WASHINGTON — Taking a final turn in the spotlight before the nation begins a four-day celebration of its new leaders, President Bush on Thursday offered a defense of his widely unpopular administration, telling Americans that while they may have opposed some of his policies, "I hope you can agree that I was willing to make the tough decisions."
The nationally televised address marked Bush's last planned public appearance before Tuesday's swearing-in ceremony for Barack Obama, and it drew heavily on the powerful symbols of the office.
Speaking from the stately East Room of the White House, Bush presented a campaign-style collection of average Americans who he felt represented his achievements at home and abroad, including firefighters, volunteers, wounded soldiers and a former prison inmate who heads a faith-based organization.
"There are things I would do differently if given the chance," Bush said in the 13-minute address, carried live by every major television network. "Yet I have always acted with the best interests of our country in mind. I have followed my conscience and done what I thought was right."
Bush's speech came as the city around him began gearing up for a highly choreographed series of inaugural events celebrating Obama, starting Saturday, when the president-elect takes a whistle-stop train ride tracing the path of Abraham Lincoln from Philadelphia to Washington. Sunday features a star-studded concert at the Lincoln Memorial.
The culmination will be Tuesday's ceremony, for which more than 1 million onlookers are expected to brave subfreezing temperatures to cram the National Mall and watch the country's first African American president take the oath of office.
Bush, the occupant of the Oval Office for a few more days before returning to his home state of Texas, tried for the last time to focus the country's attention on what he considers his greatest accomplishments. Chief among them, he said, was that the nation had not suffered a terrorist attack since the Sept. 11, 2001, strikes on the World Trade Center and Pentagon.
The address capped a weeks-long effort to rehabilitate an image battered by economic turmoil, an unpopular war in Iraq and controversial spying, interrogation and anti-terrorism tactics.
Vice President Dick Cheney has made complementary comments in his own interviews in recent days, specifically warning that rolling back the administration's anti-terrorism programs, as Obama has pledged to do, would "put the nation at risk."
