This just slayed me.

UPDATE: The "woman" is Amy Finnerty, a New York journalist, and I so liked her writing in the above piece I looked for others. The first one I came across was a year-old interview with British novelist Martin Amis.

In the interview, Amis brings a very discerning (and decidedly English) eye to George W. Bush.

A taste:

Mr. Amis, famous son of a famous writer, now talks about Mr. Bush, son of a president, as one might a literary character: "I'm very interested in how his whole persona has changed. Do you remember around 2002 and 2003, his body language was that of someone looking for a fight? Even his walk was very drunk with power. . . . Now his upper lip has stopped working. He can't smile. I'm glad to see it. Think of the difference between Lincoln at the start of the Civil War and Lincoln at the end: this beautiful man, emaciated by war, by the distress and pain of it. And Bush is showing it, in his sinews and his glands. It's taking a very heavy toll on him. And so it should."

... In a deeper deconstruction of the president's soul, however, Mr. Amis gives him credit for exceptional social courage. "In one veteran's hospital alone . . . Bush has made 35 visits to severely injured troops, and that's a lot. If I were president I'd try to keep it down to three, or perhaps two, or maybe one. Or maybe not visit at all. I mean, it's so impossibly painful. Some people have said to me that they think . . . it's very emotional and that he's addicted to that. But I'd give him the benefit of the doubt and say, that's brave to do that, to go and confront the results of your policies."

Good stuff.