In June this year, Simon Schama found himself sitting down to dinner with a Texas rancher who held liberal views on Hispanic immigration. The Texan, "lightly snorting like one of his own horses", rolled his eyes at the mention of a hard-line anti-migrant Republican Congressman and muttered: "He's an idiot." Nothing remarkable about this table-talk, perhaps, except that it took place over salmon, beef and berries in the drawing-room of 10 Downing Street, and that the pro-Hispanic rancher was named George W Bush. On immigration, Schama notes, the outgoing president is "more liberal than his party. He's more liberal than McCain's position now... I thought, you really are a lame-duck president. You don't care about offending people in your own party."