For years, and quite after it was obvious that the Bush administration was a kind of tinpot revolution of rabid anti-New-Dealers, fascist lawbreakers and choose-up-siders, legions of Bush’s supporters threw around the defamatory remark that anyone pining for the Constitution was somehow a problematic mind suffering from “Bush derangement syndrome.”

The reality, of course, is that many of these maniacs were the ones truly deranged.

One of the benefits of study of America’s history is the discredit of the patriotic naivete that, I am afraid to say, so many of my fellow citizens (and too many these days on the left) seem to have gained from their superficial, clouded view of what this country is really about.

Every one of Bush’s stupid defenders–and by that I mean ones not directly and heavily invested in this collapsing administration, who may be acting rationally by defending him–should take a look at what Joe Nacchio is saying:

‘Former chief executive Joseph P. Nacchio, convicted in April of 19 counts of insider trading, said the NSA approached Qwest more than six months before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, according to court documents unsealed in Denver this week.’

All of a sudden all those 9/11 rationalizations that political commentators of all sorts have given for the illegal wiretapping and data mining all fall by the wayside. Time to think of some new excuses, deranged Republicans.