Many in the right wing have called it Bush Derangement Syndrome (BDS), believed to be originally coined by Anything Not Far-Right Derangement Syndrome (ANFRDS) sufferer, neo-conservative pundit, Charles Krauthammer. Krauthammer defined BDS as “the acute onset of paranoia in otherwise normal people in reaction to the policies, the presidency — the very existence of George W. Bush.” It stems from the belief that some extreme criticisms of President Bush are emotional rather than based on facts or logic.
In the hands of the functionally literate BDS would be considered an honest take if it applied to those who blanket-hate the President. But it has been applied by the Right’s entire noise machine to anyone who doesn’t have their tongue so far up the President’s butt you can taste his chewing gum.
Problem with Krauthammer’s assertion is that the polls show that vitriol lobbed towards this president consistently climbed during his presidency. Did our emotions change or did the facts? Did we fall out of love just because the dew had fallen off the rose or were we so regularly physically beaten by our suitor’s bad judgement that we needed to attain a restraining order because we were tired of explaining to the world that the fresh black eye we greeted them with each week was caused by a flying door.
The fact is, the door that slammed into our collective faces was a President and his administration who didn’t give a damn about what we thought. Bush, Cheney and their minions are famous for the “we don’t pay attention to the polls” style of administering their duties. The President has called them a snapshot of yesterday’s news. Problem is, the snapshot has grown into a seven and a half years of “Shoah.”
Unfortunately, we couldn’t find a lawyer courageous enough to get us out of the marriage until this abusive presidency died of natural causes.
As they have done for years the Right just added BDS to the nomenclature built on dismissing disagreement with the President or his actions as emotional or anti-American.
Bill O’Reilly sold half his show this past week asking his objective pundits - Glenn Beck and Bernie Goldberg: Does the Left senselessly hate President Bush or are they just sick? The “Did you stop beating your wife” question is at the core of most talk radio debate. It doesn’t open the discussion for actual…discussion. For if it did, they’d be discussing lost lives in Katrina and Iraq: vice presidents who feel that “I think so,” is an appropriate answer to whether 4500 American soldiers and 100,000 Iraqis dead was worth invading Iraq; that torture was approved; that covert American spies could be outed…by their own government; that environmental standards could be lowered; that justices selected were being chosen politically ; that…oh hell, I guess I’m just being all emotional.
But as the ANFRDS sufferers, the few of them left, would say, he did keep us safe - though if they weren’t just being emotional they’d have to add - “…from a SECOND attack on his watch.”
Sick, full of hatred, or just plain tired of watching this country being pulled every which way but up, this BDS afflicted American can only say…
DON’T LET THE DOOR HIT YOU IN THE ASS ON THE WAY OUT.
Steve Young blogs at steveyoungonpolitics.com
