For some reason, people don't seem to actually watch the rankings shows. Kirby Hocutt said there was a lot of debate about Oklahoma, Clemson, and Miami. It's not like it was exactly a cut and dried selection. The other thing he said is that Clemson has more wins over teams with winning records than anyone in the top 25, and he mentioned that the committee was impressed with two of Clemson's road wins, as opposed to Miami. (And they have the Auburn win to boot.) He also said previously that the committee, particularly the coaches, simply don't like Oklahoma because of their defense. He gave a pretty clear explanation of why the teams were ranked like they were.
One other point, which you raised about Syracuse. The committee simply doesn't consider a "bad loss." A loss is a loss, is the way they look at it. You may not agree with that, and that's fine, but that's simply not how the committee looks at it.