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The good and the bad about McCain is public knowledge. He has a long legislative history, and he has also taken a firm stand on most issues.

I did not accuse this president of being poll driven. I accused him of playing politics with every single situation that comes across his desk. Ask any political observer and you will be told the same thing - this White House is the most poltically driven one they've ever seen. No decisions are made in this White House without the political impact on the Republican party being given heavy weight.

In other words, when making policy decisions, the question being asked in this White House is not "Is it good for the country?" but more often "Is it good for the Republican Party?"

Not only do I not think this is true, I know for a fact that the vaunted Bob Woodward doesn't think it's true.

In his book on the runup to the war, after Bush had been told that the intelligence was a 'slam dunk' Woodward describes a meeting where he made the decision "to go into Iraq, even if it cost him the election."

No, I truly don't think that foreign policy decisions were made according to some republican welfare criteria.

For once and for all, the true description of a neo-con is one who has a vision of the US as a force for change around the world. The Ultimate Hedgemonist. Philosophically driven, not primarily politically driven.

McClellan includes the charges in a 341-page book, "What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and Washington's Culture of Deception," that delivers a harsh look at the White House and the man he served for close to a decade. He describes Bush as demonstrating a "lack of inquisitiveness," says the White House operated in "permanent campaign" mode, and admits to having been deceived by some in the president's inner circle about the leak of a CIA operative's name.

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"The president had promised himself that he would accomplish what his father had failed to do by winning a second term in office," he writes. "And that meant operating continually in campaign mode: never explaining, never apologizing, never retreating. Unfortunately, that strategy also had less justifiable repercussions: never reflecting, never reconsidering, never compromising. Especially not where Iraq was concerned.