What Exactly Is This Malfunction Called?

I just haven't had the juice to blog these last couple of days. Between Tom Delay's ironically cockroach-like survival under conditions that ought to exterminate any public figure, and that simpering, narrow-eyed, shoulder-hopping laugh that accompanies the most unfunny jokes in human history coming from George "I'm not a chimp" Bush, I find myself wondering this: Is there some mental condition that protects right-wingers from the illness that overcomes me and many of my cohorts whenever we see or hear either of these vile characters? There is something so repulsive in each of these figures that I simply can no longer countenance them on my television or in a magazine or on radio. To hear Bush's faux-folksie drawl wrestling with even single-syllable words in a mock sincerity that is so obviously phony literally puts me off my lunch. And Tom Delay, while as smart and crafty and ruthless as Karl Rove, is so morally compromised that he nearly can be seen to be rotting before our eyes.

And yet there are millions of Americans who love these two. How is that possible?

Humans are wired marvelously for determining subtle indicators of hostile or other intentions in our fellow humans. Call it a bullshit detector or an alarm system, the capability serves us well at avoiding uncomfortable or even dangerous encounters. Some people, admittedly, have a very high sensitivity to such things, and live lives of terror. Others, however, have almost none, and in situations that would have most of us running for our lives or striking against the threat, will actually embrace someone who is intent on harming them.

So, is love of Bush and Delay some sort of brain disorder? Oh, if only that were true, then there would be hope. Yes, our long Bush-Delay nightmare would turn out to be something treatable, perhaps. Then again, maybe not, since even when confronted with proof, including the person's own words (as in Bush admitting no WDM or Al Qaeda connections in Iraq), the repugs still love their corrupt and failed leaders and will deny the existence of any such evidence.

Snow is falling outside. Better to watch that than continue this for the moment.