Dear George

Dear George,

You inspire me.

Or to be more accurate... this week you inspired me.

To be brutally honest, until now I have found you singularly uninspiring. Back in the late 1990's, when you first started your run for your current office, I remember a Laser Masters regatta where some of us drilled one of the Texas sailors for more information about you. We couldn't believe you were a serious candidate. "What you see is what you get," was the Texas sailor's enigmatic reply about his governor. I guess we all misunderestimated you.

But this week you inspired me.

You didn't inspire me during the 2000 election campaign. "Compassionate Conservative" didn't turn me on. It seemed as lame and meaningless as any other artificial alliterative oxymoron such as Ferocious Freethinker or Benevolent Bigot. It didn't surprise me when the majority of Americans voted for the other guy, the one with the lock-box and the big sighs. (I wonder what happened to him?)

But this week you inspired me.

During the last seven years you have done little to excite me. Sure we all rallied behind you when you stood on the rubble of the World Trade Center with that old firefighter guy. But since then we've had yellowcake in Niger and aluminum tubes, "mission accomplished" and "bring 'em on" and "stay the course" and "heck of a job Brownie" so I've seen little to inspire me.

I won't go on. This is not a political blog and I guess some of my readers may be among the 14% of Americans who still think the country is on the right course, so I don't want to upset them.

But this week you inspired me, George.

You see I've been reading a book about your presidency, Dead Certain by Robert Draper. It's one of those inside stories based on interviews with many of the key players in your administration, including five one-on-one sessions with yourself. Draper has written what you might call a personality-driven history, with a special emphasis, George, on your personality of course.

And you inspired me.

No, it wasn't your optimism in the face of harsh unpopularity. It wasn't your apparent certainty in your own decisions even when all the evidence spoke against you. It wasn't even your obsession with punctuality... though that is a "virtue" I share with you.

What inspired me most was the description of your commitment to daily physical exercise. Apparently whatever is going on in the world, however busy your schedule, your aides know that every day without fail they have to allow you at least an hour to go for a run, or a bike-ride, or to work out in the White House gym. (The index to the book actually has 27 page references to Bush, George Walker, jogging and exercise of.)

What a guy. I should really be exercising at least an hour a day too. If you can do it, then so can I. George, I should be more like you. You inspire me.