“Democratic congressional leaders on Friday offered the first concessions in a fight with President Bush over a spending bill for Iraq, but the White House turned them down.”
In a closed-door meeting with Bush’s top aides on Capitol Hill, Democrats said they’d strip billions of dollars in domestic spending out of a war spending that Bush opposed if the president would accept a timetable to pull combat troops out of Iraq. As part of the deal, Democrats said they would allow the president to waive compliance with a deadline for troop withdrawals.
But no deal was struck.
“To say I was disappointed in the meeting is an understatement,” said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev. “I really did expect that the president would accept some accountability for what we’re trying to accomplish here.”
White House chief of staff Joshua Bolten, who rejected the deal, said any timetable on the war would undermine the nation’s efforts in Iraq.
“We consider that to be not a significant distinction,” he said. “Whether waivable or not, timelines send the wrong signal.”
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