No politics here, I’m just saying.

Via Sullivan, Bill Kristol on the Weekly Standard Blog:

Here’s a highlight of Purdum’s reporting: “More than once in my travels in Alaska, people brought up, without prompting, the question of Palin’s extravagant self-regard. Several told me, independently of one another, that they had consulted the definition of ‘narcissistic personality disorder’ in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders–’a pervasive pattern of grandiosity (in fantasy or behavior), need for admiration, and lack of empathy’–and thought it fit her perfectly.”

Is there any real chance that “several” Alaskans independently told Purdum that they had consulted the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders? I don’t believe it for a moment. I’ve (for better or worse) moved in pretty well-educated circles in my life, and I’ve gone decades without “several” people telling me they had consulted the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.

Really? Because I “check” the DSM all the time. That is, I look up psychiatric disorders on Wikipedia where there is always a list of the DSM criteria. Now, it should be said that I have a lot of crazy acquaintances. However, this is not that hard and if you think someone is off, it’s probably the first thing a lot of people would do. It’s certainly what you should do if someone suggests to you that a friend or an acquaintance was suffering from some mental disorder.