You are probably right about Bush not being aware of that "silver platter". But how about sacking that official who made that decision? Who was it? Military or political? They did it on the Abu-whatever prison, why not here?
First of all what decision? The American public (and especially Freepers) need to end this weird fantasy that when they read or hear something from our media it has any bearing on the truth. The first assumption when you see any MSM story should be "This story presents a partial or false picture designed to promote the specific agenda of the person or agency who wrote it." How many forged document, photoshopped photo, "Karl Rove leaked Plame's name", examples do we need before we stop instantly knee jerking ourselves into outrage everytime the MSM releases some anonymously sourced drivel about how screwed up the world is. Ok...off the soapbox
"Military or political?"
The military writes its rules of engagement after consulting with its own lawyers. The rules are based on laws and precedents. But they can flex with regard to the nature of the situation. This has been true since our military was formed. There are always rules and usually there are good reasons for them. Since nobody on this thread really has any idea what happened in this situation outside of some reporter's interpretation, it isn't even worth speculating what really happened here.