The Robert Bork piece in the Wall Street Journal is unfortunately but understandably intemperate. As he criticizes the Miers nomination, Bork expands out his criticism to accuse Bush of not being a “conservative.” That is simply preposterous, and it’s become a lazy charge on the part of right-wingers who have problems with individual parts of his agenda.

Yes, he signed No Child Left Behind. Yes, he signed campaign-finance reform. Yes, he supports an immigration-reform proposal that some say features amnesty. But let’s not miss the major fact. Anyone who cuts taxes by nearly $2 trillion is a CONSERVATIVE. Anyone who is willing to pursue an aggressive foreign policy without the support of the liberal elite is a CONSERVATIVE. And anyone who has appointed as many conservative jurists as Bush is a CONSERVATIVE.

As for Bush’s failure to contain spending, hey, if you guys want a Republican president obsessed with federal spending and the need to contain it, let me introduce you to George Herbert Walker Bush. Remember him? The one-term floperoo?

I said that Bork’s attack was understandable. That’s because, all the way back in 1999, Bush chose to attack Bork quite directly and with some disrespect in the most important early speech of his campaign. “”Too often, on social issues, my party has painted an image of America slouching toward Gomorrah,” Bush said, using the title of Bork’s own wildly pessimistic bestseller about American decline. “Something unexpected happened on the way to cultural decline. Problems that seemed inevitable proved to be reversible.”

Bush was and remains a spokesman for a more confident and optimistic vision of America and its future than many on the Right, including Bob Bork. But Bork didn’t deserve to be slapped that way, and so he has every right to be angry at Bush.

But everybody needs to chill a little bit. The president made a bad Supreme Court appointment, and has done other disappointing things in the last five years. Grow up, people. He’s a politician — in my view, a great one, but still a politician. And if you lived in Washington in the 1980s, you heard all manner of similar attacks on Ronald Reagan during his presidency, let me assure you — including, may I say, during the summer that Bob Bork was under merciless attack. “Where’s the president?” people cried. “Why isn’t he defending Bork? Why is he letting this happen? He’s so lazy. He’s so distracted. Blah blah blah.”