During a private dinner at the White House to discuss how to buoy Bush's presidency, seven voted to dump Rumsfeld, including Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, incoming chief of staff Joshua B. Bolten, the outgoing chief, Andrew Card, and Ed Gillespie, then an outside adviser and now White House counselor. Bush raised his hand along with three others who wanted Rumsfeld to stay, including Rove and national security adviser Stephen J. Hadley.

The book has some gossipy infighting details about Rove, Card, Bartlett and Bolton.

Rove also opposed Cheney for the VP slot:

Rove told Bush it was a bad idea to select Cheney as his vice president: "Selecting Daddy's top foreign-policy guru ran counter to message. It was worse than a safe pick -- it was needy." But Bush did not care -- he was comfortable with Cheney and "saw no harm in giving his VP unprecedented run of the place."

About Rove, Bush and Valerie Plame:

Rove assured Bush, Draper reports, that he had known nothing about Valerie Plame, a CIA operative whose covert status was revealed by administration officials to reporters after Plame's husband criticized the administration's case for war in Iraq. "When Bush learned otherwise," he said, "he hit the roof."

Two more quick hits: Bush has no lofty aspirations to help the world after his term is done:

He told Draper he could see himself shuttling between Dallas and Crawford. Noting that he ran into former president Bill Clinton at the United Nations last year, Bush added, "Six years from now, you're not going to see me hanging out in the lobby of the U.N."

And the last line of the NY Times article on the book:

“Sixty-two is really young,” Mr. Bush said, “and yet I’ll be through with my presidency.”

Thank goodness. Not a moment too soon.