It is always interesting to see how former American presidents conduct their lives once out of office.

Former President George W. Bush has stayed out of the public spotlight consistently. Like most ex-presidents, he refrains from commenting on his successor’s policies.

Mr. Bush did endorse the Republican candidate in the presidential race. When pressed by an ABC News crew in May, Mr. Bush said, as he stepped into an elevator, “I’m for Mitt Romney.”

The two Republicans have spoken since then, but Mr. Bush is not expected to campaign much for Mr. Romney, if at all.

In fact, Mr. Bush has politely declined an invitation to the Republican National Convention.

A spokesman said in a statement that Mr. Bush “supports Governor Romney and wants him to succeed. But in keeping with his desire to stay off the political stage at this point in the postpresidency, he respectfully declined the invitation to go to Tampa.”

The GOP has moved further to the right since Mr. Bush was in office. Much of the Republican primary field opposed his spending policies and disagreed with his immigration initiatives, such as offering a pathway to citizenship for some illegal immigrants.

But the main reason may be that the ex-president simply is done with politics, as he told the Hoover Institution recently.

“I crawled out of the swamp,” he said, “and I’m not crawling back in.”

There are other pursuits besides politics.

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