"I admire him as a president and I regard him as a friend."

Bush and Blair in the Rose Garden. Poignant, almost tragic. I don't have a transcript yet, but I was listening to part of this on C-Span radio as I was driving in my car.

Bush said that he's read three biographies of George Washington in the last year and isn't it interesting that they are still analyzing what the first President did? If they're still trying to understand that now, it means that the final interpretation of what he has done will be written long after he is gone. So, he says, he feels confident in what he is doing, despite all the criticism. It's based on sound philosophical ideas, he said, and eventually people will see that he was right.

At some distance there were protesters, and Tony Blair said he couldn't quite hear what they were saying but he imagined it wasn't complimentary. Blair brought a light, humorous touch that contrasted with Bush's profession of deep commitment to philosophy and history. Blair expressed more concern for the people who think he was wrong about Iraq, though he still says the war was right, and of course he articulates the reasons why it was right so much better than Bush can. Everywhere in the world, Blair says, when people have been given the choice of what kind of government they want, they choose freedom and democracy, not a secular dictatorship or religious fundamentalism. I'm not so sure that's true, but it's always so beautiful when someone says it is.