I beg to disagree. Bush in the WH followed the same pattern he established when Gov of TX. He played nice with the Dems in the legislature, reckoning that would win them over. He tried it in DC and got clobbered.
Moreover, it’s in his genes. Do you recall his father saying, “I never got that ‘vision thing’”? The Bushes are progmatists, not ideologues.
I agree. That's WHY his second term turned out as it did. But that doesn't mean it COULDN'T have turned out otherwise.
W showed evidence of being his own man in term 1, but in term 2 he became the second term for GHWB.