Justin A. Frank, M.D., Author of "Bush on the Couch" Gets to the Heart of the Matter: We Have a Sociopath as President
A BUZZFLASH INTERVIEW
I think what he does is he turns everybody who disagrees with him into his father. It doesn’t matter whether it’s actually the concrete representation of his father, like Baker, or the voters who vote against staying in Iraq. We have become his father. We are the people he is now defying. He will turn everybody, any authority, anybody who disagrees with him, into a father figure who he’d have to defy. -- Justin A. Frank, M.D.
* * *
Years after Bush announced, like a toy soldier, "Mission Accomplished" and "Major Combat Operations" over in Iraq, he is preparing to escalate the conflict yet again, sure to result in the loss of even more than the grim milestone of 3,000 GI lives currently gone from their families. He is reportedly going to base his escalation on a "plan" from the Bushevik right wing American Enterprise Institute, the most prominent last refuge of neo-con scoundrels, scamps and losers.
There are many explanations for Dick Cheney's character. He can be understood through characteristics like greed, evil, and cunning.
But Bush, stereotyped as an "aw shucks" All-American everyman, is, in reality, the more psychologically complicated one. Indeed, Bush's behavior is far more understandable when seen through the filter of psychiatric analysis than through the analysis of foreign policy or political perspective.
Virtually every major military figure with combat experience -- except for the toadies willing to tout the party line -- opposes his Iraq insanity of continuing to up the ante of death in a conflict that long ago became a Civil War in which American GIs are helpless ducks in a row to both sides.
Why is this a nightmare without end, in which Bush only increases our losses in life and financially as a nation?
That is best explained through a psychiatric model. Many diagnostic categories may be applied to Bush (and we can only speculate on them since one of his psychological obstacles is that he has no interest in or inclination towards introspection). But perhaps the most accurate and telling one is that he is indeed a sociopath.
A sociopath is someone (to grossly generalize) who exhibits external and surface empathy and amiability, but internally cannot actually empathize with the pain and suffering of others. In fact, a sociopath may take hidden pleasure in being able to cause emotional distress, suffering, and even death to others, while -- on a day to day basis -- appearing as Mr. Affability.
(There is more, here.)
I think what he does is he turns everybody who disagrees with him into his father. It doesn’t matter whether it’s actually the concrete representation of his father, like Baker, or the voters who vote against staying in Iraq. We have become his father. We are the people he is now defying. He will turn everybody, any authority, anybody who disagrees with him, into a father figure who he’d have to defy. -- Justin A. Frank, M.D.
* * *
Years after Bush announced, like a toy soldier, "Mission Accomplished" and "Major Combat Operations" over in Iraq, he is preparing to escalate the conflict yet again, sure to result in the loss of even more than the grim milestone of 3,000 GI lives currently gone from their families. He is reportedly going to base his escalation on a "plan" from the Bushevik right wing American Enterprise Institute, the most prominent last refuge of neo-con scoundrels, scamps and losers.
There are many explanations for Dick Cheney's character. He can be understood through characteristics like greed, evil, and cunning.
But Bush, stereotyped as an "aw shucks" All-American everyman, is, in reality, the more psychologically complicated one. Indeed, Bush's behavior is far more understandable when seen through the filter of psychiatric analysis than through the analysis of foreign policy or political perspective.
Virtually every major military figure with combat experience -- except for the toadies willing to tout the party line -- opposes his Iraq insanity of continuing to up the ante of death in a conflict that long ago became a Civil War in which American GIs are helpless ducks in a row to both sides.
Why is this a nightmare without end, in which Bush only increases our losses in life and financially as a nation?
That is best explained through a psychiatric model. Many diagnostic categories may be applied to Bush (and we can only speculate on them since one of his psychological obstacles is that he has no interest in or inclination towards introspection). But perhaps the most accurate and telling one is that he is indeed a sociopath.
A sociopath is someone (to grossly generalize) who exhibits external and surface empathy and amiability, but internally cannot actually empathize with the pain and suffering of others. In fact, a sociopath may take hidden pleasure in being able to cause emotional distress, suffering, and even death to others, while -- on a day to day basis -- appearing as Mr. Affability.
(There is more, here.)
Powered by Blogger
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home