But Words Will Never Hurt Me

In place of the convention in St. Paul, that week Bush took a tour of the battlefield at Gettysburg with his wife, Laura, and a small retinue of loyalists, including Karl Rove, Alberto Gonzales, Karen Hughes and Harriet Miers. Bush was in an expansive mood, pushing aside the vagaries of election-year politics and taking the long view of history. His tour guides recounted Lincoln's war strategy and the newspaper headlines that screamed INVASION! INVASION! Bush interjected: "Well, did the president say, 'Bring it on'?" says Jake Boritt, one of the guides. Bush made it clear he was being self-deprecating. "He's got that Southern style of being quick-witted with a slow delivery," Boritt recalls.

Bush has made just one public campaign appearance with McCain. On the morning after the Texas primary in March, the two men had lunch in the White House and then went before reporters. At the time, McCain was battling to win over the conservative base of the Republican Party and hoped an event with Bush would help. There is little warmth between the president and the senator. In 2000, Bush allies brought down McCain's presidential bid with a smear campaign in South Carolina claiming McCain had fathered an illegitimate child. McCain subsequently made peace with the president for political purposes, but the damage could not be undone.

The Rose Garden event lasted exactly 10 minutes. Bush slapped McCain on the back and smiled for the cameras. A reporter asked McCain if the two would campaign together. "I hope that he will campaign for me as much as is keeping with his busy schedule," McCain answered awkwardly. As one senior McCain aide puts it now, "We were getting it over with."

Little wonder Bush has been content to keep his distance. (The men have been seen together one other time, getting into a limo after a Phoenix fundraiser.) "He's approached this with a degree of understanding and is not letting it get to him," says a former senior aide who remains close to Bush. Another friend says Bush knew the attacks were coming. "He made up his mind during the '06 midterms that he was going to become the easy, short-term punching bag," the friend says. "Any second-term president gets a longer-term perspective, with politics in the rearview mirror a little bit." Some Bush aides privately express relief that political reporters, preoccupied with the campaign, no longer bother to scrutinize the president's every move and misstep.

Bush has begun to look toward life after the Oval Office. Friends say he will likely move back to Dallas, where he and Laura lived before Bush was governor. Texas remains the last frontier of Bush Country. "There is a great deal of affection for the Bush family, and that includes the entire family," says James Francis Jr., a close friend. Francis says Bush will likely write his memoirs and give speeches. But his main focus will be to build his library and a policy institute to promote democracy in the Middle East. Laura Bush, who is said to dislike Washington even more than her husband, is looking forward to reclaiming a more normal life. "She told me she hadn't cooked in 14 years," says Ruth Altshuler, another close Bush family friend. "I really see her taking a few months, if not a year, to get settled and then start slowly to get in the Dallas life," she says. "Everybody is going to want her to be honorary chairman of everything."

Last month Bush had a taste of the kind of friendly crowds he can expect to greet him back home. At a barbecue fundraiser in Midland, he told the audience a folksy tale about what he said was the most nerve-racking moment of his presidency: throwing out the first pitch of the World Series in 2001, after 9/11. "The enthusiasm of the people of West Texas for this man and this friend of theirs was just over the top," says Don Evans, one of Bush's oldest friends and political supporters. "It was very uplifting for him because there was a lot of cheering and hollering." Just the sort of adoration that can make a man think he might someday like to get into politics.

With Suzanne Smalley and Anne Belli Perez

© 2008