NEW YORK, Dec. 19 -- After winning reelection and "reshaping the rules of politics to fit his 10-gallon-hat leadership style," President Bush for the second time was chosen as Time magazine's Person of the Year.
The editors tapped Bush "for sharpening the debate until the choices bled, for reframing reality to match his design, for gambling his fortunes -- and ours -- on his faith in the power of leadership."
Time's 2004 Person of the Year package, on newsstands Monday, includes an Oval Office interview with Bush; an interview with his father, former president George H.W. Bush; and a profile of Bush's chief political adviser, Karl Rove.
In the interview, Bush attributed his victory over the Democratic candidate, Sen. John F. Kerry (Mass.), to his foreign policy and the wars he began in Afghanistan and Iraq. "The election was about the use of American influence," Bush said.
After a grueling campaign, Bush remains a polarizing figure in the United States and around the world, and that's part of the reason he earned the magazine's honor, Managing Editor Jim Kelly said. "Many, many Americans deeply wish he had not won," Kelly said in a telephone interview. "And yet he did."
Bush said he relishes that some people dislike him. "I think the natural instinct for most people in the political world is that they want people to like them," Bush said. "On the other hand, I think sometimes I take kind of a delight in who the critics are."
Bush joins six other presidents who have twice won the magazine's top honor: Harry S. Truman, Dwight D. Eisenhower (first as a general), Lyndon B. Johnson, Richard M. Nixon, Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton. Franklin D. Roosevelt holds the record with three nods from the editors.
