Via TNR’s Jonathan Chait, the Weekly Standard’s Fred Barnes reveals the bizarre standards of judgment President Bush uses in making decisions:

The
president is especially fond of General George Casey, the commander on the ground in Iraq. He invited Casey and his family to a meal at the White House last year, partly to size him up by seeing how he interacted with his wife and kids. In September, he told conservative journalists he was totally confident in Casey’s advice. “If Casey is wrong, I’m wrong,” he said.

Why not “size him up” by evaluating, say, how well Casey manages the war in Iraq? The President seems to rely heavily on snap judgments and irrelevant personality traits in making decisions. Consider what’s already publicly known.

Back in 2001, Bush famously claimed he “looked [Vladimir Putin] in the eye” and “was able to get a sense of his soul.” According to the Washington Post, Bush “complained privately about [former economic adviser Larry Lindsey’s] failure to exercise physically” before forcing him out in 2002. And when interviewing Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III for a vacancy on the Supreme Court, Bush “asked him about the hardest decision he had ever made – and also how much he exercised.”

So how did Bush pick General Petraeus to replace Casey? Did Barney like Petraeus when he came to the White House? Maybe Petraeus has a better bench press?