I agree. Kind of. Still, cutting it makes it an even less gratifying movie to watch. What's worse - stupidity, or no sense of visual-narrative pleasure WHATSOEVER?
That's not a rhetorical question. I'm honestly not sure. And it's a question you rarely have to ask. If a film is truly bad, you never really ask that question - you file the film under "'F' for 'Forget it'", to quote the great Dale Cooper. But Star Wars is different, mostly thanks to brilliant The Empire Strikes Back. You want to save it because you care about the story despite the awfulness of parts of it.
AotC as is makes the downfall of the Jedi seem not only inevitable given their arrogant and servile nature - their subservience almost smells of decadence in the classical sense; fall of the Roman empire-esque as it is - but also you're left with no real sense of loss. They're bloody THICK, meaning they deserve it.
The galacto-political ramifications of this bloody thick-ness are probably the most subtle and interesting thing about the films. Still, I'm not sure that's the impression George Lucas wanted my mind to be left with after watching the prequels. In fact, if you asked him why Obi-Wan was so stupid in AotC, I think he would respond with a resounding "Huh?".
Where am I going? I have no idea. Maybe that if we want to make the Jedi more intelligent, we might have to rewrite and remake all the prequels, because if you take out the Space Detective, there's nothing left that's actually enjoyable.
Or is there any way of inserting something better about Obi-Wan having reason to believe that clones might be loyal to their (new) master, despite the actual intent of their breeding? If he has a REASON to believe this, it might lessen the bloody thick-ness. The betrayal comes as no surprise to anyone apart from the Jedi. Narratively, that stinks to high heaven.