No doubt elated by his recent surge in popularity, the President once again played the little boy caught in malfeasance who knows that what he was caught doing is the least of his transgressions. If that's all he suffers for, he'll do it again. If he gets caught in major misdoings, he'll blame everyone around him.

In a White House news conference before leaving for vacation, Bush also had cautionary words for U.S. allies in the region: Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf. He said Maliki, who is visiting Tehran, should realize that Iran is playing a “very troubling” role and that he would need to “have a heart to heart” talk with the Iraqi leader if he believed the Iranians were being constructive. Bush said he expects the embattled Musharraf to take “swift action” against Taliban and al-Qaeda leaders if there is “actionable intelligence” on their whereabouts in Pakistan's rugged tribal areas, and he called on the Pakistani general to hold a “free and fair election.”

On U.S. domestic issues, Bush dismissed the idea of raising the federal gasoline tax to generate funds for repairing the nation's bridges in the wake of the collapse last week of the Interstate 35W bridge in Minneapolis. Instead, he said Congress should do a better job of setting priorities.