UNCHANGED:

Our old friend Bush was back (William McKenzie, January 12, 2009, Dallas Morning News)

For 75 minutes, George W. Bush sat in a crème-and-blue high-backed chair in the Oval Office, answering questions that my Dallas Morning News colleagues, Todd Gillman and Lori Stahl, and I put to him about everything from 9/11 to bipartisanship to Texas politics to his new presidential library and institute.

He gestured with his hands, cast asides with his eyes, relaxed in his chair and explained his views with the same manner he did while a popular governor of Texas. Even down to the same kind of black loafers, he was the guy many Texans saw in Austin. Our give-and-take went far past the scheduled 45 minutes, as he twice waved off aides to keep it going. As he had years before, he usually responded with answers that would shock those who long ago swallowed the caricature of him as a lightweight. He gave reasons for his actions, understood why some took offense and showed none of the stiff-necked ideologue side that had become his image.

So, this: Can modern presidents, with all their handlers, scheduling and scripting, really reveal themselves to the larger public? Franklin Roosevelt did through fireside chats, but can we ever know the real guy anymore?