"Meet the Press", by Samuel Beckett:

Russert: And we are in the Oval Office this morning with the President of the United States. Mr. President, welcome back to Meet The Press.

President Bush: Thank you, sir.

Russert: On Friday, you announced a committee, commission to look into intelligence failures regarding the Iraq war and our entire intelligence community. You have been reluctant to do that for some time. (despairing) Why?

President Bush: Well, first let me kind of step back and talk about intelligence in general, if I might. Intelligence is a vital part of fighting and winning the war against the terrorists. It is because the war against terrorists is a war against individuals who hide in caves in remote parts of the world, individuals who have these kind of shadowy networks, individuals who deal with rogue nations. So, we need a good intelligence system. (whimsically) We need really good intelligence.

So, the commission I set up is to obviously analyze what went right or what went wrong with the Iraqi intelligence. It was kind of lessons learned. But it's really set up to make sure the intelligence services provide as good a product as possible for future presidents as well. This is just a part of analyzing where we are on the war against terror.

(pause) There is a lot of investigations going on about the intelligence service, particularly in the Congress, and that's good as well. The Congress has got the capacity to look at the intelligence gathering without giving away state secrets, and I look forward to all the investigations and looks. (despairing) Again, I repeat to you, the capacity to have good intelligence means that a president can make good calls about fighting this war on terror.

Russert: Prime Minister Blair has set up a similar commission in Great Britain.

President Bush: (pause) Yeah.

Russert: His is going to report back in July. Ours is not going to be until March of 2005, five months after the presidential election.

President Bush: (pause) Yeah.

[snip]

Russert: There is another commission right now looking into September 11th.

President Bush: (pause) Yeah.

Russert: Will you testify before that commission?

President Bush: We have given extraordinary cooperation with Chairmen Kean and Hamilton. As you know, we made an agreement on what's called "Presidential Daily Briefs," and they could see the information the CIA provided me that is unique, by the way, to have provided what's called the PDB, because...

Russert: Presidential Daily Brief?

President Bush: (pause) Right.

[snip]

Russert: Let me turn to Iraq. And this is the whole idea of what you based your decision to go to war on.

President Bush: (pause) Sure, sure.

Russert: The night you took the country to war, March 17th, you said this: "Intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised."

President Bush: (pause) Right.

Russert: That apparently is not the case.

President Bush: (pause) Correct.

[snip]

Russert: When allegations were made about John McCain or Wesley Clark on their military records, they opened up their entire files. Would you agree to do that?

President Bush: Yeah. (pause) Listen, these files, I mean, people have been looking for these files for a long period of time, trust me, and starting in the 1994 campaign for governor. And I can assure you in the year 2000, people were looking for those files as well. Probably you were. (pause) And, absolutely. I mean, I...

Russert: (despairing) But would you allow pay stubs, tax records, anything to show that you were serving during that period?

President Bush: Yeah. If we still have them, but I, you know, the records are kept in Colorado, as I understand, and they scoured the records. (exit)

Well, it's just a first draft....