Ron Suskind's juicy bits

I've been reading Ron Suskind's The One Percent Doctrine: Deep Inside America's Pursuit of Its Enemies Since 9/11. Here's an interesting selection about Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah's visit to G. Bush's ranch in 2002:

Abdullah, dabbing his lips, snapped to attention as the brownies were cleared... They had eight items on their list. They needed deliverables - something to bring back to the roiling Gulf that would ease the Arab world. Would Bush back up his words with actions? Was he on Sharon's side, or was the United States still interested in supporting its Arab friends? Was America any longer the region's honest broker?

But the discussions could get no traction. The Saudis wanted pressure on Sharon to release Arafat from confinement in Ramallah. Saud went over possible steps the United States could take. Bush stared blankly at them. They went down the items. Sometimes the President nodded, as though something sounded reasonable, but he offered little response.

And, after almost an hour of this, the Saudis, looking a bit perplexed, got up to go. It was as though Bush had never read the packet they sent over to the White House in preparation for this meeting: a terse, lean document, just a few pages, listing the Saudis' demands and an array of options that the President might consider. After the meeting, a few attendees on the American team wondered why the President seemed to have no idea what the Saudis were after, and why he didn't bother to answer their concerns or get any concessions from them, either, on the 'war on terror'... Several of the attendees checked into what had happened.

The Saudi packet, they found, had been diverted to Dick Cheney's office. The President never got it, never read it. In what may have been the most important, and contentious, foreign policy meeting of his presidency, George W. Bush was unaware of what the Saudis hoped to achieve in traveling to Crawford."

So assume this is true; why didn't Cheney give Bush the Saudi packet? Was he afraid Bush would give up too much to the Saudis or too little? My money is too little. Cheney wanted to give the Saudis what they wanted and was afraid Bush's principles would cause him to stick with the Israelis. Earlier in the book we read

Privately, the current President had railed against his father's alliances, and his mistakes. Living, and leading, in reaction to his namesake was a guiding principle. In a defense of his tilting toward Israel, for example, Bush told an old foreign policy hand, 'I'm not going to be supportive of my father and all his Arab buddies!'

So Cheney cut Bush out of the loop. Cut the President of the United States out of the loop.