Not often do I see my darker and more paranoid speculations confirmed in the MSM, but today is an exception.

First, I'll repeat my darker speculations from last Tuesday:

....(Others would argue that George Bush himself is sick of the very people he's deliberately manipulated to believe he's one of; I heard Howard Dean say precisely that!)

But politics is about compromise, and many Republicans have compromised with the "religious right." Hell, I've compromised my worthless principles every time I've voted for a Republican who supported the evil "Drug war," so what the hell is the big effing deal with the religious so-called right? I figure maybe if they don't want to kill me, why should I want to kill them? (Especially when millions and millions want to kill us!)

WASHINGTON - A former aide to President Bush contends that evangelical Christians were embraced for political gain at the White House but derided privately as "nuts," "ridiculous" and "goofy."

The allegations - denied by the White House on Friday - are in a new book by David Kuo, a conservative Christian who was deputy director of Bush's Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives until 2003.

The book describes Kuo's frustration at what he felt was lackluster enthusiasm in the White House for the program, which seeks to steer more federal social-service contracts to religious organizations. Details from the book, Tempting Faith: An Inside Story of Political Seduction, were reported by MSNBC ahead of tomorrow's publication date.

Kuo singled out staffers in the office of Karl Rove, Bush's top political adviser, as particularly condescending toward evangelical Christians, viewing them as necessary to help win elections but ridiculing them behind the scenes.

Kuo also described how officials from the faith-based office were dispatched to hold large events in areas where there were key House and Senate races before the 2002 elections.

As to the "nuts, ridiculous, and goofy" business, as a libertarian I'm quite used to it. It's politics.

What ought to matter are not private attitudes, but areas of common agreement.

I know I'm a compromiser, but I once tried to sum up (in admittedly blunt language) one way we might be able to get along:

"You have a constitutional right to be sickened by anything and everything which sickens you. Just don't get mad at me for not puking."

Of course, it's easy for me to argue that my private thoughts are irrelevant, and that I have every right to deride or praise anything I want in private. Other people, I would argue, have a similar right to their private derision. I think this goes to the essence of freedom of thought.

The reason it's easy for me to say this is because I'm not running for office and have no interest in doing so. Does that mean there's a double standard under which only private citizens are free to express private thoughts (and only as long as they realize that voicing such thoughts may bar them from ever holding public office)?

If their private thoughts are public business, I actually feel sorry for politicians.

Imagine living in a world where dishonesty is mandatory, 24 hours a day.