WASHINGTON — While praising the conciliatory tone of President Bush’s State of the Union address last night and a few of its specific proposals, members of Rhode Island’s Democratic congressional delegation reacted with hostility to his plan to send more troops to Iraq and skepticism toward most of his domestic program.

After Mr. Bush entreated the Congress to give his new Iraq plan “a chance to work,” Sen. Jack Reed answered, “He’s had 3½ years almost to make his plan work, but he has not provided the kind of leadership needed to secure the situation in Iraq.”

“Of course we wish it works for our troops’ sake and our country’s sake,” Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse said of Mr. Bush’s troop plan, among other initiatives. But the plan will confront “none of the fundamental problems” in Iraq, he said.

“I’m not sure there is anything we can do immediately to prevent it,” Whitehouse said of the addition of 21,500 troops to the more than 130,000 already in Iraq. But he said he is considering support for legislation to require a congressional vote of approval for such troop increases.

Rep. Patrick J. Kennedy reiterated his support for such a measure in the House and Rep. James R. Langevin said he may back it, providing he can assure himself that it is constitutional.

Reed said he continues to prefer a nonbinding Senate measure expressing disapproval of Mr. Bush’s plan and predicted that one will emerge today from the Senate Foreign Relations Committee with “significant bipartisan support” and pass the full Senate as early as next week.

As a practical matter, Reed said a tougher measure to force Mr. Bush’s hand would be less effective. It would probably not pass the Senate but would allow Mr. Bush to point to its failure as evidence that his opponents had fallen short, Reed said.

Kennedy termed Mr. Bush’s troop influx “a political plan” that will accomplish little. “I’d give it a chance if it were made in all seriousness, if it were a military plan,” but a serious military plan would require 100,000 more troops, Kennedy said.

“I disagree strongly” with Mr. Bush’s new initiative on the war, Langevin said. “We should be trying to get troops out of Iraq, not bringing more in.”

All four members of the local delegation expressed support for Mr. Bush’s plan to increase the size of the Marines and Army by 92,000 members. Reed noted tartly, however: “I proposed that three years ago with [Nebraska Republican Senator] Chuck Hagel. The irony is today it will be much harder” to recruit and pay for such an increase.

As to the tone of the speech, “The president struck one of his rare good notes when he opened up with his wonderful reference” to the historic role of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Whitehouse said after attending his first such address. But the moment came “late into an unsuccessful presidency,” Whitehouse said, “and the speech itself didn’t contain much of import.”

The Rhode Islanders generally dismissed Mr. Bush's health care initiative as ``nibbling around the edges'' of a major national problem, as Whitehouse put it.

Mr. Bush proposed a package to improve access to private health insurance, including a new standard tax deduction of $15,000 per family, a special tax break for the self-insurance of workers without access to family plans, and a program to subsidize state efforts to get private insurance for poorer people who don't qualify for Medicaid.

Reed said the package is ``not particularly beneficial for middle-income Americans'' because the new deduction would fall short of insurance costs.

Poorer people generally pay little or taxes, he said, so tax incentives won't be effective.

Kennedy called the program for the working poor because it would be financed by shifts from elsewhere in the Medicaid system.

``I'm glad be raised the issue of the uninsured,'' Langevin said, but ``this plan will not work. We need to get serious about establishing universal health care.'' Langevin has proposed universal health care legislation.

The delegation was more receptive toward Mr. Bush's energy initiatives, principally a call for a large increase in the production of ethanol and other alternative fuels, and the adoption for cars of fuel efficiency standards that have already been imposed on light trucks.

``Those are laudable objectives,'' Reed said, ``but the question is, can he make it happen, working with the congress?''

``He's actually starting to talk a pretty good game'' on energy issues -- six years into his administration, Whitehouse said of the President.

Fuel efficiency standards could have been increased years ago, said Kennedy, ``but I welcome the president's being an eleventh-hour convert.''

Langevin expressed worry that Mr. Bush's energy program, though commendable, would be ``long on rhetioric and short on action.''

Overall, Langevin said the speech ``touched on important points'' but was ``short on substance in finding common ground'' -- a key shortcoming in a president to whom the people ``spoke loud and clear'' during last years elections.

On immigration, members of the delegation expressed hope in Mr. Bush's proposal to resuscitate the immigration law overhaul that passed the Senate with bipartisan support last year but died in the House.

The tone of the speech was "not as strident as heard in past,'' from Mr. Bush, ``not as self congratulatory,'' said Reed. ``Maybe that's a signal that we can move ahead together on some of these issues.''

jmulligan@belo-dc.com