O'Neill Slams President in Book

The former Treasury Secretary depicts Bush as "detached and dim witted"; White House replies Bush "not detached"

Former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill appears to be the latest outcast from the Bush administration to cast doubt on his former boss's ability to run the government. O'Neill's accounts are told in Ron Suskind's latest book "The Price of Loyalty," which is full of lots of "gotchas" of the type not welcome, especially in an election year.

Suskind's book portrays Bush not as the impressive leader of the free world, but as a figurehead for a propaganda machine oiled and maintained by people like Cheney and Rumsfeld. O'Neill confirms that the President rarely asks challenging questions of his top advisors and doesn't even read the newspaper.

Recounting a meeting during which an attack on an Iraqi position was being discussed, O'Neill indicates that the President summoned his top advisors to the Oval Office and then demonstrated how he thought the attack could be carried out using his G.I. Joe collection. O'Neill claims they watched as the President moved the little toys around his desk and made explosion noises with his mouth.

As for understanding the Treasury Secretary's reports, O'Neill recalls presenting the President with a one page summary of his ideas for discussion. As O'Neill began explaining his thoughts, he noticed the President folding the report into a paper airplane. When O'Neill finished speaking, the President launched the paper missile in O'Neill's direction and dismissed him with a "Good work, Paul."

The decision to invade Iraq, says O'Neill, was primarily made by advisors like Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Condoleeza Rice. During meetings he attended, O'Neill says the President often sat playing with a Game Boy device while others plotted the invasion. The book also indicates that the President frequently turned the White House news monitors to the Cartoon Network, particularly in the mornings when he liked to eat his morning cereal in his pajamas and watch TV.

Republican leaders have tried to dismiss O'Neill as a "bitter old guy" who got fired for "not backing the President's tax cuts." Whether it's intended as payback or not, it's not the motive behind O'Neill's tell all that has tongues wagging but rather the disturbing portrait it depicts of the most powerful man on the planet.

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