BUSH THREATENS VETO OVER UNION RULES WAIVER.(MAIN)

TRENTON, N.J. -- A day before senators headed into a showdown over President Bush's proposal to create a new homeland security department, Bush on Monday said a dispute over labor rights threatened to leave America unprepared to ``take the enemy on.''

Democrats, who control the Senate by a one-vote margin, largely oppose Bush's demands to be allowed for reasons of national security to implement a new personnel system in the agency and waive union job rules for the proposed department's 170,000 employees. Bush again threatened, in forceful terms, to veto any bill that does not include those powers.

He was seeking to persuade a few key wavering senators to back …