UPDATE: A sleuthing commentator suggests it's a low/non-alcoholic beer. Add as many grains of salt to the following as you see fit.

G-dubs is on the sauce, in case that hasn't been obvious for a while. The headline is Illness Sidelines Bush at G-8 Summit. Bottle flu is a bitch, man.

I don't really think there's anything wrong with a president drinking, or being drunk even. However, if Bush has actually internalized the AA model of relating to alcohol -- which is debatable; it's totally possible that his whole Billy Graham come-to-Jesus thing was a sham from the start, or that the "dry drunk" theory is for real -- it's not a good thing for him to be drinking at all.

AA doesn't really work any better than other methods of treating alcohol. Relapse-rates remain in the 90th percentile. However, the fact is that the AA model is founded on a paradigm of total abstinence and release of control, the recognition that the addict is helpless and that they must appeal to a "higher power" to control their relationship with the chemicals. Relapses from this kind of treatment -- as opposed to those which try to create a more normalized relationship between addict and substance -- tend to be total, a fall from grace so to speak.

So, while I'm 100% sure that the bureaucracy of government is fully capable of handling a president on a bender -- Darth Cheney and all -- it's still more troubling to see Bush off the wagon than, say, Nixon getting boozed up and confronting protesters. Tricky Dick was in charge of the bottle. Dubs, if his narrative of alcoholic redemption is true, may be at its mercy.