Congress isn't waiting for Obama

[Plato]

Reporting from Washington -- More than two months before he is sworn in, Barack Obama already is facing a Congress busily asserting itself on the timing and details of the president-elect's agenda, including major issues like healthcare and economic policy.

Committee chairmen are unveiling legislation to expand health insurance coverage and curb global warming. Democratic leaders have called a lame-duck session next week to consider an auto industry bailout. And other economic stimulus measures may be enacted even before Obama is inaugurated

The activity is in part a measure of the pent-up demand among Democrats who have had little legislative power for more than a decade. Obama, by contrast, has been constrained in an awkward limbo by his assertion that the country has "only one president at a time."