Whore City — James Baker, the man who helped make two Bushes
          president, had a black-tie inaugural bash Friday night at the Ronald Reagan Building.

          In his welcoming remarks, Mr. Baker referred to the first President Bush as "41"
          and the second President Bush as "43."

          Nobody mentioned 42, the Democrat sandwiched between, who was
          doing his best — with remarks about how the Republicans stopped the
          vote in Florida, with a prime-time farewell address, with a Lewinsky plea
          bargain, with the firing of Linda Tripp, with inauguration morning
          pardons, and with a Barbra Streisand-style farewell tour at Andrews and
          Kennedy — to cling to the spotlight until the last microsecond.

          No. 41, among friends, decided to unleash Chiang, Bush argot for letting
          loose. He talked about "the terrible 37 days" in Florida. He said Warren
          Christopher "was in over his head when Baker took him on." He said he
          and Barbara were "burned up" about the "gratuitous attacks" on Jeb.

          He praised the Tallahassee crew for doing "a fantastic job at getting out
          the truth and protecting the rights of all voters in Florida." It was an
          astonishing scene, this skin-of-the-teeth restoration of the Tex-prep dynasty.

          "I used to be George Bush," the 76- year-old said, with a sweet, loopy
          smile. "I used to be President Bush. Now I don't know what the hell I am."

          Of course, Poppy is giddy. During his reign, no one thought Junior would
          ever succeed in politics because he reacted to every criticism with a
          hair-trigger temper. He showed no interest in policy, only in tracking
          loyalty and disloyalty to the family.

          When he ran for governor, and later for president, W. disciplined himself
          not to be so volatile, so openly hostile to skeptics and naysayers. But on
          Saturday, as he stepped into his dad's topsiders — both of them tearing
          up and nervously biting the insides of their cheeks — there was a question
          about whether he has gone from being too touchy to being too detached.

          Washington is a wet haze of clouds this weekend. Bill Clinton is leaving
          as he came in — obscured in a Pigpen cloud of dysfunction and
          confession. Jesse Jackson, Mr. Clinton's minister in times of trouble, is in
          his own cloud of marital misbehavior.

          W. is wrapped in a worrisome cloud of his own — a nimbus of
          non-engagement. The Bushes are encapsulated by their privilege, and W.
          has intensified this by distancing himself from firsthand information.

          When Al Gore talked about media sex and violence, W. was at a
          disadvantage on popular culture, since he thought "Friends" was a movie
          and the Taliban was a rock band. He watches little prime-time television
          besides sports. When his presidency was being decided by a historic
          Supreme Court argument, he did not even tune in. He toned up at the gym.

          He was informed by his staff of Dick Cheney's heart attack only after he
          said it didn't happen on TV. He was not told about Linda Chavez's
          Labor pains for 24 hours, until her problems had been dissected on the
          Sunday talk shows, which he doesn't watch. When Tom Brokaw asked
          about John Ashcroft's interview in the creepy neo- Confederate journal
          Southern Partisan, W. said he could not respond because he had not read it.

          Once you're president, there's little incentive to work on bad habits. Just
          look at Bill Clinton. But one measure of W.'s presidency will be whether
          he can reveal himself through decisions that he makes rather than ones that are
          made for him by Dick Cheney and Colin Powell and Poppy, whether he can
          stop referring reporters to advisers and answer his own questions.

          Elected president at 69, Ronald Reagan was a fixed image politically. At
          54, W. is a work in progress. If his style remains lackadaisical, that void
          is bound to spark power struggles among his aides, who will rush to fill it.
          The White House, like nature, abhors a vacuum.

          The new president thinks he can simply rely on his advisers for the
          bottom line. But even the most trusted aides provide information in a way
          that puts them and their positions in the best light. A president who
          avoids primary information only gets the spin, not the reality. That means
          he can only react to the spin. And that means events shape him, not the
          other way around.

          W. has shown he can grow and change. It's still early enough for him to
          learn that some things can't be staffed out. Like the presidency.