Newly re-elected US President George W. Bush will today sit down with his Cabinet for their first such meeting since August 2nd.
He will have to deal with an inevitable rash of Cabinet departures, likely to include Secretary of State Mr Colin Powell, national security adviser Ms Condoleezza Rice, Homeland Security Secretary Mr Tom Ridge, and Health and Human Services Secretary Mr Tommy Thompson.
In a quietly jubilant victory speech yesterday that came a full 21 hours after the polls closed, Mr Bush outlined the goals he planned to start work on immediately and pursue in the next four years, a period he termed "a season of hope."
He pledged to keep up the fight against terrorism, press for stable democracies in Iraq and Afghanistan, simplify the tax code, allow younger workers to invest some of their Social Security withholdings in the stock market, raise accountability standards in public schools and "uphold our deepest values and family and faith".
Other items include reforms to the nation's intelligence community, halving the record $413 billion deficit, expanding health care coverage, a constitutional ban on gay marriage and moving "this good-hearted nation toward a culture of life".
Mr Bush said: "Reaching these goals will require the broad support of Americans," as he asked Senator John Kerry's disappointed supporters to back him. Many of his proposals are anathema the opponents of his re-election.
"I will work to earn it. I will do all I can do to deserve your trust," he said. "When we come together and work together, there is no limit to the greatness of America."
Even before the election, aides started work on a new budget, and the administration is preparing to ask Congress for up to $75 billion more to finance the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and operations against terrorism.