BURDEN OF DREAMS. Thus sprach Tacitus (scroll to June 14, "assumed elision" -- Tac has encrypted his permalinks and I don't have a Turing Machine):

With all respect to those who operated on a thesis of Administration incompetence from day one, most of them have all the rational quality of the Randy Quaid character from ID4: just because an alien invasion did finally happen doesn't mean you're no longer a nutcake. You're just a very lucky nutcake. And you will be tomorrow. Rational, sane people could and did believe that the occupation would be pursued along rational, sane lines. I'm among them, and I see no reason to apologize for it. We were wrong, of course, but if you think that invalidates our judgment for the rest of time, well, think again...

Remember that, sons of Lenin: even when you're right, you're wrong. Or nuts. Or something.

Actually I know how he feels. During the Reagan years, I saw that the country was turning into a nuthouse in which money-worship unhinged my fellow-citizens sufficiently that, like medieval peasants, they became awestruck at the very presence of riches and even ceased to recall that some, at least, of that money had once been available for their own use. This madness never entirely passed, as many aspects of our hellish present condition -- in which Middle Easterners we once paid off to fight proxy wars on our behalf have become our most dangerous enemies, and people eat worms on TV for money -- stem directly from it.

I never doubted that it was my country, not me, that was going nuts. So I can imagine how it must be for Tacitus. Now he's talking about abolishing the Department of Education -- something even Reagan couldn't do. Similarly, I dream of a world where abortions, teenage group sex, and blasphemy are mandatory. I suppose we'll both fall a little short. If you have a dream, any dream, you are sometimes going to sound like a visionary, which is to say, like a fucking nut. I know I do; but I am surrounded by a warm and loving community that enables my ravings with praise, as others might throw dollars into a cockfighting pit, and this makes things a little easier. Tacitus has his own readers, and whatever military operation he keeps slipping off to assist (I like to think he's on a top-secret mission to develop Captain Shotover's mind ray).

In the end age (in my case, senility) will bring the wisdom that heat-sinks all emotional power surges, and we will relax, he in his armory, I in my charity hospital, and watch with equanimity the world growing madder and madder.