The Decider
I am certainly not alone in wondering just what is (or has been) going on in Bush’s head. More people have conjectured on that than you can shake the proverbial stick at, including professional, as well as amateur (the rest of us!), psychologists.
A true cottage industry!
Here is a conjecture:
The President has been described, from pretty much the beginning, as one who would get a list of choices from his ‘expert’ advisors, and then choose one (or maybe one from column A and one from Column B.) More recently he has presented himself as ‘The Decider’.
Let’s take that for the reality.
There is a difference between working through material on your own - deciding within yourself what you think and then charting a course - and choosing something from a list provided you. (It is something like the difference between breeding, raising, training and racing a thoroughbred, and picking one before a race to bet on.) You are ‘personally invested’ in the former in a way you cannot be in the latter. True leadership could be proposed to consist of the former, and then, after collegial ‘peer review’, choosing a course. The strategy of choosing from a list can, over time, create a framework for your ‘experts’ in which they will never challenge you to think for yourself; they will just provide new lists. You never develop any personal investment beyond placing ‘the bet’. And, of course, one can incline towards placing a bet on gut instinct.
Sound familiar?
Perhaps someone (Condi?) should have made Bush write a ‘term paper’ on situations he faced, certainly on Iraq. Made to do that kind of ‘homework’, the president might have cultivated habits of personal investment conducive to more effective leadership. Lacking that, leadership can become confused with sticking with your bet, come hell or high water (or Iraq as it is, and Katrina as it was). The ‘quality’ of your leadership becomes solely a function of the resolve with which you pursue your 'selection': a curiously hollow kind leadership. No wonder people have trouble figuring out what is going on inside your head. You are just reviewing the lists and waiting for the diviner’s twitch of your gut.
8:05:40 PM 
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