush, Advisers to Discuss Iraq Strategy

12/26/2006

WASHINGTON (AP) - President Bush is leaving for a weeklong trip to his Texas ranch, where he and his advisers will rethink U.S. involvement in Iraq. The president also will work on an upcoming speech outlining what he says will be a new way forward in the war.

The White House said the president, saddled with low approval ratings for his handling of Iraq, will be consulting, not making final decisions, at the National Security Council meeting on Thursday at his ranch in Crawford. He is expected to deliver a speech on Iraq sometime before the State of the Union address on Jan. 23.

He and first lady Laura Bush were to leave Washington on Tuesday morning, returning Jan. 1.

Bush spent the Christmas holiday with his family at the Camp David presidential retreat in Maryland.