Dear Leader's Rules

Roger Cohen, of the International Herald Tribune and Globalist columnist for the NYTimes, has come up with a cheeky set of 20 "cardinal rules" for the President. It's hidden behind the Times Select subscription wall, but here's a taste

1) "I'm the decider, and I decide what is best," as spelled out on April 18, 2006.

4) Always push freedom and democracy, especially in the Middle East, and even when the newest democracies are being bombed by your ally. As Bush said on May 24, 2005, "See, in my line of work you got to keep repeating things over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kind of catapult the propaganda."

5) When forced to travel, head home as fast as possible. It's weird out there in the world. A lot of people don't drink Diet Coke.

7) Never express skepticism, doubt, nuance, ambivalence or uncertainty. None of these concessions to the complexity of the world wins elections. Winning is about remembering it's us against them. Politics is war by other means. Or rather: politics is war, at times by other means.

10) A politician whose intelligence is underestimated is more effective, and more dangerous, than a politician whose intelligence is respected.

11) Never stray from the war on terror as paradigm. Once you've piled them all into a single sack - Al Qaeda, Hamas, Hezbollah, much of the Iraqi insurgency, Chechen insurrectionists and the like - and stuck a "terrorists" label on it, you've simplified the world. Once you have war without end, you've solved the problem of the end of the Cold War, which left America without an enemy.

Sure, a price is paid, but as Bush said last year: "Well, we've made the decision to defeat the terrorists abroad so we don't have to face them here at home. And you engage terrorists abroad, it causes activity and action."

12) Action will mask a host of errors, at least for a while. Keep moving.

14) Keep people on their toes with bamboozling statements like this one last year on the Iraqi response to America's presence: "I think we are welcomed. But it was not a peaceful welcome." Or, when sitting in Russia with world leaders: "Got something to do tonight. Go to the airport, get on the airplane and go home."

17) Israel is always right, or about right, or near enough right, or at least more right than its enemies.

19) Darwin is dubious.

20) Deciders are decisive, and may history - which goes on for a very long time, and long after any of us are around anyway, by which point this particular decider won't be in a position to care - be the judge.