For Bill Safire, retirement from the NYT also entails a complete estrangement from the realm of reason and reality. Read his latest column where Bill concocts an alternate reality so impossible that he pitches it as the sequel to Roth's The Plot Against America. (I very much doubt senile Safire has read the book; I think he just liked the title.) Then he goes on to argue against it with much aplomb. Next in Safire's itinerary will be entering ass-kicking contests where he will be the only two-legged participant and other aphoristic likes.