About PDB's -- A CIA guy told me they've been dumbed down...

[mainer]

I had a conversation with a former CIA employee last year, and we got to talking about PDB's. He's been privy to them for about a decade, and he was laughing about how PDB's have changed since the Clinton era. While Clinton was president, he said, the PDB's were voluminous and thorough, with a lot of background information -- very dense reading, because Clinton liked to know everything about a subject.

But after Bush took office, he said, the PDB's got dumbed down. "They're now like PEOPLE Magazine, everything summarized down to the barest minimum, because Bush doesn't like to read. Or CAN'T read." He was laughing about it, and said "you can draw your own conclusions about Bush's I.Q." They even talked about issuing it in comic-book form so Bush could absorb it.

[frank frankly]

1. PEOPLE magazine!!! LOL!!!

Bush is a complete and total POS.

[PfcHammer]

37. more like Highlights or Weekly Reader. god I loved those

[The Land of the Free]

43. Goofus and Gallant

That couldn't be a more apt comparison to GW and Kerry

[leftofthedial]

2. the bushgang should be sent to Gitmo

Everyone who voted vor them should be sent to Iraq after we pull the military out. Military people who voted for them should be dishonorably discharged and then sent back to Iraq.

Stupidity should be painful.

[mouse7]

3. Comic Book PDBs?!?!?

Like that, maybe?

[underpants]

6. Stick figures and plastic Army men

...and this guy goes over here BOOM! Pssssshhh! and then, Mr. President, this guy goes over here..........

[underpants]

4. Executive summary of an executive summary?

I've heard/read that not only doesn't W read much (no newspapers thanks) but that he only reads executive summaries and often has them read to him.

I noticed that part of the daily press briefing is to mention that W received the intel and security briefing and then some mention of making calls and such. What President HASN'T started the day with these briefs? They mention that (IMHO) simply to account for W's time, there is little that he seems to do otherwise.

[amandabeech]

13. I've always wondered whether Bush has things read to him.

The stories coming out of Texas were that he would push aside memos and ask for an oral 10-minute presentation.

How he got something like 550 on the SAT verbal, I'll never know.

He is probably learning disabled as well as just completely uninterested in policy unrelated to his religious beliefs or baseball.

The question then comes down to who decides what goes into his briefing memos. That individual or group truly controls the country by controlling what Bush reads, or most probably hears, and thusly, about which issues Bush is allowed to think that he makes decisions.

[underpants]

15. Paul O'Neill on Nixon and the "Brandeis briefs"

Pages 166-169

Summary:

Nixon demanded 10 page briefs to be prepared on issues and they had better be complete and well thought out or Nixon "would call you on the carpet". This was at the founding of the OMB. O'Neill says that the continued to be prepared by he and his "class" that came in under Nixon and continued with Ford etc. He said that Ford received oral briefings but that the reports were still created and that W received oral briefs to an extent he had never seen or even considered before.

end of summary


W probably does have a learning disability but that really should stop him from performing the Presidential functions. Lots of people with learnind disabilities have carried on through them to all stages of success and careers. I don't mean this as a slight towards W.

Yes the question of who controls what he hears or is available to him is key. Cheney surely oversees that and this leads to the direct line the OSP had to the White House.

[amandabeech]

31. I really need to read that O'Neill book.

You are right that LD people have gone on to do amazing things. Many of them have talents in other areas that help them in their success. Perhaps Shrub is really suited to something that he has not yet tried. Obviously, he is not suited to the Presidency.

Yes, the 9/11 commission's investigations have brought out a couple of points showing W's reliance on Cheney. Obviously, the insistence that W speak to the commission only with Cheney present is a real give-away.

I was also struck by Bob Kerrey's statements concerning his attempts to contact someone in charge at the White House a few days before 9/11 to give them his opinion that something very serious was about to happen. Kerrey ended up getting ahold of Rice, who listened to him, but brushed him off with "I'll let Dick know," or something to that effect.

If Cheney's running things, that makes Cheney's staff the key. I know that Scooter Libbey is nuts, but who is Cheney's shadow national security adviser? And where, then, does Rice end up in the real organization chart? Is she there to baby-sit Bush and spoon feed him whatever it is that she,Cheney and others cook up because Cheney does not have the time and patience to deal with W on a daily basis?

[underpants]

42. It leads to incompetence

My guess oon Cheney's Chief would be that Libby is #1 other than that I would guess...........whooboy Perle or North. North is more of the nuts and bolts guy but then that is just a guess.

[alfredo]

33. He's a cheerleader, a glad hand, good ole boy businesses used

to bring in investors. It's kind of like using hookers and booze to entice football players to sign for some college team. He never did much in the way of executive work, he was there to make a business appear on the level because of the Bush name.

[amandabeech]

36. Good grief. I thought that he did a little more than that.

Before he was inaugurated, I prayed that we'd have a calm, peaceful four years so that the Bush administration wouldn't have a lot of opportunity to really screw things up so badly that the following Dem administration would have to spend years in clean-up activities.

Obviously, those prayers have not been answered.

[alfredo]

39. Even as governor his role was

ceremonial. He had little power. The governor doesn't have much power at all in Texas.

[xultar]

5. I can only PRAY that the 9/11 Comm compare PDBs fom Clinton to DumbYa

:crazy:

[underpants]

8. LBN thread says the Aug.6th PDB was 1 1/2 pages

sounds awful small to sum up everything that is happening everywhere.

I don't know but it would be interesting to see someone just hold one of each up-if there is that big of a difference it would be notable.

[Octafish]

7. Bush is a moron.

"He is a friend of mine, he is not a moron at all." -- Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien



Canadian Pol Calls Bush "a Moron"

Chief spokeswoman for Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien blasts president. White House refuses comment.

By Gilbert Trottier

Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien has rejected an offer by his chief spokeswoman to resign after being quoted as calling President George W. Bush a moron.

"She has great affection for morons . . ."

Francoise Ducros reportedly made the remarks during this week's NATO summit in Prague. PM Chretien downplayed the incident, telling reporters that nobody in the U.S. delegation made reference to the comments during several meetings this week at the summit.

Chretien maintained that Ducros, who is a former practicing psychologist who worked with the mentally handicapped, uses the word "moron" regularly. "She meant no harm, and assures me she has great affection for the many morons she has encountered therapeutically over the years."

CONTINUED...

http://www.newyorkslime.com/bush-moron.html

[Prodemsouth]

9. Mainer, your post brings up a larger issue that many left leaning

Americans were warning about before the election of 2000. I remember Rob Riner warning about how Bush's lack of intellectual curiosity could be very damaging to us in the intelligence community and international issues on the Leher report in a debate with that creep Ben Stein. So this could turn into a big I told you so, by many on the left.

[liveoaktx]

10. CIA article talks about PDB *bound book*-but Aug 6th 1 1/2 pages?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A34541-2004Feb11.html
Miscik also said there would be a review of the President's Daily Briefing, the bound book presented each morning to Bush with the most sensitive, latest overnight intelligence. Saying the PDB had been "dramatically revamped" in a way that "significantly improved the quality of the product" when Bush entered the White House, she said there would be a comparison with the material presented to President Bill Clinton "to see if some of the strong points of our earlier approach have been lost."

According to a senior intelligence official, the Bush version added "more sensitive operational information" and dropped some of the accompanying graphics that helped in understanding the substance of the material. In addition, the Bush PDB gets a more limited distribution within the agency, leaving some senior analysts unaware of what has been sent to the White House.

******************This ALSO puts the lie to Condi's *historical* document baloney.

[jackstraw45]

11. Some PDB drafts by CIA for Bush

Perhaps they will classify one from Clinton as well?

Just hilarious and sad.

Actually, I've heard they chose lots of different versions of PDBs to try and catch Dubya's interest.

They had the:

-The Pop-up book PDB

-The Choose Your Own Adventure PDB

-The Mad-Lib PDB where Cheney would ask Dubya for a noun, adjective, etc. to describe the activities of the "evil doers"

-and of course, the PDBs were written in the literary style of Dubya's favorite book: the The Very Hungry Caterpillar Board Book

[Nobody]

18. Some of those examples didn't work

For instance, the Choose Your Own Adventures required that Bush make a choice and the outcome was based on the choice. In Bush's world, he decides and the outcome is based on how much money his daddy has.

Mad libs wouldn't work because his reading skills don't include knowing what nouns, adjectives, and verbs are.

He needs the I Can Read It All By Myself series. Even Dr. Suess' Green Eggs and Ham with a 50 word vocabulary is too advanced for him.

[jackstraw45]

21. Uh...it's called a joke

Ease up, it's the weekend.

[liveoaktx]

12. WaP-6/24/2002-Under Bush the Briefing Gets Briefer

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A2130-2002May23?language=printer

You have to read this article-it also shows Condi's LIE, that she knew from the Genoa conference about planes being used to attack the president
"Bush's request last July for more information about bin Laden's interest in attacking the United States illustrates how the CIA works the PDB system. One trigger for his request was information developed around mid-July when there was, Rice said, a "major threat spike" related to a possible attempt to kill the president using an aircraft at the Group of Eight meeting scheduled in Genoa, Italy. "

AND WTF IS a multi-modality learner?
"Under Bush, the PDB has become shorter, a seven-to-10-page document containing "more targeted hard intelligence" items, with few longer than a page, according to a former senior intelligence official who was involved in the process. It is written with the understanding that the president is a "multi-modality learner" who processes information better through questions and answers while reading along, the former official said."

[dae]

14. I'm interested in this "multi-modality learner" thing myself. I think

I'll check with a few educators I know for clarification.
:dem:

[charlie]

17. It means words, pictures, sounds

Bush is getting remedial comprehension aids during his briefings.

[seabeyond]

19. f*ck

and going into a laugh. after reading down this thread get to this post and just a shit. i have two little ones, unique learning styles i have researched for them.

i mean f*ck

i am feeling like we are talking about my kindergartener

[charlie]

23. Yup. This is the training-wheel presidency

And the only reason for his success in the face of his obvious ineptitude is relentless spin and propaganda through a compliant media.

Look at this, they don't even bother their fucking spin straight, they can be as sloppy as they want to be:

THIS --

President Bush's aides did not forcefully present him with dissenting views from CIA and State and Defense Department officials who warned that U.S.-led forces could face stiff resistance in Iraq, according to three senior administration officials.

Bush embraced the predictions of some top administration hawks, beginning with Vice President Dick Cheney, who predicted in the weeks before the war with Iraq that Saddam Hussein's regime was brittle and that Iraqis would joyously greet coalition troops as liberators, the officials said.

The dissenting views "were not fully or energetically communicated to the president," said one top official, who like the others requested anonymity. "As a result, almost every assumption the plan's based on looks to be wrong."

http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/news/columnists/warren_p_strobel/5508086.htm

VERSUS -

Given Bush's Harvard MBA and the widespread descriptions that he is far from a detail person, his advisers encourage the image of the confident president as CEO, and yet that masks the way he has operated since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

Bush constantly prodded his advisers to demonstrate results -- as quickly as possible. He wanted details of the hunt for the leaders of the al Qaeda terrorist network and the pace of the war in Afghanistan, to the point that his advisers in the White House told him that he should stand back and not try to assume the role of general himself.

He has, aides say, played a similar role in preparing for the war in Iraq, questioning...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A39785-2003Mar27.html

[dae]

27. Man, this is some serious crapola. He's a Kindergartener?

:dem:Damn!

[seabeyond]

30. you are right

i couldnt even compare him to my third grader, edmund is beyond by far bushie boy

[AbbeyRoad]

22. What I think "multiple modality" means

I agree with the previous poster. It means that in order to learn things Bush has to have them relayed to him through multiple modes of communication.

Reading isn't enough. I know that there are intelligent people who have learning disabilities such as dyslexia, but there seems to be more than that going on with him.

His misspeaks are often the source of laughter for us, but it seems that underlying that is something kinda serious and scary. He is the intellect that has been leading our country.

[spanone]

16. They had to put them in fourth grade reading skills.

[ConcernedCanuk]

20. Hmmmm - someone's talking to the Star about that PDB

.
.
.
And it looks like that PDB is a lot more than 2 pages:

Bush warned of Al Qaeda plot in Aug/01: Sources

The so-called presidential daily briefing, or PDB, delivered to Bush on Aug. 6, 2001 — a month before the Sept. 11 attacks — said there were various reports accused terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden had wanted to strike inside the United States as early as 1997 and continuing into the spring of 2001, the sources said.

The same month as that briefing of Bush, U.S. intelligence officials received two uncorroborated reports suggesting terrorists might use airplanes, including one that suggested Al Qaeda operatives were considering flying a plane into a U.S. embassy, current and former government officials said.

/snip/

The sources said the presidential memo included a series of bullet items that brought Bush through a history of mostly uncorroborated intelligence that cited Al Qaeda's interest in hijacking planes to win the release of Islamic extremists who had been arrested in 1998 and 1999, as well as the travels of suspected Al Qaeda operatives, including some U.S. citizens, in and out of the United States. It suggested Al Qaeda might have a support system in place on U.S. soil, the sources said.

/snip/

The second-to-last bullet told the president there were numerous — at least 70 — terror-related investigations under way by the FBI in 2001 involving matters or people on U.S. soil, the sources said.

And the final bullet told the president of a recent intelligence report indicating Al Qaeda operatives were trying to enter the United States to carry out an attack with explosives, the sources said. There was no specifics about the timing or target, the sources said.





RELATED ARTICLE

Have they found a "deep throat" for 911?

[AbbeyRoad]

28. My first thought was "The Star Tabloid?"

When I saw your post's title, I thought a government official was talking to a tabloid. I guess I need to expand my concept of the "Star" in my mental database. :D

[ConcernedCanuk]

29. Really, ya - you do - the Star's url is "thestar.com" -

.
.
.

[Tracer]

24. I heard on NPR this morning ...

,,, that the White House plans to release "A VERSION" of the August 6th PDB.

A VERSION?

Good Lord. If it's only a page long, how much can they black out?

[chookie]

25. Insights from Suskind's book: home schooling Prince George

Suskind writes in "The Price of Loyalty" that when George W, in 1998, understanding that his destiny was to be appointed POTUS, began a series of history and geo-political tutorials with Condaleeza Rice and Paul Wolfowitz. That's right -- he started to think about this stuff way back in 1998. WOW! He's been "at it" for almost 5 years now! Whatta guy! Not like that bureaucratic chair-warmer-for-decades Richard Clarke /sarcasm off

Suskind quotes Richard Perle, who was also involved in these lessons, as saying that he liked George W because he never pretended he knew ANYTHING about any of this stuff, but was up front about his utter lack of knowledge of history and geo-politics. He also said he liked his "attitude", i.e. he really bought into their world view and accepted it absolutely, without reservation or critique or question.

I don't think he understands much of anything to this day, but was has changed is that he now *pretends*, or has to, to understand. He may be Churchill in his own mind, but listening to him verbalize at length (as in the MTP interview) is like playing with a Chatty Cathy doll -- hearing the same old phrases repeated over and over again, only in unpredictable sequences.

Interesting that Poppy was the one who supposedly linked Prince George up with the hard core neocon ideologues like Wolfowitz and Perle -- I thought that he was far more pragmatic (i.e. doesn't do the vision thing) than his stupid son.

Can you imagine fiercely ambitious neocon ideologues being given the opportunity to mold the mind of the Prince to their hearts' desire? Imagine: all that George W knows about history and geo-politics has come through the neocon filter. Just about the rest of us have had more traditional educations in which we have been exposed to a variety out outlooks, and been trained in research, analysis and criticism. George W has merely been spoonfed opinion -- and rather extreme ones at that -- and treats it as Revealed Truth.

The closest they have to an opposing viewpoint is Colin Powell, who seems to have been striving all along to keep the village idiots from burning down the whole village -- and has been pretty much isolated and ostracized as a result. He sacrificed his own credibility by agreeing to lie for his boss -- and thus signed off on this debacle.

I think that goes a long way towards explaining why things are going as badly as they are....

[Octafish]

38. Excellent post, chookie!

"My bran was mulded by these soo-aydo cons..."

[chookie]

40. "Humble foreign policy." Yeah, right.

The Bush myth is that he was pursuing a humble foreign policy, until Destiny arrived in the form of 19 murderous creeps from the Middle East.

Normally highly critical of the Bush administration, traditional conservative Pat Buchanon wrote recently that while his administration is a total disaster, Bush himself can't be blamed, because he has innocently been snookered by the nasty boy NeoCons. It was *they* who advised him to do all these crazy things. See http://www.antiwar.com/pat/?articleid=1981

How Buchanon got this detail so wrong is something I do not fully comprehend.

If Bush *honestly* had been set on a humble foreign policy, and had only been galvanized by the horrific events of Sept 11 to undertake the occupation of a major Middle Eastern state and gamble with the stakes being as high as a regional war -- why the HELL did he FROM THE BEGINNING surround himself with well-known NeoCon ideologues Wolfowitz and Perle, and their buddies in government service Cheney and Rumsfeld? The obvious conclusion is that His Chimperial Highness entered the White House with a Big Plan -- basically to make the PNAC program "actionable." I do not think one can conclude that it was a program or world view that he bought into AFTER the events of Sept 11.

One of the early clues that Bush entered office with A Plan is that His Chimperial Highness, against the advice of his Secretary of State, in Jan 2001, in the very first meeting of the Cabinet,decided to withdraw all attention from the Israel/Palestine situation. O'Neill describes this meeting in Suskind's book, in a discussion of the very first Cabinet meeting -- two subjects were discussed: withdrawing attention from Israel/Palestine, and finding a way to "git" Iraq. Bush poo-pooed Powell's analysis, saying that he had a very good feeling about Ariel Sharon and trusted him, and it might be a good thing for "one side to prevail for a while."

I always wondered, and wondered at the time, WHY the hell they let Israel/Palestine explode into the horrific violence there in summer of 2001. Given the insider information that O'Neill provides, I conclude that sitting back while Israel exploded into violence was actually part of his plan. I think Bush intended for Americans to be aroused by the dozens of deaths occuring there every day -- to "soften them up" for Stage 2 -- the Invasion of Iraq.

Maybe, maybe, another part of "softening up Americans" for the PNAC dream of a prolonged regional war in the Middle East included "allowing" Al Qaeda to hit the USA. Nothing like watching Americans die in our own streets to be able to sell them a strange new experiment with "democratizing" the Middle East.

Well, we have our position on these matters, and the NeoCons have theirs. What I yearn for is that the two very stark alternatives are laid side by side, and that Americans choose between them this election year. IF the Bush administration is so damned Divinely Inspired that it is on the right course, let them just level with the American people about The Plan, instead of consealing it. People need to understand that if they accept the premise that American freedom depends on a necessity for a prolonged regional war in the Middle East, and accept the price -- that's one thing. Trouble is -- they're being snookered. For crying out loud -- let them base their decision on The Plan, not on goddamned commercials of George and Laura talking about how resolute they are.

[chookie]

41. "Humble foreign policy." Yeah, right.

The Bush myth is that he was pursuing a humble foreign policy, until Destiny arrived in the form of 19 murderous creeps from the Middle East.

Normally highly critical of the Bush administration, traditional conservative Pat Buchanon wrote recently that while his administration is a total disaster, Bush himself can't be blamed, because he has innocently been snookered by the nasty boy NeoCons. It was *they* who advised him to do all these crazy things. See http://www.antiwar.com/pat/?articleid=1981

How Buchanon got this detail so wrong is something I do not fully comprehend.

If Bush *honestly* had been set on a humble foreign policy, and had only been galvanized by the horrific events of Sept 11 to undertake the occupation of a major Middle Eastern state and gamble with the stakes being as high as a regional war -- why the HELL did he FROM THE BEGINNING surround himself with well-known NeoCon ideologues Wolfowitz and Perle, and their buddies in government service Cheney and Rumsfeld? The obvious conclusion is that His Chimperial Highness entered the White House with a Big Plan -- basically to make the PNAC program "actionable." I do not think one can conclude that it was a program or world view that he bought into AFTER the events of Sept 11.

One of the early clues that Bush entered office with A Plan is that His Chimperial Highness, against the advice of his Secretary of State, in Jan 2001, in the very first meeting of the Cabinet,decided to withdraw all attention from the Israel/Palestine situation. O'Neill describes this meeting in Suskind's book, in a discussion of the very first Cabinet meeting -- two subjects were discussed: withdrawing attention from Israel/Palestine, and finding a way to "git" Iraq. Bush poo-pooed Powell's analysis, saying that he had a very good feeling about Ariel Sharon and trusted him, and it might be a good thing for "one side to prevail for a while."

I always wondered, and wondered at the time, WHY the hell they let Israel/Palestine explode into the horrific violence there in summer of 2001. Given the insider information that O'Neill provides, I conclude that sitting back while Israel exploded into violence was actually part of his plan. I think Bush intended for Americans to be aroused by the dozens of deaths occuring there every day -- to "soften them up" for Stage 2 -- the Invasion of Iraq.

Maybe, maybe, another part of "softening up Americans" for the PNAC dream of a prolonged regional war in the Middle East included "allowing" Al Qaeda to hit the USA. Nothing like watching Americans die in our own streets to be able to sell them a strange new experiment with "democratizing" the Middle East.

Well, we have our position on these matters, and the NeoCons have theirs. What I yearn for is that the two very stark alternatives are laid side by side, and that Americans choose between them this election year. IF the Bush administration is so damned Divinely Inspired that it is on the right course, let them just level with the American people about The Plan, instead of concealing it. People need to understand that if they accept the premise that American freedom depends on a necessity for a prolonged regional war in the Middle East, and accept the price -- that's one thing. Trouble is -- they're being snookered. For crying out loud -- let them base their decision on The Plan, not on goddamned commercials of George and Laura talking about how resolute they are.

[trof]

26. Cliffs Notes or Classic Comics?

You decide.
http://www.cliffsnotes.com/
http://www.geocities.com/mbrown123/greatest_comics/classics1.html

What a maroon.

[SpaceCatMeetsMars]

32. Richard Clarke told Franken in that interview that

they had been instructed that the pResident "was not a reader" and wanted things written very briefly. You would think the press would have covered this very important fact a long time ago. You would think they would cover this now.

Will they ever understand that having a smart president is a good thing and having a disengaged figurehead is a bad thing? Too difficult of a concept, I guess.

[jonnyblitz]

44. in his case "not a reader" is a nice way of saying dumbass n/t

[bearfartinthewoods]

34. ya know....this would be a great money maker AND effective tool

if there were any clever, talented people who could woop up a comic book of various security scenerios. you would get a million dollars of free publicity....

[leetrisck]

35. Back when bush first "took" office

someone (I believe Condi Rice) said bush wanted the briefings to be no more than 2 pages long and that's what they were doing. The PDB in question now is 1-1/1 pages - yet they need considerable time to declassify things - what a crock.