Everyone I've talked to, including a senator who had just come from a meeting with him, says the president himself is feeling feisty and peppery, up for the battle. He believes he did the right thing in Iraq and feels internal confidence about it. He continues to hope that the question of what happened to Saddam's WMDs, which the dictator had used before in Iran and on the Iraqi Kurds, will be fully answered in time. Were they destroyed, or sold? Are some still hidden? I was told that whenever U.S. troops find and search a new facility, Bush wonders if something will be found.

We're a little late to point out Peggy Noonan's Friday the 13th column, but if you missed it, it's worth a look: an informative example of how the goofy, bubbly side of the right wing talks to itself. Since Bush has a well-documented goofy side (not to mention his bubbly qualities), there's every reason to view Noonan's mixture of happy talk with a bizarre twisting of political reality (in which Republicans, ever the outsiders, have watched over their mac'n'cheese tv dinners as the Democrats ride around in limosines!) as indicative of the presidential mindset.

And as such it also indicates Bush's greatest strength as a political warrior. Like Noonan (and her hero, St. Ronnie), Bush doesn't refer very frequently to the sources of information the rest of us consult. He prefers to dismiss such quotidian perceptions, and instead visualizes the world he wishes to operate in. And we all know that creative visualization is a vital element in the kind of magic -- political or otherwise -- that can achieve stunning results.

Note -- Noonan's bleating via JMM's Talking Points Memo.