Watching Bush’s final press conference was kind of depressing. After 8 years of wanting to hate the man as an evil leader, you could suddenly see him for what he really is: a not terribly stupid, college-educated son from a wealthy and powerful family who was ill-equipped to lead the free world and probably knew it from the get-go.  His tone throughout most of the conference was what one might call “wistfully relieved”. He still exhibited his tendency to come across as a little sociopathic, showing no remorse for his actions beyond how they may have been perceived historically or as bad policy timing. He displayed none of his familiar deer-in-the-headlights-while-waiting-for-the-soundbite-through-the-earpiece-shifty-eyedness. He was clearly speaking “on his feet”, as it were, presumably a safe move when one has barely a week left in office and is in fact already packed and heading off to the golf course. To me the single most notable thing was the appalling detachment he seems to have toward the country he led for eight years. It’s like he took the family Mercedes for a spin on a sunny day with bricks of cash and a reasonably happy family in the back seat, and brought it back a few years later fender-less, out of gas, broke, the family emaciated or dead, and is handing the keys back to dad with a  blank look of “What? I brought it back before curfew like I said” on his face.

*Worst journalistic pun I plan to make this year.