“Not since Ronald Reagan”

I don’t know whether she realized it or not, but Maureen Dowd has paid Paul Ryan the highest compliment yet:

I’d been wondering how long it would take Republicans to realize that Paul Ryan is their guy.

He’s the cutest package that cruelty ever came in. He has a winning air of sad cheerfulness. He’s affable, clean cut and really cut, with the Irish altar-boy widow’s peak and droopy, winsome blue eyes and unashamed sentimentality.

Who better to rain misery upon the heads of millions of Americans?

He’s Scrooge disguised as a Pickwick, an ideologue disguised as a wonk. Not since Ronald Reagan tried to cut the budget by categorizing ketchup and relish as vegetables has the G.O.P. managed to find such an attractive vessel to mask harsh policies with a smiling face.

She means the Reagan comparison as the ultimate insult, of course. But considering who she is, many Republicans will consider it the highest compliment Ryan could have received.

I guess she is so surrounded by like-minded thinkers at the Times that she is unaware that there are people out there who like Ronald Reagan.