As a personal acquaintance of Kimball (Encounter Press published my first book) and someone whom I have always held in high regard for his intelligence and erudition, I was shocked by his readiness to endorse a man I regard as the antithesis of everything conservatism stands for. And I was flabbergasted by the sheer nuttiness of his contention that Obama hates America and is seeking to impoverish our country and render it vulnerable, a point of view one finds on the lunatic fringe but not in the rarefied offices of the New York intellectual elite.