Cured!

Peggy Noonan says that no one now believes that loathing the President is a sign of “Bush Deranagment Syndrome. Now THAT’s a relief.

Peggy Noonan, reflecting on why just about everyone these days loathes and despises George W. Bush:

I’m not referring to what used to be called Bush Derangement Syndrome. That phrase suggested that to passionately dislike the president was to be somewhat unhinged. No one thinks that anymore. [emphasis added]

I’m glad to hear it. (Quick! Someone tell Krauthammer and Don Surber and their fan Glenn Reynolds.) It feels good to be sane again.

But I have a question for Noonan and the other folks who have finally stopped drinking the Kool-Aid: When did I stop being crazy? When did it become consistent with sanity to notice that we are ruled by combination of fool, fanatic, bully, and weakling? Or is it barely possible that what “no one thinks anymore” was never the case, and that the derangement was on the other side?

If anyone on the Right, including Noonan, challenged the rhetorical tactic of questioning the mental health of Bush’s critics, I must have missed it. Consider that the next time Wingnutistan picks itself a target.

I’m not expecting an apology. But would just a little bit of self-reflection, prompting just a little bit of humility, be too much to ask? I suppose it would.

h/t Andrew Sullivan

Author: Mark Kleiman

Professor of Public Policy at the NYU Marron Institute for Urban Management and editor of the Journal of Drug Policy Analysis. Teaches about the methods of policy analysis about drug abuse control and crime control policy, working out the implications of two principles: that swift and certain sanctions don't have to be severe to be effective, and that well-designed threats usually don't have to be carried out. Books: Drugs and Drug Policy: What Everyone Needs to Know (with Jonathan Caulkins and Angela Hawken) When Brute Force Fails: How to Have Less Crime and Less Punishment (Princeton, 2009; named one of the "books of the year" by The Economist Against Excess: Drug Policy for Results (Basic, 1993) Marijuana: Costs of Abuse, Costs of Control (Greenwood, 1989) UCLA Homepage Curriculum Vitae Contact: Markarkleiman-at-gmail.com