1115.org

Apparently, Bush wanted to pay homage to Tony Blair’s speaking skills, both public and private. Evidently, he felt the most striking form of homage would be to provide a stark contrast. So he put on a clinic about how not to say stuff, and what not to say:

The president told the Sun: “Tony’s had a great run and history will judge him kindly. He’s a very talented man for whom I’ve got a great deal of respect.”

Mr Bush added: “I’ve heard he’s been called Bush’s poodle. He’s bigger than that.

“We are working together to achieve global peace in the face of enormous danger. This kind of thing is just silly ridicule and that’s how I treat it.”

He said they had served together during a time of war and “found each other in the same foxhole”. (Very tempting, but let’s not go there. Though, it would give a whole new meaning to my working subtitle for this post: Bush on Blair.)

The president added: “Tony’s great skill, and I wish I had it, is that he’s very articulate. I wish I was a better speaker.”

Bush was on a roll, and he knew it. So he went ahead and heaped praise on Blair’s heir apparent too:

Mr Bush said he had a “good meeting” with (Gordon) Brown when he visited Washington, and that he “wasn’t the image of the dour Scotsman at all”.

Switching over to Reuters now:

“Somehow our relationship has been seen as Bush saying to Blair, ‘jump’ and Blair saying, ‘how high?’. But that’s just not the way it works. It’s a relationship where we say we’re both going to jump together.”

If only they had. Jumped together.