That is what today's column is about. Maybe? It is a particularly digressive and rambling effort even by Peggy's standards.

It is about "The New Elders," by which she means people who are kind of old, but not yet dead, like Safire and Walter Cronkite are, now. It is the responsibility of The New Elders to be older than young people, who are not yet wise, because they are young.

So the New Elders should try to be responsible, like William Safire was when he repeatedly claimed that Saddam Hussein did 9/11, or like Robert Novak was when he smeared a Chilean diplomat assassinated by Pinochet.

But there is a problem: Peggy Noonan uses math to calculate that there are literally three million crazy people in the United States, and apparently they all listen to Alex Jones.

This is why, I think, so many people-I include, literally, every person I know, from all walks of life, and all ages-are worried that our elected leaders are not safe, that this overheated era will end in some violent act or acts.

Stop reading this and ask whoever's nearby, "Do you find yourself worrying about President Obama's safety?" I do not think you are going to get, "No."

But Peggy, what if you're reading this in the Wall Street Journal opinion section office? Don't you know that OBAMA LOVES DICTATORS?

(Also, like a month ago, it was Barry who was scaring us, according to Peg.)

Depending, perhaps, on her painkiller supply, Peggy Noonan veers wildly between hackish defenses of Republican doctrine and actual clear-thinking criticisms of politicians (and sometimes, when she's had a little Chardonnay, she goes to airports, or walks around the Upper East Side looking at buildings). The latter columns tend to trick people into thinking the former columns are something other than a lifelong party faithful carrying water. But we digress! As a Republican, she would like to see Republicans actually win elections, someday, and because she is already on record as hating Sarah Palin it would not damage her brand, too much, to continue the attack.

She throws a few sops to the believers: after the Palin pick "the left and the media immediately overplayed their hand, with attacks on her children" (if we remember correctly, "the left," as represented by Barack Obama, asked that her children be declared off-limits, and "the media" merely reported, belatedly and with obvious disbelief, on her bizarre family life). And there are attacks on unnamed "intellectuals," by which she actually means "the Republican party elite," but she knows quite well that the word she uses is dogwhistle for "liberals."

But maybe we should just enjoy the actually unbridled disdain on display, here.

"The elites hate her." The elites made her. It was the elites of the party, the McCain campaign and the conservative media that picked her and pushed her. The base barely knew who she was. It was the elites, from party operatives to public intellectuals, who advanced her and attacked those who said she lacked heft. She is a complete elite confection. She might as well have been a bonbon.

"She makes the Republican Party look inclusive." She makes the party look stupid, a party of the easily manipulated.

"She shows our ingenuous interest in all classes." She shows your cynicism.

"Now she can prepare herself for higher office by studying up, reading in, boning up on the issues." Mrs. Palin's supporters have been ordering her to spend the next two years reflecting and pondering. But she is a ponder-free zone. She can memorize the names of the presidents of Pakistan, but she is not going to be able to know how to think about Pakistan. Why do her supporters not see this? Maybe they think "not thoughtful" is a working-class trope!

From there, we go on to blaming Palin's fall on "membership in the self-esteem generation," and a repetition of Noonan's post-9/11 mantra: "the world is a dangerous place." She feels that if she repeats it often enough, the Cold War will reignite and Ronald Reagan will rise from the dead, to win it again, for the Gipper, and for the team.

We can't wait to hear what Meg Stapleton has to say about all this!