Cross-posted on Political Grind.

Charles Krauthammer, the clinically trained psychiatrist turned conservative columnist, whimsically announced a new mental disorder back in 2003: "Bush Derangement Syndrome." Krauthammer defined the condition as "the acute onset of paranoia in otherwise normal people in reaction to the policies, the presidency—nay—the very existence of George W. Bush" (read the original Post column here).

Consider this recent example of BDS:

"I am writing because we have an emergency."

"There are ten steps that are taken in order to close down a democracy or crush a pro-democratic movement, whether by capitalists, communists, or right-wing fascists. These ten steps, together, are more than the sum of their parts. Once all ten have been put in place, each magnifies the power of the others and of the whole."

"Impossible as it may seem, we are seeing each of these ten steps taking hold in the United States today."

So writes Naomi Wolf in End of America: A Letter of Warning to a Young Patriot, which reveals that the Bush administration is using the events of 9-11 to destroy democracy in America and institute a fascist police state. Most alarming, in her view, the Bush conspirators are not patiently sowing the seeds of a future or incremental conservative coup; Wolf expects a major crackdown on dissent (like locking people up in gulags) within the year.

What of Naomi Wolf and her call to arms?

A celebrated feminist writer and thinker, Wolf is currently director of the Woodhull Institute for Ethical Leadership. She emerged as a superstar in women's studies in 1991 when she published her first monograph, The Beauty Myth, which argued that the patriarchy intentionally placed a premium on female beauty to maintain oppression against women. Several books later, she quietly advised Bill Clinton to be a "father figure" to the country and may have coined the term "soccer mom." She entered pop culture consciousness as Al Gore's high-priced image consultant for his 2000 presidential campaign, when TIME Magazine reported her suggestions that the candidate wear more "earth tones" and assert himself as an "alpha male."

Back in the early 1990s, commenting on the Beauty Myth, Camille Paglia offered the following withering analysis of Wolf’s literary debut:

"If you want to see what's wrong with Ivy League education, look at...Naomi Wolf. [She] is a woman who graduated from Yale magna cum laude, is a Rhodes scholar, and cannot write a coherent paragraph."

Paglia also asserted that Wolf proved completely incapable of performing "historical analysis," was "full of paranoid fantasies," and "completely removed from reality."

Unfortunately, Paglia's frank assessment from fifteen years ago remains apropos to this current work. In terms of pedaling "paranoid fantasies," disappointingly, Wolf is at it again.

This weekend, I watched Wolf on AfterWords, a very smart C-SPAN2/ Book-TV program that spotlights authors and their recent books. AfterWords features a guest author interviewed by a guest host, who is always another consequential public figure with some connection to the author or the subject matter of the new book.

For example, last weekend, Viet Dinh interviewed Wolf regarding End of America. Wolf views the USA Patriot Act as a primary component of the Bush plan to subvert liberty in America. Viet Dinh is a superstar of conservative legal scholarship who served as Assistant Attorney General for George Bush from 2001-2003. He is generally accepted as the dominant intellectual force behind the Patriot Act.

Naomi Wolf appeared one other time (that I know of) on AfterWords. Back in March 2006 she interviewed the eminent Harvard philosopher and conservative public intellectual, Harvey Mansfield, who had recently published a book called Manliness. You see the tension. The beautiful and brilliant feminist luminary (and Yalie) pitted against the distinguished gentleman scholar of the traditionalist persuasion, who happens to be arguing that the world would be a better place if men acted more like men.

Of course, AfterWords works best when the two potential antagonists are not adversarial. For example, Viet Dinh proved courteous, interested, and deferential to the author in his stint as guest interviewer. I did not put a stop watch to the exchange--but my sense is that Wolf won "time of possession" handily. Wolf has a tendency to monologue, filibuster, and use questions as platforms to make quasi-related boilerplate statements. Her answers to his queries most often mirrored passages in her book nearly verbatim.

In contrast, in her previous role as a guest interviewer, Wolf mostly debated Harvey Mansfield.

Time-Out for Full Disclosure: at some point, for the record, it is incumbent on me to state the obvious: I do not admire or respect Naomi Wolf very much. In terms of her intellect: what Camille Paglia said. In terms of her prowess as an historian: she is sloppy, facile, and completely misguided in re the role of history in society. She makes an elementary mistake in advertising history as a tool to predict the future and too often ham-handedly manipulates the past to illustrate whatever particular political point of view she supports in the present.

Moreover, I dislike her personal style. She is all smiles and winks, using every ounce of her humanity (and femininity) to give off the impression of collegiality and civility. But there are flashes of anger, petulance, and superiority lurking always just below her strained mask of placidity.

She feels free to interrupt whenever she takes a notion--but she snaps curtly, "excuse me," and continues on when the interviewer attempts to intervene for a pertinent follow-up question in the midst of one of her harangues.

She deals almost exclusively in the currency of broad logic, sweeping statements, guilt by transfer, scare tactics, and hyperbole.

George Bush is following Hitler’s playbook.

The White House is studying Goebbels for keys to success.

The student whom authorities tasered in Florida was really silenced on the orders of Jeb Bush (even if he was no longer governor at the time of the incident).

Frankly, I have grown weary of all this silliness.

The Bottom Line:

Crying Wolf in this particular manner has been with us from the very beginning in American politics. Jefferson did it to Adams. Clay did it to Jackson. In 1858, with a straight face, Abraham Lincoln asserted that a "slave power conspiracy" intended to impose slavery on the "free" and sovereign states north of the Mason-Dixon line. And he named names. Lincoln (a Republican) charged that the cabal included two presidents (both Democrats), a Supreme Court chief justice (a Democratic appointee), and Stephen A. Douglas, who happened to by his Democratic opponent for the Illinois senate race that year. Southerners reciprocated by demonizing Lincoln as a wild-eyed abolitionist bent on destroying their "peculiar institution" post haste (and convinced themselves so thoroughly that they seceded from the Union upon his election as president in 1860). And the beat goes on. We did it to Clinton. And Naomi Wolf and a host of others are doing it to our current president.

Are these ravings healthy for the body politic? Reasonable people will disagree—although it mostly depends on whose ox is getting gored. So far, at least, this tendency has never caused any irreparable damage to the system (although the aforementioned Civil War came dangerously close). Regardless of the larger debate, inarguably, this constant chant that "Republicans are evil" and "Bush is Hitler" poisons the well.

The people who ought to know better vex me the most.

Politicians, party hacks, and conspiracy theorists do what comes natural. But public figures posing as intellectuals and historians must meet a much more rigorous standard of responsibility. Disingenuous propaganda and inflammatory demagoguery is not worthy of their higher calling. Naomi Wolf and her cohorts should demonstrate greater respect for the truth, love the nation more, and hate George Bush less.

What should be done? Nothing. Just as the freedom to burn the flag proves that most of the reasons for burning the flag are completely misguided, the fact that the "Naomi Wolfs" of our world don't get carted off to federal detention centers in the middle of the night for reasons of national security proves that we maintain extraordinary latitude in criticizing (slandering) our government.