"We think we changed the debate," one of the designers of that strategy said in Washington recently. "But it only worked because we married it up with admitting some mistakes, and that was quite a fight, because the president doesn't talk that way."

To some historians, spinning the meaning of victory seems an exercise in futility.

"It's ridiculous talk," said John Dower, the historian who has chronicled war propaganda and written the definitive history of the American occupation of Japan. "People know what victory looks like," he said, and are unlikely to adopt the president's definitions.

But what truly sets Dower off are Bush's comparisons between rebuilding Iraq and the postwar rebuilding of Japan. He and others note that Japan was religiously unified with some history of parliamentary government and a bureaucracy ready to work as soon as the conflict ended.

Bush's team is already acutely aware that even if Iraq ultimately proves a success — far from a sure bet — a major part of his legacy hinges on his performance on the home front. Smith, of the Lincoln Library, argues that the president got a good start his first year when "he changed the Republican orthodoxy on education from dismantling the Education Department to actually paying attention to the issue."

With a new chief justice confirmed, and an associate justice on deck, he has a shot at reformulating the Supreme Court, though a real judicial legacy might require one or two more resignations. There is little time left for a Social Security overhaul and fundamental tax reform, the two domestic issues Bush once thought would be his.

And then there is the big legacy question of how well Bush persuades the country that extraordinary times truly called for the assumption of extraordinary presidential powers. Bush argues that authorizing domestic wiretaps without warrants was part of his inherent power as commander in chief. His defenders cited Lincoln's suspension of habeas corpus during the Civil War.

But as David Donald, the Lincoln biographer, notes, there was an uproar at the time. It all might be remembered differently had the war taken another turn. "A lot of people believed it wasn't necessary for Lincoln to do these things, just as a lot of people think that about Bush," he said.

POLITICS — DEMOCRATS KEEP THE SENATE IN SIGHT

It has been a while since Democrats have held such high hopes for an election year — confident of, at the least, making significant gains in the Republican-controlled House and Senate.

In truth, Democratic hopes of winning back the House are somewhat remote. They have a better shot at capturing the Senate. A few races are worth tracking for early signs about how realistic these hopes are.