Former Speechwriter Says Bush Slammed Obama, Predicted Palin Debacle

Former president George W. Bush had a flair for insulting the people fighting to be his successor, former speechwriter Matt Latimer reveals in the October issue of GQ. The piece, an excerpt from Latimer's forthcoming book, "Speech Less: Tales of a White House Survivor," gives a candid look at the final days of the Bush presidency. In several passages, Bush comments on the candidates then vying for the White House:

The president, like me, didn't seem to be in love with any of the available options. He always believed Hillary Clinton would be the Democratic nominee. "Wait till her fat keister is sitting at this desk," he once said (except he didn't say "keister"). He didn't think much of Barack Obama. After one of Obama's blistering speeches against the administration, the president had a very human reaction: He was ticked off. He came in one day to rehearse a speech, fuming. "This is a dangerous world," he said for no apparent reason, "and this cat isn't remotely qualified to handle it. This guy has no clue, I promise you." He wound himself up even more. "You think I wasn't qualified?" he said to no one in particular. "I was qualified."

Latimer also writes that in the final months of the presidential campaign, Bush stunned the euphoric White House by objecting to John McCain's selection of Sarah Palin as his running mate, which the former president would at first only describe as "interesting." Even though he was informed that conservatives were responding enthusiastically, Bush advised people to wait "until the bloom is off the rose." Finally, as everyone in the room "looked at him with horror, Bush gave a 'smart assessment' ":

"This woman is being put into a position she is not even remotely prepared for," he said. "She hasn't spent one day on the national level. Neither has her family. Let's wait and see how she looks five days out." It was a rare dose of reality in a White House that liked to believe every decision was great, every Republican was a genius, and McCain was the hope of the world because, well, because he chose to be a member of our party.