President Bush speaks in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington. Bush digs in on the war and other issues

President Bush is set to veto the $124 billion wartime funding bill this week in a bitter dispute with Congress over the direction of the war in Iraq – a veto that appears part of an emerging White House strategy to hold a tough line against Democrats on a number of issues, not just the war.

In recent weeks, the embattled president has also refused to fire or force the resignation of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales over his role in the sacking of eight U.S. attorneys last year. Bush has also ruled out allowing House and Senate Democrats to publicly question White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove and other top aides about their involvement in the firings. And the Justice Department has declined to turn over some documents sought by congressional investigators,


White House lawyers have also played tough in response to a congressional investigation of Republican National Committee e-mail accounts used by dozens of White House aides, telling two House committees that it wants the RNC to turn over any documents from those accounts first to the White House counsel’s office, suggesting that an executive-privilege claim may be invoked.

Additionally, Bush infuriated Senate Democrats by using a recess appointment early this month to install Republican fundraiser Sam Fox as the ambassador to Belgium. Fox helped fund the “Swift Boats” ads against Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) during the 2004 presidential campaign. Bush had actually withdrawn Fox’s nomination before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee voted on it, further fueling Democratic ire once the recess appointment was made public.

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On his signature education issue, Bush is a refusing as well to consider major changes to the 2002 "No Child Left Behind" law as Congress debates it reauthorization. While there is bipartisan congressional support for some changes, Bush has warned that he will not accept any proposal, that in his view, weakens the law.

The White House notes, however, the administration has reached out to Democratic congressional leaders on two other major issues – energy and immigration – and are hopeful that agreements can eventually be forged.

On Iraq, though, the White House has signaled that there is very little room to negotiate with Democratic leaders on additional funding for the war. Bush has refused to even consider setting a withdrawal deadline, or non-binding “goal,” for pulling U.S. troops out of Iraq. Rather, Bush wants a "clean" bill that places no restrictions on his ability to conduct the war.

The administration is now rejecting any formal connection between “benchmarks” for measuring the political, economic and security progress made by the government of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Malaki and continued U.S. involvement in Iraq.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Sunday that any linkage between benchmarks and continued U.S. funding for the war or a withdrawal timetable, was unacceptable, potentially cutting off one area where agreement could be reached with Democratic opponents of the war.

''That's the problem with having so-called consequences,'' Rice said on ABC’s “This Week.”

''To begin now to tie our own hands -- and to say 'We must do this if they don't do that,' ” she said, “doesn't allow us the flexibility and creativity that we need to move this forward.”

Rice also indicated she was not going to respond to a subpoena from House Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), who is investigating 2003 claims that Saddam Hussein had sought uranium from Niger. Rice said she has answered Waxman’s requests for information on the matter in previous letters to him and had addressed it when she was confirmed two years ago.

“This is a White House issue, and I was national security adviser,” Rice said on CBS’ “Face the Nation,” referring to her job in the first Bush term. “That means I was at the time an adviser to the president, and there's a constitutional issue here that the White House will have to handle.”

In his remarks on the war lately, Vice President Dick Cheney has been even harsher, calling Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) “uninformed” and his declaration that the war is lost “unfortunate and misleading.”

While the tough rhetoric and repeated veto threats are not in itself a sign that compromise with Democrats is unachievable, Bush’s combative posture in recent weeks has not gone unnoticed on Capitol Hill by either party.

“This is a clearly a sign that Bush is reacting to conservatives who think the White House has had a ‘kick me’ sign on its back” since the Democrats’ victory in the November elections, said a Senate GOP leadership aide.

The aide pointed to an April 9 article by conservative columnist William Kristol in The Weekly Standard, which first used the “kick me” reference, as a rallying point for conservatives, who in turn urged the White House to be more combative in its relationship with congressional Democrats.

“Democrats have been in an ‘investigate-and-attack mode,’ and the White House is reacting to that,” the aide suggested.

Democrats, however, believe that Bush’s actions demonstrate the White House is in a full defensive mode and incapable of addressing the problems facing the country, including the war. Democrats have openly begun to use a “bunker” analogy to describe Bush’s view of the world, including Capitol Hill. Reid himself compared Bush to former President Richard Nixon, saying that Bush is acting like Nixon did during the height of the Watergate crisis.

“This just shows how isolated the president and his White House are on every major issue,” said Reid’s spokesman, Jim Manley. “They are increasingly out of touch with the American people on every important issue.”

White House officials, however, believe that Bush has sought compromise with Democrats, citing several areas where they say he has reached out, only to find Democrats unwilling to negotiate or reach agreement with him.

“First of all, the Democrats don't have the votes to override the president's veto (of the wartime funding bill), so why should the burden be on him initially to compromise?” said Deputy White House Press Secretary Dana Perino. “Plus, it was the president who reached out to the leadership to invite them down [to the White House] 10 days ago and again for this coming Wednesday. So, there will be progress, the money will get to the troops, and that will be because the elected leaders of this country are going to make it so.”

Perino was referring to Wednesday's White House meeting between Reid, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), and senior GOP lawmakers, which will be the second time in two weeks the Democratic leaders have met with Bush at the White House, though this time, it will come after Bush has vetoed the Iraq spending bill.

Reid and Pelosi have declined to discuss their strategy for completing a second bill after the president’s expected veto, preferring instead to highlight Bush's veto and use that action to spur further debate over the president's policies in Iraq and what it means for this country.

Perino also said Bush has tried to accommodate the Democrats as they investigate the U.S. attorney firings, only to be rebuffed.

“As for the attorney general, I don't see where there needs to be a compromise on our end,” she said. “Remember, it was the president who directed the Justice Department to be fully responsive to the Congress. With hours of collective testimony and thousands of pages of documents turned over, it has been. As for requests to talk to White House staff, remember that [Bush] didn't have to offer any interviews [with Gonzales and other Justice Department officials] or documents at all, but we did. They have chosen not to take us up on the offer.”