Let Sullivan be Sullivan

After the SOTU, Andrew Sullivan's been getting the usual abuse from Bush-supporters: the accusation that he's gone wobbly. I joined in the chorus last time, but not this time. I disagree with him on his overall take on the speech, but agree on certain points. I am underwhelmed, for example, by the president's attention on steroids, and other points I believe to be beyond the federal government's appropriate purview. Nevertheless, I don't think that this signals the kind of hubris or malaise that Sullivan and others might think. I think Bush is ready and waiting for campaign season to start, and that he wants this re-election, wants it so bad that he will campaign the living hell out of anybody that the Dems push up against him. Bush the Elder, alas, thought the re-election was his by right. I do not think the son is so deluded.


At any rate, Sullivan is right to point out (as he's been pointing out for a year or more) that there is much to worry a true fiscal conservative with regard to the Bush presidency. Alas, I don't take Democratic rhetoric on fiscal responsibility seriously. So I swallow the pill of fiscal stupidity so that I can get continued leadership towards undermining terrorism. So, I think in the end, will Sully. So leave him be. The old boy's not even a Republican.


UPDATE: Just scanned the SOTU reviews over at National Review Online, and many of them bring up the same substantive critiques. Even John Derbyshire (insert "bedfellows" joke here). So qwitcherbitchin'.