I've met Bill several times over my life. First time was when I was about 8 years old and he was Govn'r of Arkansas. I was in Cub Scouts and living just outside of Little Rock and he seemed like the most awesome politician ever. He memorized all of our names and our parents names before he met us...there use to be a saying that he knew everyone in Arkansas by name. It was a trick, but he went out of his way to know even the kids that wouldn't be able to vote for him for over a decade. Ran into him a few more times over the next few years, always addressed me by my name and asked, "How is your momma been doing, [CLIFYT'S_MOM]?"

Years later, I was doing a charity concert at a very rich person's estate...I had blackmailed a few of my friends from my days in entertainment into playing as we raised a half million dollars for about 3 hours of work. A few weeks before the show (and well into the Bush presidency), we are told that we need to change the security and that our staff / musicians need to go through background checks and all that. He only stayed a half hour, but came back to out 'greenroom' (a dude's pool house that I think had more square footage than my house). Thanks all the people that were working and seemed to spend more time with the volunteers and musicians (err...we didn't get paid, so...one and the same) than he did the rich folks. And when he got to me, he asked if I lived in Little Rock when I was younger. Said yes, and thank you for coming to our show and before I could say much more else than my name he said, "Well tell your momma [CLIFYT'S_MOM] that she raised a great family" (trust me, she wasn't his type! Err...ok, I guess he liked them chubby, but I think he liked them younger!) I couldn't believe that he remembered her name two decades later. I told him she was sitting at the table next to the edge of the stage, and when he went out to talk to everyone -- encouraging them to give -- he made his way to the poor table where the guests of the musicians were sitting and talked to her and the rest of them for a few minutes.

He always seemed like a very decent man, he seemed to be more comfortable around regular people, and he was kind to us kids. I've heard stories of GWB in the same vein -- one up the way from this one -- and I have a feeling he is a good guy as well. Both probably great people that wanted to help others, both deeply flawed and failed miserably (depending on what side you are on) but probably not nearly as bad as people think they did.