None so blind

TIME.com has a brief excerpt from David Kuo's book. Kuo is obviously earnest and somewhat disillusioned. But the Time excerpt includes this passage:

Now I am finding the courage to speak out about God and politics and their dangerous dance. George W. Bush, the man, is a person of profound faith and deep compassion for those who suffer. But President George W. Bush is a politician and is ultimately no different from any other politician, content to use religion for electoral gain more than for good works. Millions of Evangelicals may share Bush's faith, but they would protect themselves—and their interests—better if they looked at him through the same coldly political lens with which he views them.

Thus Kuo reveals himself to still be illusioned in some significant ways. How, exactly, does he know that Dubya is "a person of profound faith"? What evidence can he martial in support of that conclusion? The thesis of his book appears to be that Dubya, like his administration, is coldly cynical and a bald-faced liar -- and not in service of his faith, but in service of his own earthly power.

So how could he know if Bush's piety is genuine? Does he think he knows what is in another man's heart? How has that worked out so far for Dubya? Not so well. At the very least, Kuo is still horribly naive. He continues to manifest the very flaw that has allowed this Administration to fleece its flock -- an eagerness to believe the cynical pieties of of charlatans. If Kuo can still believe, after witnessing such manipulation and betrayal, that the perp is deeply religious, he will be fleeced again-- and, frankly, deserves it.

(On the other hand, I suppose it is possible that Kuo doesn't really mean the sentence I am pointing to. Perhpas it is a sop thrown to his evangelical pals to try to soften and make his core message more palatable. But what would that say about him?)