Just in case you were part of the 19% of the country who don’t think the quote unquote president is dangerously naive, read this brief excerpt from “Dead Certain,” the much-talked-about new biography of Bush. You’ll get a close look at his “leadership” style, as when he tries through the sheer power of his own personality to wish Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki into doing a better job. This is a style often associated with little girls and boys. In separate news coverage, Bush admits he “cries a lot.”

In this piece, Bush also says that if he decides that Maliki is “deceptive,” then we’ll change course, because deception is an unfit characteristic for leaders. (Clearly, Dick Cheney missed this lesson.) Deception, by the way, is the hallmark of leadership according to Sun Tzu and Macchiavelli. To Bush, who operates from the heart and can scry an opponent’s full character simply by looking in his eyes, a la Vladimir Putin, such things are demonic.

It’s distressing to be ruled by a naif, especially when he’s doing it so badly.

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