… and then of course there’s
    Pro-Bush Derangement Syndrome

1. George W. Bush is almost certainly guilty of torture, a felony under Federal law which becomes a capital crime if any of the victims dies.
2. A Green Party candidate calls for GWB’s trial and execution, and Chris Matthews laughs.
3. Hinderaker more or less accuses the candidate, and Matthews, of calling for Bush’s assassination. (Hinderaker’s headline: “Kill the President? Good idea!”)
4. Glenn Reynolds agrees.

I would have expected Glenn Reynolds, a law professor, and John Hinderaker, a lawyer, to be able to distinguish between (1) advocating that someone who has committed a capital offense be tried and executed and (2)advocating that the offender in question be murdered. But, as is so often the case, I would have been completely wrong. Are they suffering from PBDS (pro-Bush derangement syndrome)? We report, you decide.

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

3 thoughts on “… and then of course there’s
    Pro-Bush Derangement Syndrome”

  2. This does not surprise me, because I follow the dictum that whatever appalls Republicans reflects their deepest wishes. We already know that they believe in – and are trying to engineer more – kangaroo trials. And not just for Bill Clinton, atheist Saddam Hussein and foreign Muslims.
    Their views are right out of Alice through the Looking Glass — announce the verdict, stage the execution, then organize the trial. I wish I were joking, but I am not.

  3. I have long believed, and have written at my own place, that GWBush could appear on TV, sodomizing Glenn's, or Hindrocket's wives, snorting a mound of cocaine, defecate on the floor, turn to the camera and say "Fuck all y'all", and the PBDS wingers would applaud, and immediately blog about his "steely-eyed vision, clarity and strengh of purpose, his virtue."
    Bastards.

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