Obama avoids intel briefings on purpose. Probably for the reason W pointed out, he does not want to be changed. In fact, all statists avoid truth for that reason.
I was going to quote that line too.
I recall some aide talking about Bush at those meetings. He would just listen. No notes, didn’t say much unless to ask a question. They thought he wasn’t really paying attention. Then one day he told them what he was going to do, gave them the reasons and the facts told to him in earlier meetings to back it up, etc.
I recall the day after the first election some liberal at work was all distressed about Bush getting elected, that she hated Bush, etc. I replied “Yeah - I don’t care for him all that much either. He’s too liberal.” She looked at me like I had two heads!
Given the choice between George W. or Al Gore - it was easy.