Will on Healy

Radley Balko | May 27, 2008

In this week's Newsweek, George Will lets loose with some resounding praise for Gene Healy and his book The Cult of the Presidency, calling it "the year's most pertinent and sobering public affairs book." Will then gushes:

Healy's dissection of the delusions of "redemption through presidential politics" comes at a moment when liberals, for reasons of liberalism, and conservatives, because they have forgotten their raison d'être, "agree on the boundless nature of presidential responsibility." Liberals think boundless government is beneficent. Conservatives practice situational constitutionalism, favoring what Healy calls "Caesaropapism" as long as the Caesar-cum-Pope wields his anti constitutional powers in the service of things these faux conservatives favor.

Will—easily the most intellectually honest conservative pundit in the business—has been known to tease out his inner libertarian from time to time.

An excerpt adaptation from Healy's book ran as the cover story in our June issue.