One of the things that Clarke mentioned in his “60 Minutes” interview which has not been discussed much is his belief that Bush is carefully fed filtered information by what Paul O’Neill (it may have been Suskind) called his “Praetorian Guard.” I imagine this is comprised of most of the cabinet members and Karl Rove, who provide incurious George with whatever they think it is that he wants to hear and some degree of deniability when it is shown to have been manipulated. The existence of this information filtration system is certainly not a revelation, but it is an important thing to consider when Bush talks about making the best decisions he can with the information he has.

The other interesting (and somewhat comical, in my mind) bit was Bush wanting cards of the major Al Qaeda leaders which he could X out once they had been captured or killed. Cutting off one, two, or even five heads of the hydra is not going to kill it because the body remains to sprout new heads. Also, the supposed mastermind (Zawahiri) and the figurehead and chief financier (Bin Laden) are still active.