He says all this in his intensely personal way. Some politicians orate: The late Barbara Jordan, for example, spoke to one person sitting across a desk from her the way she spoke to an entire Democratic convention, shaping each sentence as if it would soon be etched in marble. But George W. Bush converses: He knows what he wants to say, but he still utters a phrase and stops, looking for a head-nod or a smile of agreement.
So his "I" sounds not arrogant but self-consciously aware. He said, when asked about how he expresses his Christian faith, "I have a fantastic opportunity to let the light shine," but immediately followed that with a caveat: "I will do so, however, as a secular politician. ... My job is not to promote a religion but to promote the ability of people to worship as they see fit."
In that sense, he is ready to talk about what sustains him as president. His wife: "My marriage is really good." His own prayer: "I pray all the time. You don't need a chapel to pray ... I just do." The prayer of others: When he shakes hands on the campaign trail, "every other person or every third person says, ?My family prays for you.'" His reading: "I read Oswald Chambers every morning. ... If you can figure out everything he's saying, then you have a depth of understanding of the gospel beyond the emotional."
But President Bush also knows how talking about such matters is suspect, for good reason: "I'm sometimes in a world of fakery, obfuscation (yes, he knows and can use big words), political bank shots, so I'm very mindful of the use of faith in this process." He says he's not concerned about how journalists judge him: "Short-term history will be written by people who didn't particularly want me to be president to begin with." He expresses a deeper concern: You "can't use your faith as a shallow attempt to garner votes. Otherwise, you'll receive the ultimate condemnation."
One thing that's changed about George W. Bush during his 40 White House months is his short list of presidents he admires. He's still a Reagan and a Lincoln fan, but he now talks more of Lincoln's role as a wartime president. New to his list is Franklin Roosevelt, because of FDR's growing awareness that Hitler had to be stopped: "In the face of another ?ism,' he saw the problems clearly."
No. 43 is also learning more about No. 1, and particularly George Washington's thinking during the troubled Articles of Confederation period of the 1780s. President Bush uses history to make contemporary practical applications: Americans who expect Iraq to have an elegant constitution in one year's time should look to our own difficult experience.
The president touched on other subjects -- his hope for improvements in Sudan and in Cuba, his concern for Israel: "We will stand side by side with Israel if anyone tries to annihilate her" -- but came back to what for him is the hardest part of being a war president: "death."
When visiting the grieving, he said, "part of my job is to comfort ... hug them, laugh with them, cry with them, hold them, do whatever I can." He then said, with his straight-in-the-eyes look: "After most of those encounters, I'm the one who gets inspired. ... You hear amazing statements from the mouths of these grieving souls, inspired by the Almighty."