“More than a little scary.”

So says Ezra at Tapped about Kathryn Lopez’s truly bizarre response to Miers’ withdrawal, which, to summarize, was “Phew. It looked like the entire wingnut conservative movement was going to implode, but now that the crisis is over, we can go back to pretending Bush is infallible.” There’s some kind of massive disconnect causing people like Lopez to blithely ignore all the things happening—including Miers’ nomination—that lit the wick in the first place are Bush’s responsibility.

Ez gets it totally right when he notes:

While a cult of personality focusing on Bush's mid-40s spiritual resurrection and his quiet, determined morality has long been necessary to hide his essential lack of commitment to conservative causes, the belief in George W. Bush is beginning to take on a religious subtext: Even when Big Things go wrong, like floods, plagues, and earthquakes, you can take comfort in knowing that they were temporary detours in a benevolent, carefully examined master plan. This isn't political analysis or pop-psychology, it's theology. Back in reality, what actually happened to Miers is that her nomination was greeted with hostility from the right, bemusement from the left, and was finally slapped back by an angry conservative base and Bill Frist's admission that she wouldn't be confirmed. In politics, that's not called a detour; it's a defeat. That Lopez has instead taken it as more proof of Bush's infallible internal compass is, to be honest, more than a little scary.