DOES THE LEFT UNDERSTAND PSYCHOLOGICAL DENIAL?

In a post titled "Does the Left Understand Religious Liberty?", David French reflects on the kind of religious liberty the Left always respects:

...the freedom to advocate for liberal social-welfare policies and liberal visions of “social justice.” Debate the issue for long, and you’ll get some version of the following (typically delivered with maximum snark): Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t the Bible much more concerned about the poor than about [fill in the issue -- from abortion to contraception to proselytizing to worship]? “Concern for the poor” is redefined as support for this or that government program, while “religious liberty” is redefined as hatred for women or gays or perhaps even just simple intolerance.
Of course, the same standards aren’t applied to, say, Muslims, but that’s a post for another time.{emphasis mine]

This is so true, and it brings me to a point that I've been thinking about forquite a while.

What I emphasized in the above quote is something that we see over and over again on many issues. The political left always redefines the issue:

--A principled stand on reducing the deficit and reforming entitlements is redefined as "pushing Granny over a cliff."
A concern about the implications for the institution of marriage is redefined as homophobic;
--The idea of preventing voter fraud by requiring voters to show an ID, something that is required for almost everything else in life these days; is redefined as "disenfranchising poor or black Americans";
--If you support a woman's right to choose her own destiny (i.e., contraception, abortion etc.) but suggest that it isn't the government's place to pay for it with YOUR money--or the money of people who might oppose abortion or certain types of contraception; they you are redefined as "anti-woman";
--If you want to keep our borders safe and prevent illegal immigration; you are redefined as "anti-Hispanic" and "racist";
--If you oppose socialized medicine then you are redefined as "anti-poor, anti-black, anti-woman, and probably racist and just plain mean.

Notice how every "redefinition" of a principled opposition to a leftist policy has been transformed into an ad hominem , or personal attack?

JUST BECAUSE YOU ARE OPPOSED TO SOME GOVERNMENT PROGRAM DOESN'T MEAN THAT YOU ARE ANTI-WOMAN, ANTI-GAY, ANTI-BLACK OR WHATEVER. Perhaps, just perhaps, you stand for less government intrusion or control.

It so happens that I do not object to women using birth control. But that DOES NOT MEAN that I support the government forcing someone who is opposed to PAYING for her birth control to pay for it.

That does not make me anti-woman, it makes me PRO-LIBERTY.

I am basically opposed to government intervention in almost every area of our lives except for the purpose of protecting our rights and liberties; but anyone who takes a stance to limit government power and intrusion into the lives of others has become a target of the vicious and name-calling postmodern left who, since they are unable to counter the ideas or principles which underlie those who oppose their policies, instead focus on trying to destroy them on a personal level.

The postmodern left is under the delusion that they are better people; more pure and virtuous; more compassionate and loving; more fair-minded and tolerant than those who oppose them.

However, I am reasonably sure that they are human; and therefore just as prone to the same defects of personality and behaviors as any other human being. I am absolutely sure that their ideas and their policies are far, far, inferior and ultimately lead to totalitarianism, opression, and economic misery.

And, that is the crux of the problem.

The reason that they attack on the personal level anyone who disagrees with them is due to the fact that they cannot support their ideas or their policies in any rational or logical manner. Which means they have to resort to emotion, name-calling, and logical fallacies in order to maintain their psychological denial.

They are in denial because, instead of being champions of the oppressed, they are the root cause of oppression.

They are in denial because, instead of empowering women, blacks, gays and the poor; they are making them more and more dependent on government and infantalizing them.

Instead of doing "good" and promoting "justice"; instead of working toward peace and harmony among people; they are promoting hate, class warfare, envy, and the worst aspects of human nature.

The use of ad hominem attacks has become one of the preferred methods to deal with Republicans and conservatives who are trying to make the argument (ineptly, I grant you) that FREEDOM is preferable to GOVERNMENT CONTROL. Routinely, such people are portrayed as racist, sexist, homophobic monsters (or, as Maxine Waters might say, "DEMONS!!").

It makes them feel better about themselves.

At the center of all psychological denial is a hidden agenda.

That agenda is usually not completely conscious--meaning that the denier has not thought through the issues surrounding his denial; and may not even be aware of what his motivation is in asserting something is true when it isn't; or false when it isn't.

Denial need not be absolute and completely cut off from reality. Even among alcoholics and drug users there is a varying level of awareness of their problem. Some accept that they are in jail or sick because of their substance use, but yet are still not willing to do anything about it. Some may recognize some facts about their drinking (like that they get put in jail), but completely deny the impact of those facts on themselves or their families; or the future implications of continued drinking or drug use (e.g., that they are killing themselves and will die).

The hidden agenda or underlying motivation behind the denial is very frequently related to the potential adverse consequences that could ensue if the denial were eliminated and reality acknowledged. That is where the unnacceptable feelings, needs, and thoughts come in. The denier (or part of him) has made an unconscious decision that awareness of certain feelings, needs, or thoughts is more threatening to his sense of self than the act of denial.

As an example, consider a person who develops a chronic cough. He might rationalize to themselves that his cough is because of a lack of humidity in the air; or because he has a slight infection; and most certainly is not a result of his smoking habits. He could go see a doctor, but doesn't, telling himself he is fine.

As the cough gets worse, he become even more creative in his thinking about it (or not thinking about it) and is "too busy" to see a doctor; or tend to minimize the symptom even as it worsens. This strategy of ignoring the problem goes on for some time--maybe months. The person may next fail to notice that he is losing weight and looking a bit drawn-out. The rationalizations now even include benign explanations for the specks of blood that can be seen in the cough.

Finally, after much resistance, a loved one firmly intervenes--or the person faces the truth, confronts the issue-- and schedules an appointment. After a few tests, lung cancer is diagnosed. The prognosis is very poor because the cancer has already progessed to advanced stages during the months of denial.

Why would such a person deny the symptom to begin with? Because by denying the symptom, the person can pretend that everything is normal. Early on, when the symptom is new or minor, this possiblity may even be true. But as the evidence accumulates that something is very wrong; the person has now entered a phase of magical thinking and/or fantasy where he effortlessly pretends to himself that everything is as he wishes it to be.

Eventually, the individual may become totally psychologically invested in believing that nothing is wrong ("lalalalala I can't heaaaar you"), and reacts (or overreacts) with anger and rage toward anyone who questions his view of things. The entire act of denial was initiated to begin with by the psyche for a good psychological reason-- to temporarilly supress awareness that something was wrong--while the person struggled with the effort to face that possibility. That awareness was so frightening, that a temporary psychological bargain evolved into a binding contract that allows the person to suspend cognition and reason so that he is able to ignore any knowledge or evidence that alters his fantasy reality.

Unfortunately, if the person really does have a cancerous process going on within them, it is completely unaffected by the psychological bargain made by the psyche. There are certain rules that govern the progression of cancers and they will be in force, whether or not the person is aware of them or not. Hence, the denier has made a short-term pact to feel better at the expense of his long-term health.

In the case of this type of cancer, he has chosen to enjoy a period of relative complacency and blissful ignorance at the cost of catching the cancer earlier when it might be more treatable. In the long-run his unconscious choice is a very bad one. But the reality is that some people in denial prefer the lethal consequences of their denial as long as they don't have to question their own motivations, beliefs, and ideologies.

Those individuals, groups, or nations who live in the world of deep denial are practically untouchable by reality or rational argument. They go through their daily lives secure in the knowledge that their self-image is protected against any information, feelings, or awareness that might make them have to change their view of the world.

Nothing--not facts, not observable behavior; not the use of reason, logic, or the evidence of their own senses will make them reevaluate that world view. All events will simply be reinterpreted to fit into the belief system of that world--no matter how ridiculous, how distorted, hysterical or how psychotic that reinterpretation appears to others. Consistency, common sense, reality, and objective truth are unimportant and are easily discarded--as long as the world view remains intact.

There are many tried and true techniques that those in denial use in order to maintain and facilitate their denial and to prevent any confrontation about it or their own motivations.

For example, there are a number of logical fallacies and rhetorical ploys (like calling someone who disagrees with you a "racist" or insisting that they are using "code words" that MEAN you are really a racist) that frequently pop up when dealing with those in psychological denial.

People in denial may believe they are engaging in substantive arguments and presenting their case, but when examined, the grounds they present are actually examples of pseudo-reasoning.

Although not precisely a fallacy or rhetorical ploy, physical coercion is another important technique that is used to defuse and/or disrupt rational argument or discussion. For the denier, coercion has the advantage of eliminating any possibiity they might have to confront their denial and what is driving it.

Understanding all of these techniques is essential for being able to deal with individuals in denial.

There is frequently a connection between the pseudo-reasoning technique employed to perpetuate denial, and the style of denial being used (as described in Part I). The list that follows is not exhaustive, and only includes some of what I consider the more important techniques being used. The table is only intended to be a preliminary guide. A brief discussion of each of the fallacies or rhetorical ploys referred to follows after table.



COMMON RHETORICAL PLOYS

From: Critical Thinking A Concise Guide (Bowell and Kemp):

Rhetoric is any verbal or written attempt to persuade someone to beieve, desire or do something that does not attempt to give good reasons for the belief, desire or action, but attempts ot motivate that belief, desire or action solely through the power of the words used.

The difference between fallacies and rhetorical ploys is understood most eaily as a difference in the function of the language being employed....politicians, advertisers and newspaper columnists tend to be experts when it come to using rhetorical ploys. Rhetorical ploys typically make a more or less direct appeal to feeling and emotion rather than to reason, which is the domin of argument. Fallacies, on the other hand, are simply defective attempts at arguments....They may fool us into thinking they are not defective, but they are still presented as attempts at argument. Of course, manny writers and speakers will use a mixture of rhetorical ploys, fallacies, and genuine arguments when attempting to persuade us of the truth of their claim.

Let us first consider some of the most common rhetorical ploys in use:

-Appeals to FEELINGS : this type of ploy is very common and the user tries to appeal to specific feelings or desires. For example, you may be enticed to believe what is said because of the passion with which it is said (rather than analyzing the content); or because it stimulates compassion, pity, guilt, fear or any number of other feelings.

Eliciting fear is also known as using "scare tactics", and should be distinguished from genuine warnings for which there is a good reason to act and/or experience the emotion.

Additionally, when one appeals to feelings; emphasis may be placed on the novelty of the idea; or popularity ("everyone thinks this!") or the sexiness or cuteness etc.; all of which can easily distract from a rational analysis of the idea or product.

-Direct attack is simply the unapologetic assertion that something is true or not true without any evidence presented.

-Buzzwords are the use of emotion-laden terms that subtly influence the listener but which offer no information about the truth of what is being said.

-Scare quotes are used to mock the opposition (I use them myself at times!) by calling into question a particular concept (e.g., terrorism vs "terrorism").

-Smokescreen is diverting attention from the topic of discussion by introducing a new topic.

-Equivocation is deliberately making ambiguous statements in order to mislead.

LOGICAL FALLACIES

-Formal fallacies can be found in almost any text on logic and include affirming the consequent (i.e., if P then Q; Q; therefore P) or denying the antecedent (i.e., if P then Q; not-P; therefore not-Q). As a group they are invalid arguments because of formal mistakes in reasoning.

-Substantive fallacies are fallacies that rely on an implied but not expressed general premise, but which are false when scrutinized. They include:
Majority belief - concluding that because a majority believe something it must be true. This category includes the excessive reliance on polls to be the arbiter of what is true or false and how one should behave.
Common practice - concluding that because everyone does a certain thing, you should do it too.
Ad hominem is responding to an argument by attacking your opponent rather than addressing the argument itself.
Appeal to an alleged authority - is problematic when the authority appealed to has no expertise in a particular field; or even if he does, there is no automatic guarantee that he is correct.
Perfectionist fallacy - where an idea or proposal is rejected because it cannot completely solve a particular problem.
Weak analogy -use of an unjustied or unsustainable analogy;
Causal fallacies are also very common and involve making assumptions that (1)because things are temporally related that there is a cause and effect (temporal fallacy); or (2) that because two things are correlated there is a causal relationship between them; (3) going from knowing a certain thing is true to believing that something else also must be true when there is no evidence to support the belief is called the Epistemic fallacy.

OTHER LOGICICAL FALLACIES AND DENIAL TECHNIQUES

The following techniques don't fit into the previous categories; or are a combination of one or more already mentioned. They include:

-Red Herrings are premises or ideas that are irrelevant to a particular conclusion but which are offered as evidence of the conclusion;

-Straw man is deliberately setting up a false target that is easier to defeat in argument;

-Begging the question is the situation where the truth of a conclusion is assumed by its premises;

-Selective use of evidence: in any analysis there is usually a large amount of evidence to consider; particularly when there is sufficient complexity involved, it is sometimes easy to pay attention only to evidence that supports the desired conclusions and not to evidence which contradicts it;

-Moving the goalposts is a common practice in denial and occurs when someone always demands more evidence than can currently be provided. If that evidence becomes available at a later date, the demand is then made for even more evidence ad infinitum;

-Argument by definition is changing the meaning of words or concepts so that they support your argument (e.g., "it depends on what the meaning of 'is' is."; and other distortions of language like using the opposite meaning of a word as in Orwell's Newspeak)

-Liar paradox is one of my personal favorites to argue against, and is the use of paradoxical statements (e.g., "This statement is false" or "There is no objective truth") that are linguistically correct but internally inconsistent and cannot be demonstrated to be either true or false.

AGGRESSION AND PHYSICAL ATTACK

The most obvious technique in this category is the physical analog of the ad hominem attack. This clearly requires no thinking or logic manipulations at all. We see this in the physical attacks that are made by the left on whoever incurs their ire; or dares to spread ideas that deviate from their own script.

Isaac Asimov famously said that "violence is the last refuge of the incompetent." From a psychiatric perspective, I would amend the saying to: physical coercion is the last refuge of a person in denial.

Coercion is the historically tried and true method by which most totalitarian regimes perpetuate themselves. They must control the flow of information; ruthlessly suppress any ideas that delegitimize their ideology; eliminate any persons threatening to expose their weaknesses; and even physically prevent their own people from being able to freely leave the country where they might pick up alien ideas. All of these measures ensure that psychological denial and the underlying motives of those in control are never questioned or challenged. A tyrant is, from this perspective, the ultimate person in denial.

Further, there are numerous physical attempts to shut people up that also use the rhetorical ploy of appeal to feelings--in particular, an appeal to cuteness--when protesters throw pies in the faces of speakers they don't agree with; or the latest rave of "glitter bombing" those who disagree with you. Never forget the tried and true method of the mindless contingent of the left: those who chant cute slogans to drown out speakers with whom they disagree, hoping to silence them.

Not only do these individuals and groups not bother to argue their side of an issue, but they can't even bear to listen to someone who might stimulate them to consider alternative ideas or confront their own denial.

Other ways that today's political left have developed to control the flow of information include manipulating websites such as Amazon, where you can track swarms of those on the left panning new conservative books they've obviously never bothered to read.

The mere existence of ideas that threaten their image of themselves or challenges their dysfunctional worldview is a threat that must be extinguished before people can be allowed to make up their own minds.

The last thing a person in denial wants is the free flow of information about a topic that threatens the perfection and contentment of his denial. Thus you have Obama starting up

Wikipedia is another forum where people deep in denial have painstakingly tried to rewrite history so that it conforms with their ideology.

How many times have you heard those from the left side of the political spectrum state that the FCC should shut down FOX for its "lies". At college campuses all over the country, every time a campus newspaper runs an editorial that goes against the ideology, all the papers are stolen by the ideological minions of the left. Military recruiters are run off campus by the threat of violence (either to them or any who would like to listen to them).

I won't even go into the entire issue of leftist mainstream media bias, which has been taken up in many other venues many times.

The pattern remains the same. To physically prevent people access to alternate
worldviews or information instead of persuasing them by rational argument of the truth of your own position.

None of these techniques (rhetorical ploys, logical fallacies, or physical control) are unique to one side of the political spectrum or the other certainly; but in today's political climate, most of the denial manifested is coming from the left with few exceptions.

So, does the left understand psychological denial? Probably about as much as they understand religious liberty; i.e., not at all.

COMMENTS

I just received an email from a upset prospective commentor who writes:

I spent another wasted 20 minutes trying to comment on your page. I tried before logging in, after logging in, pasting in the text, typing in the text, etc, etc, etc. It's just not worth my time. I assumed you wanted comments since there was a field, but the evidence says otherwise. There are usually only 3 or 4 comments--I have to wonder how many simply gave up. I can find no way to put text in the comment field that actually is accepted by the webpage.

Are others having problems?

If so, write me at patsanty@aol.com. If you have any idea what the technical problem is preventing this individual from commenting, please let me know in the comments!

Thanks to all my readers.

A VALENTINE FOR THOSE WITHOUT A SENSE OF HUMOR---AND WITHOUT MUCH LOVE EITHER

Even if you put aside the ubiquitous denigration of women; the persecution of gays; the violent jihad against both Jews and Christians, Islam would still is a despicable religion despite its claims to be the "religion of peace."

The only way to deal with it is to mock it, but even those brave enough to risk the fatwas of the fatuous clerics and leaders, would be hard-pressed to outdo them in their ability to be sink into the ridiculous and absurd.

Here's the Islamic verdict on Valentine's day:

The next time you hear the familiar co-existence, religion-of-peace blather from some Saudi-purchased, Brotherhood canoodling hack (e.g., Georgetown University’s Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding, under the direction of the Left’s favorite Islam expert, John Esposito), keep this one in the back of your mind. It’s not from al-Qaeda; it’s from Malaysia’s widely proclaimed moderate Islamic government — the same one that, with Interpol’s help, has reportedly extradited a journalist to Saudi Arabia to face trial for insulting Mohammed, a death-penalty offense:

An invitation “to be my Valentine” on February 14 is against Islamic beliefs and would incur the wrath of Allah, Muslims were told today in the official Friday sermon prepared by the federal government.

The sermon warned Muslims against celebrating Valentine’s Day, which the federal Islamic authorities claimed was in breach of the tenets of their religion.

In the text of a sermon provided by the Department of Islamic Development Malaysia (Jakim) titled “Awas jerat Valentine” (Beware Valentine’s trap), Muslims were told that asking someone to be his or her “Valentine” could lead to idolatry.

Yeah yeah. It's always "Death to everyone!" For pretty much everything.

How can you begin to mock such idiocy?

I wrote a post a while back about the lack of any sort of a sense of humor in the Muslim world. Most other cultures have the ability to make fun of even the most sacred of beliefs. Of course, this is not to everyone's liking, but it is the hallmark of a guilt culture, as opposed to a shame culture--the latter being the kind of culture in which Islam takes hold.

The hearts and flowers of Valentine's Day are a benign form of pleasure for most people. Valentine was, to be sure, a Christian saint, but the modern celebration of the day is completely secular and a chance to show love and affection.

Horrors.

You might think that perhaps I'm being a tad insensitive to Islam's deeply held beliefs? Well, you might be right; but you know what? I don't much care.

So, HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY to every Muslim on the planet --especially all you fanatical, humorousless ones (you know who you are). May your hearts be filled with love and joy and even peace... instead of being preoccupied with hate and death and jihad all the time.

AN AMERICA MICHELLE OBAMA CAN BE PROUD OF...

I didn't even know there was such a thing as a "Dependency Index", but it basically supports what I said in this post about how our "progressive" liberals foster dependence.

According to the IBD article:

The American public's dependence on the federal government shot up 23% in just two years under President Obama, with 67 million now relying on some federal program, according to a newly released study by the Heritage Foundation.

The conservative think tank's annual Index of Dependence on Government tracks money spent on housing, health, welfare, education subsidies and other federal programs that were "traditionally provided to needy people by local organizations and families."

The increase under Obama is the biggest two-year jump since Jimmy Carter was president, the data show....

The report also found that spending on "dependence programs" accounts for more than 70% of the federal budget. That, too, is up dramatically. In 1990, for example, the figure stood at 48.5%, and in 1962 just over a quarter of federal spending went to dependence programs.

(There's a nice graph to go along with the article at the link)

Finally! An America Michelle Obama can be proud of!

SUGAR DADDIES AND THE MOMMY STATE

Are these people insane?

First they come for the alcohol, then for the tobacco, then for your sugar.

When the day arrives when you have to undergo a background check and endure a three-day waiting period to enter a Dunkin’ Donuts, you can trace the loss of your unrestricted access to a Boston Kreme or French Cruller to this moment. Namely the publication in the journal Nature of an article calling for regulating sugar as a health hazard, although stopping “far short of all-out prohibition” (that would be too extreme).

Apparently nothing is too extreme for these busybodies.

Lowry goes on to note:

Under this regime, we’ll go from gun-free school zones to Snickers-free school zones. Lustig and Co. want to double the price of a soda by taxation. They seriously propose starting to card young people who try to buy a Dr. Pepper, with an age cutoff of 17. This will make 17 a fraught age: Old enough (with parental consent) to join the military and old enough to buy chocolate milk....

The mindset of the Robert Lustigs of the world is that we can’t trust parents or individuals to make sound choices. ....

If this all seems good for yuks, just wait ten years.

Let me just state that if Barack and Michelle occupy the White House for another term, then we can anticipate an even shorter wait time for our sugar-free utopia.

The entire Democratic Party (along with significant numbers in the Republican Party, unfortunately) have morphed into annoyingly intrusive, know-it-all nannies, whose goal is not to persuade you that their ideas are correct or even better than yours; but to force you to accept their ideas by making them laws.

We used to contemptuously call such people busybodies (which was not a compliment), and, by and large, were mostly able to ignore their nitpicking power plays to control or change our lives.

Sadly, we can't do that anymore.

When they start controlling everything from mandating health care coverage to the type of light bulb you use in your lamps' to the amount of sugar and other items you consume, a free society just becomes another oppressive postmodern deceit.

But we the people have let all these postmodern busybodies of all political persuasions think they can get away with running out lives, especially when they precede their power grab with the sickeningly sweet bromides like, "BUT, IT'S FOR THE CHILDREN!!"

Here is Mathhew Yglesias, who thinks that the "trouble" with America is that we don't give our children good enough school lunches. We give them Pizza—the horror of it all!:

I was being a bit contrarian about an aspect of this on Twitter the other day, but obviously it’s insane to declare that your average slice of public school pizza meets healthy eating standards for high nutrition. Everyone understands that. Sometimes public policy goes awry because of good faith disagreement about the issues, but there’s no serious disagreement about whether “feed kids more pizza” is a valid way to improve the nutritional content of school lunch. Read Michele Simon on the gory details of the ferocious lobbying that led to this outcome. Compare that to the story of Finland’s 1999 school lunch reform, which basically took the form of well-qualified people giving parliament a few options reasonable options and then parliament picking one whose budgetary costs they were comfortable with.
This contrast tells us a lot about America. It has a lot of lessons to teach. Most notably, it reminds us that provision of public services in this country tends not to work very well and also that low-quality provision is not inevitable. But all too often in the United States we have programs that are too dominated by the interests of the service providers. And all too often in the United States we have partisans responding to these controversies thanks to arbitrary facts about the organizational structure of the service providers. So we’ll argue about “unions” or “agribusiness” or “for-profit colleges” without seeing the underlying common structure of the problem.

A government that works well is a really valuable thing to have. It can give you reasonable nourished, healthy kids who learn a lot in school. It can give you safe streets and reasonable commuting times. It can prevent banking panics. There’s more to life than that stuff, but it’s not nothing. But you have to fight to make it work

Got that? The trouble with America is that the government can give us "reasonable noursished healthy kids who learn a lot in school" but the evil private sector is only interested in profits.

Yglesias is a true believer in the soft, compassionate tyranny of the mommy state. His touching confidence that the government will keep us all healthy and safe from the evils of the world (or, at least the evil of pizza for lunch) is amusing, albeit misplaced.

This kind of busybody dogoodism is even less amusing when it emanates from the sugar daddies who are currently running our government.

Most congresspersons, be they Democrat or Republican, have never met a government program they didn't like, as long as it helps them get elected or re-elected. “Promise the Suckers Anything!” (Suckers=Us). And, of course, human nature being what it is, most people are enthusiastically willing to take something when it is promised to us for nothing.

But, their ready and contradictory promises aren’t without consequences. And, they cost somewhat more than nothing.

There are two problems here. The first is how we the people casually shrug off any personal responsibility and abdicate our self-reliance and freedoms. If we do it often enough; eventually we will develop an enlarged sense of entitlement to other people's money and effort.

Next, we will be caught up in aggrieved victimhood, when the gravy train stops. If you doubt this, then take note of the riots in Greece and Italy and Portugal over the fact that even though their countries are completely broke and bankruptcy is upon them; they refuse to acknowledge reality, demanding like children that everything go on as usual and that they continue to receive what was "promised" to them by their own self-absorbed and anti-reality politicians.

Pretending that the real world doesn't exist is something to be expected from infants and children; in adults it is malignantly narcissistic.

The list of what these sugar daddies and mommy statists are willing to control in YOUR life to increase THEIR power, goes to infinity and beyond. Believe me, there is no end to what these Postmodern busybodies will try to control about your life and your choices in order to make themselves feel good.

Ironically, these are the same people who are presumably "pro-choice" and champion "abortion rights" and a Woman's right to choose, arguing that, since it is her body, she gets to kill the fetus if she doesn't want it. But never mind all that choice business when it comes to putting demon sugar in that body.

These crusaders for peace and social justice and bans on everything are everywhere, but they are scariest when we ourselves give them the power to make us into children and act out their malignant parental fantasies.

Take Nancy Pelosi, the poster child for the mommy state; who loudly proclaims her every action to be "for the children!" Her most recent gambit is to “do for childcare what we did for healthcare.”

No child care provider left behind.

In a rational and yes, a "just" society, these busybodies would be laughed at. In a society that valued self reliance and personal responsibility, they would rightly be considered complete and total idiots.

DELUSIONAL TRIVIALITIES

Mark Steyn writes that the state of our Union is broke:

Had I been asked to deliver the State of the Union address, it would not have delayed your dinner plans:

“The State of our Union is broke, heading for bankrupt, and total collapse shortly thereafter. Thank you and goodnight! You’ve been a terrific crowd!”

I gather that Americans prefer something a little more upbeat, so one would not begrudge a speechwriter fluffing it up by holding out at least the possibility of some change of fortune, however remote. Instead, President Obama assured us at great length that nothing is going to change, not now, not never. Indeed the Union’s state — its unprecedented world-record brokeness — was not even mentioned.

In his usual dry, humorous manner, Steyn goes on:

...[A]ny historians stumbling upon a surviving DVD while sifting through the ruins of our civilization will marvel at how his accumulation of delusional trivialities was apparently taken seriously by the assembled political class.

An honest leader would feel he owed it to the citizenry to impress upon them one central truth — that we can’t have any new programs because we’ve spent all the money. It’s gone. The cupboard is bare. What’s Obama’s plan to restock it? “Right now, Warren Buffett pays a lower tax rate than his secretary,” the president told us. “Asking a billionaire to pay at least as much as his secretary in taxes? Most Americans would call that common sense.”

But why stop there? Americans need affordable health care and affordable master’s degrees in Climate Change and Social Justice Studies, so why not take everything that Warren Buffett’s got? After all, if you confiscated the total wealth of the Forbes 400 richest Americans it would come to $1.5 trillion.

Which is just a wee bit less than the federal shortfall in just one year of Obama-sized budgets. 2011 deficit: $1.56 trillion.

One of the things I spend a lot of time doing in my work as a psychiatrist is encouraging patients that I see--patients whose lives are characterized by repeatedly making bad choices; by projection (blaming everybody else for the plight they find themselves in); and by delusional thinking (not necessicaril to the point of frank psychosis, but delusional nonetheless when it comes to their situation)--to slowly learn to appreciate the distinction between the internal world and the external world.

This is called "reality testing".

The ability to appreciate that external reality is NOT the same thing as what might be going on inide your head is a critical task of development. This task is made much harder these days because the dominant philosophical model, Postmodernism, basically asserts the opposite--i.e. that there is no distinction, and that what you are thinking or feeling IS the same as, and even superior to, external reality.

This philosophy is dominant in educational circles; and itunderlies most K-12 and college curricula.

This is why so many supposedly intelligent people develop such misbegotten notions about the world. This is why so many of them end up coming to see people like me when their fantasies and delusions pop like bubbles when they eventually run into the brick wall of reality. And they always do run into that wall, sooner or later.

The accumulation of "delusional trivialities" in one person's life can and will eventually lead to significantly negative consequences for that individual at some point. When the delusions are shared by the leaders of a nation, all of its citizens will eventually suffer the consequences.

In the case of our own country, our leaders appear to be only minimally interested in the reality of our debt situation; and their trivial "fixes" are like putting a bandaid on a wound where one's lifeblood is being pumped out. Instead of stopping the bleeding, they seek new and better ways to transfuse the patient to stay ahead of imminent collapse and death.

Where are we going? We are being led down the psychopath to economic destruction by the empty-headed promises of hope and change, made by people so blinded by the enchanting delusions clanking around inside their heads, that they have been able to ignore reality for a very long time.

Reality, however, will not be ignoring them for much longer.

THE DEBT GENERATION

My daughter's generation begins to speak out:




They have reason to be a teensy bit upset...just watch:

Visit USADebtClock.com to learn more!

And how long would it take to pay this debt off?



Hope and Change, Baby!

THE LIBERAL SOLUTION: FOSTERING DEPENDENCE

The hysteria on the left regarding Newt Gingrich's calling President Obama the "Food Stamps President" and asserting that more people are no on food stamps than at any other time in history, is fascinating.

Tom Blumer says that Gingrich was factually correct, both narrowly and broadly, then goes on to document why. Blumer cites Gingrich's response to the Food Stamp question and the resulting charge of "racism" leveled at him:

When conservatives care about the poor and conservatives offer ideas to help the poor, and conservatives suggest that the poor would rather have a paycheck than a food stamp, the very liberals who have failed them at places like the New York Times promptly scream “racism,” because they have no defense for the failure of liberal institutions which have trapped poor children in bad schools, trapped them in bad neighborhoods, trapped them in crime-ridden situations. Liberal solutions have failed, and their only answer is to cry “racism” and hide.

It used to be that "welfare" was thought of in this country as a compassionate and temporary means of supporting those in poverty, with the overall goal of helping them in various ways to get out of poverty and providing for themselves as quickly as possible. Gingrich's stark contrast between the "Paycheck vs Food Stamp" attitude reflects this attitude; and it also reflects the deeply held belief that welfare, particularly in the long run, has detrimental psychological effects on the recipients and can make them permanantly disabled.

Indeed, the primary psychological consequences of such long-term charity, especially for those who are aware on some level that they are not disabled, is the slow, steady erosion of genuine self-esteem and feelings of self-worth.

In typically pervere manner, the "progressive" political left has developed a strategy to cover that problem as they forge full steam ahead in creating a permanent class of people dependent on the State. In the same way that they have distorted "self esteem" in childhood development and hyped it to the point that it fosters and enables an unhealthy narcissism, they have managed to foster a narcissistic sense of entitlement in welfare recipients, by eliminating any sense that handouts are a negative thing; and neglecting to mention that they foster dependence, passivity and continued poverty.

No, everyone is ENTITLED to handouts. Poverty is just something bad that happens to them and not ever the result of bad choices on the recipient's part; but rather the result of greedy rich people taking away their share of the American pie--nothing more. And the solution is always--not private charity (how demeaning!), but state-sponsored redistribution of wealth.

Strange as it seems today, people used to object to being the objects of handouts and charity , and the concomitant pity and condescension that it implied; except perhaps in dire circumstances. They looked to their own extended families and friends; or their church for help.

You might put aside your sense of pride and accept it for a while but, again, the goal was to "get back on your feet" as soon as possible.

Not any longer!

In an article in the NY Times from exactly 1 year ago, we are informed that, "Once Stigmatized, Food Stamps Find Acceptance":

A decade ago, New York City officials were so reluctant to give out food stamps, they made people register one day and return the next just to get an application. The welfare commissioner said the program caused dependency and the poor were “better off” without it.

With millions of jobs lost and major industries on the ropes, America’s array of government aid — including unemployment insurance, food stamps and cash welfare — is being tested as never before. This series examines how the safety net is holding up under the worst economic crisis in decades.

Now the city urges the needy to seek aid (in languages from Albanian to Yiddish). Neighborhood groups recruit clients at churches and grocery stores, with materials that all but proclaim a civic duty to apply — to “help New York farmers, grocers, and businesses.” There is even a program on Rikers Island to enroll inmates leaving the jail.

“Applying for food stamps is easier than ever,” city posters say.

The same is true nationwide. After a U-turn in the politics of poverty, food stamps, a program once scorned as “welfare,” enjoys broad new support. Following deep cuts in the 1990s, Congress reversed course to expand eligibility, cut red tape and burnish the program’s image, with a special effort to enroll the working poor. These changes, combined with soaring unemployment, have pushed enrollment to record highs, with one in eight Americans now getting aid.

Commenting on the article, The Weekly Standard noted at the time:

As with any social program, there are many people on it who are indeed needy, but the article makes clear that the revival of food stamp popularity has more to do with state and local officials who are glad to curry favor with local constituents using federal dollars.

Since they're not paying for it, local officials and a network of aid organizations happily aid the federal government in recruiting more food-stamp recipients, regardless of how much they actually need the assistance. Meet Juan Diego Castro, who demonstrates how the system works:

Juan Diego Castro, 24, is a college graduate and Americorps volunteer whose immigrant parents warned him “not to be a burden on this country.” He has a monthly stipend of about $2,500 and initially thought food stamps should go to needier people, like the tenants he organizes. “My concern was if I’m taking food stamps and I have a job, is it morally correct?” he said.

But federal law eases eligibility for Americorps members, and a food bank worker urged him and fellow volunteers to apply, arguing that there was enough aid to go around and that use would demonstrate continuing need. “That meeting definitely turned us around,” Mr. Castro said.

Of course it is morally correct, Juan! Especially in this day and age. Dependence is GOOD! Accepting a handout shouldn't make you even in the slightest bit anxious or impact your fragile self-esteem at all! You are entitled to other people's money, even if you are able to support yourself now!

The Food Stamp program (or SNAP, or whatever it is called now) is not the only program that started out with a good premise intended to help people or make life a little easier. But somehow with programs like this it always ends up fostering dependence and making eventual independence a mere pipe dream.

Please don't misunderstand me. I am not saying that it is wrong in any way to help people in need. I am not saying that people who need help are bad. I am suggesting that the specific approach that has been favored by the political progressive left and the Democrats has serious, psychologically damaging consequences that lead to never-ending dependence, passivity, and continued poverty.

And that approach is to let the government do it, i.e., to use other people's money to redistribute wealth in the manner the progressives want. Donating to private charities is clearly UNprogressive. Witness their personal stinginess in this area: Romney gives 15% of his large income to charity, while Obama gives 1%. But Obama and those of his political persuasion believe they are better people because they want to give YOUR money away to help people. Romney to them (and to some deluded people on the right) is just another evil, money-grubbing capitalist.

Paychecks or Food Stamps? The Free Market or Crony Socialized Capitalism? Private charity or Government Redistribution of Wealth? Independence or Dependence? Obama-style hopeychangey or Real Hope and Real Change?

Two visions of where America should be heading couldn't be more sharply defined than these choices.



[Cartoons by Chip Bok here]

SAME OLD, SAME OLD USELESS RHETORIC FROM A USELESS PRESIDENT

Mickey Kaus says it was boring to read since he couldn't watch it. My response to that is that it would have been boring to watch if it hadn't been so infuriatingly empty of meaning and divisive; while all the time attempting to sound profound (8th grade profound?) and conciliatory (Presidential? Really? Really??)

And if you had the sense that you heard it all before....(h/t Instapundit)



To those of you 9th grade and above (I'm talking to YOU, Republican candidates!) will you please do something so that he does not get re-elected??? PLEASE? Otherwise, I'm throwing my support to this grownup:

EVERY FOUR YEARS, AMERICA HAS A MAJOR EXERCISE IN POLITICAL NARCISSISM

It's called the Presidential Campaign, and it starts earlier and earlier with every iteration. And, of course, in between the campaigns for both parties is the usual, everyday political narcissism we see emanating from Washington DC like some bad odor hovering over the country.

What do I mean by an exercise in political narcissism?

Far too often, narcissistically flawed individuals are hopelessly attracted by the grandiose opportunities of the political arena (as well as the Hollywood arena) like moths to a flame. Their sense of self is starkly invested in the desire for power over others (always, of course, "for their own good") , constant admiration and adulation and grandiose ambitions. This makes them remarkably adept at what is called the "politics of personal destruction".

For the narcissist it is always a zero-sum game he or she plays with other individuals. From the perspective of the narcissist, if someone else "wins", the narcissist "loses". It cannot be otherwise, since on some level they know that their own talent and skills are way overblown. Hence, they cannot hope to "win" based on those talents alone. Thus, the behavior of the classic narcissist is mostly directed toward making others lose so they can win by default. To that end, there is no behavior or tactic that is considered out -of-bounds or over-the-top.

This leads us to the current state of political discourse in this country and the ubiquitous personal attacks that have become the trademark of all political campaigns in both the Republican and Democrat parties.

If you want to understand why political campaigns have become so virulent and personally vicious you need not look any farther that this sad truth. While politics still occasionally brings out those who have strong personal integrity and values; often it is the people of no demonstrable integrity and elastic values who are obsessively attracted to the field and who triumph--and that is true on both sides of the political spectrum.

By that, I mean that those who would actually make the best leaders generally opt out of the process, because they tend to be too healthy to generate the continual all-consuming rage necessary to destroy all opponents; or they lack the required-- and mostly distorted --sense of personal "perfection" and grandiosity that drives the power-hungry.

Clearly, there can be other conflicts that motivate people in politics other than a broken sense of self. This is not an indictment of all politicians; but it does apply to many. Healthy self-respect and self-worth, i.e., healthy narcissism is essential for functioning in any profession; or, for that matter, for simply functioning effectively.

There are few politicians who are deficient in grandiosity and self-serving behavior. It becomes an issue of character when their identity gets re-invented regularly to please people. A healthy individual would not want to be POTUS if in doing so he would regularly have to violate his own sense of personal honor and integrity.

Such a committment to values and ideals is based on narcissism too, but it is the healthy kind of narcissism; the kind that generates values and ideals to begin with (for a discussion of this see here).

For a typical pathological narcisssist, the only value and the only ideal is himself.

I am frequently reminded that it is hopelessly naive these days to expect the electorate to vote for a person based on what that person actually stands for; instead, these days most people respond to the negative campaign ads that slice and dice the other guy; and are mainly influenced by botoxed faces and Hollywood-packaged good-looks rather than the content of any candidate's character. The less they know of that character, the better!

Unless you can dig up some dirt; then it becomes like a reality TV show and everyone is entranced.

As far as good looks, do you imagine that a Golda Meir or a Margaret Thatcher would have a chance to become the first woman president of the US. Not these days, for sure where there is favored a certain overly-thin, botoxed, plastic look--not only for the women, but for the men.

Real personal integrity and character comes from having a consistent set of values and exhibiting behavior driven by those values. Today's classic narcissistically-driven politicians can only flutter in the political winds, and, Zelig-like, easily adopt whatever characteristics their adoring public care to project onto them.

It is easy to be tough and ruthless with political adversaries in the US political battlefield. The kind of threat political adversaries pose is hardly life-threatening (though in other, less civilized nations it may well be). Political bullies in both parties feel perfectly safe in viciously attacking and denigrating those who oppose them. And, when it happens occasionally that a political adversary unexpectedly shoots back and won't go away, the bully easily falls back on the "victim" role and whines about "vast right or left-wing conspiracies" or sheds a few tears on cue; or belligerantly attacks anyone within reach.

This is not the kind of person who can face real threats in the real world very effectively because this is not the kind of person who can effectively deal with threats they do not perceive as personal--why should they care much about any other kind, unless the latest polls indicate they should?.

The best leaders are not obsessed with themselves; or with polls; or with accumulating power by pandering to all sides.

Those leaders may, in truth, have many other personal flaws--but not particularly of the dangerously narcissistic variety. Whatever those flaws (and we all possess them), they are characterologically able to be more concerned about dealing with external reality; rather than in preserving a distorted and fragile internal one. Avenging petty slights and insults is not a high priority to a psychologically healthy person. Those healthy individuals are far more likely to direct their psychological energy toward dealing with real-world geopolitical threats that endanger both their country and the people they have the responsibility to protect; rather than using that country or the power of their office to counter threats to their endangered self and act on their grandiose fantasies about themselves.

The latter is the same psychological pathology that is rampant among dictators and dictator wannabes of all stripes. Their concern about others in their group/nation is purely of the “l’état c’est moi” variety.

That the needs of the nation, or the people they serve, might be different from their own; or that doing the right thing is often different from doing the popular thing, are foreign and dangerous concepts to the political narcissist.

The only reality they know--or care about--is the one inside themselves.

Having said all this, the voters of this country should also do a little introspection, because frequently these voters of all political persuasions, enable and encourage the narcissism of their leaders.

The sad truth is that negative campaigning works.

It appeals to the average voter who does not bother to look past the headlines or news bites to seek truth about a given situation. Oftimes, there is no "truth" to be discovered; or that can be discovered; and one must make voting decisions based on little things like character, integrity, past behavior, and mitigating factors.

It's not easy when accusations against character and integrity are hurled around unthinkingly and without consideration for facts.

And then, there is always the reality that candidates for public office, even that of the Office of the POTUS, cannot be held to an impossibly high standard of behavior, i.e., they cannot be expected to be "perfect" in every way.

If such a candidate were ever found by either political party, then I would be the first to do everything I could to ensure theat he would not get elected. Such candidates are either lying or hiding something about themselves, since such perfection is not generally a characteristic of the human species.

"Let him who is without sin, cast the first stone" seems like a good idea for these political campaigns, along with the vignette: "There is no one who has not sinned."

So, what is a voter to do?

First, we have to stop rewarding excessive political narcissism. No one is a God; no one is The One; no one is The Messiah who will lead us out of the Wilderness. While it is tempting to want to place all our faith and hope into one vessel, it is an abdication of personal responsibility and a flight into dependency and the desire for someone to take care of us.

Been there, done that as a nation--fairly recently, in fact.

It is also fairly natural, i.e. human, thing that we should flock to someone who promises to give us lots of free stuff. Children especially are attracted to such individuals. But,when you are grown up you usually have realized that getting "something or nothing" is a con, and that anyone proposing such a thing is nothing more than a con artist.

A real leader will not make unrealistic promises; his personal integrity and honesty would compel him to do what he thinks is the right thing, even if it is unpopular and difficult to do; and he would be able to state his reasons for doing what he did; and be able to persuade you that it was indeed the right thing to do--or be willing to live with the consequences afterwards if he doesn't. A real leader has nothing to hide and is honest about his mistakes.

This does not mean that a real leader is unable to compromise when the situation calls for it; but an honest man or woman who is not narcissistically preoccupied with pleasing or manipulating everyone does not compromise with fundamental values and understands when those values are at stake and when they are not.

That's why it is so important to understand a politician's basic character, because character underlies values.

Isn't it time America had a real national debate about what constitutes character in a politician?

I am not particularly satisfied with the Democratic Party answer to this quesion, because they are more concerned with demonizing anyone they label as "hypocrite" (i.e., anyone who espouses some high ieal what they consider the Good, but who personally fails to live up to it and lies to themselves about their own failures). The Democrats seem to believe that you just make every "sin" a political virtue; or accept that "anything goes" in the personal integrity sphere as long as the person is ideologically pure. They justify the way they treat corrupt or immoral Democrats is justified because Republicans are "hypocritical".

The Republicans aren't that much better, constantly espousing personal virtue and even legislating it onto others (something that the Democrats do as a matter of principle, for "our own good"). While Republicans are often intolerant of human frailty, at least they don't actively promote it like their political adversaries, whose relativistic morality makes excuses for everyone's behavior, except when it suits them politically to use such information to demonize their opponents.

Nevertheless, "demonizing one's opponents" is what it's all about these days. Candidates who refrain from doing it are punished at the polls. Candidates who try to speak about the issues have trouble gaining traction unless they too join in the demonization, even when it is against potential allies and not opponents.

So, now we come to the Republican Presidential Primary. How is one to choose?

Character does matter and so do Ideas. So does behavior and performance in both the personal and public spheres.

Each of us much decide for ourselves which candidate's character and ideas; behavior in the past and present, are most appealing to us and will work for our nation. Each of us much decide, based on past performance, past displays of character, what each candidate's future performance and character is likely to be.

As we say in psychiatry: The best predictor of FUTURE behavior is PAST behavior. Other factors may be involved, of course; and obviously, people can change for the good and give up their bad behaviors.

That doesn't necessarily mean that they are entitled to our vote. I believe in redemption for even the devil himself--but I wouldn't vote for him for President.

For example, most people will take into consideration the fact that Gingrich's past behavior in his personal and public life indicates that he had some serious character flaws which led to erratic performance and (to be blunt) narcissistic gratification chosen over responsibilities and committments. People can make mistakes and be genuinely sorry and changed for the better. The behavior I refer to happened quit a number of years ago in the past (I believe). I do not denounce Gingrich: he is only human. The question is, has he changed as he claims? Has his character improved? How will he function under stress? Will he continue to seek narcissistic gratification over his responsibilities and committments--to his family, his party and his nation? I do like his ideas; and I will be watching closely how he behaves during this primary season. In the end, he may be the best possible candidate to support--but I have not made up my mind based on the information provided and the behavior observed recently.

As for Romney, he has also some things in his past that indicate a flawed and weak character. He is definitely a good-intentioned person, but his political ambitions have lead him to support and believe in things all over the political map, left and right and East and West--a serious charge when considering character and values. I do not denounce him either for his time at Bain and I find it rather reprehensible that any conservative would, assuming such a conservative believes in the free market at all.

Santorum for me is pretty much WYSIWYG. He is politically consistent and his character seems steady. He says what he thinks wheter or not it is popular; and there is a lot to admire in that, even if you don't agree with him on some issues. He may be too much like the kind of Republican who wants to legislate morality for others, and I, for one, don't care for that. But he has some interesting ideas and he argues that he would leave most of the morality issues to the state and local levels. He will be demonized forcefully by Democrats and the Obama Administration because they disagree on policy as well as ideology. They will attempt to make it a character issue.

Paul has much to recommend him from an economic and idea perspective. But he too was so narcissistically engaged in the pursuit of his own personal glory, that he allowed some very nasty stuff to be published in his name in the past. I think he is unable to see the Big Picture in the foreign policy area, but some of his ideas there bear open discussion and debate and I am glad he is in the race to bring them up.

The only other candidate right now is Obama. I do not hesitate to say that most of his adult life has been an exercise in political narcissism and the accumulation of personal power. If Democrats and Independents who voted for him (and not a few Republicans, I would venture) are now disappointed, then they should read this post again to understand the psychological dynamics (their own as well as Obama's). Obama's ideas are old and stale. They have been tried all over the world with dismal and horrific results. All we have to do is to look at what is happening in Europe to see where it will all lead. But Obama has used these ideas to advance himself over the years

As far as Obama's character: He also has lots of skeletons in the closet for which he has received a pass from his Party; the media; and most of the voters. I suspect that if as much information about his past was known as is known about all the other candidates, there would be hell to pay.

But he came out of nowhere, a tabula rasa who was felt to be The One, The Messiah. He received a Nobel Prize for Peace for doing nothing to speak of; and several years later has brought America to the brink of economic and political disaster. His associations with people like Jeremiah Wright and Bill Ayers are despicable, as is his ability to rapidly terminate any relationship which might do him political harm. I see him as a rather weak character overall; which strong narcissistic traits, whose ideas I totally deplore.

When it comes down to a choice, I prefer almost anyone on the Republican side and at least several on the Democratic side of the aisle.

It's going to be a long and painful year in many ways.

THE WINGS OF ENVY AND RESENTMENT

This piece by Thomas Sowell is very thought provoking. In it, he describes "the way history went down" so that the Western Europeans happened to develop a literate language (i.e., a written language) a few hundred years before the Eastern Europeans. This he explains is mostly due to the fact that the West of Europe happened to be conquered by the Romans. The later disparieties in development between the Eastern and Western European peoples can be traced back to this quirk of history:

Literate people obviously have many advantages over people who are illiterate. Even after Eastern European languages became literate, it was a long time before they had such accumulations of valuable written knowledge as Western European languages had, due to Western European languages’ centuries earlier head start.

Even the educated elites of Eastern Europe were often educated in Western European languages. None of this was due to the faults of one or the merits of the other. It is just the way that history went down.

But such mundane explanations of gross disparities are seldom emotionally satisfying — least of all to those on the short end of these disparities. With the rise over time of an indigenous intelligentsia in Eastern Europe and the growing influence of mass politics, more emotionally satisfying explanations emerged, such as oppression, exploitation, and the like.

He goes on to draw a parallel between the economic disparities between Eastern and Western Europe and the situation in America today:

Today, in America, many denounce the black-white gap in economic and other achievements, which they attribute to the same kinds of causes as those to which the lags of Eastern Europeans have been attributed. Moreover, the persistence of these gaps, years after the civil-rights laws were expected to close them, is regarded as something strange and even sinister.

Yet the economic disparities between Eastern Europeans and Western Europeans remain to this day greater than the economic disparities between blacks and whites in America — and the gap in Europe has lasted for centuries.

Focusing attention and attacks on people who have greater wealth-generating capacity — whether races, classes, or whatever — has had counterproductive consequences, including tragedies written in the blood of millions. Whole totalitarian governments have risen to dictatorial power on the wings of envy and resentment ideologies.

Intellectuals have all too often promoted these envy and resentment ideologies. There are both psychic and material rewards for the intelligentsia in doing so, even when the supposed beneficiaries of these ideologies end up worse off. When you want to help people, you tell them the truth. When you want to help yourself, you tell them what they want to hear.

I have quoted extensively from Sowell's argument because it is a very crucial point he is making.

One of the "Seven Deadly Sins of Narcissism" is ENVY; and one of the key points about envy is that it is never directed at that which is bad; rather, it is a hateful attack on that which is good.

People who specialize in ENVY don't really want the good things the other person has; they want to insure that the other person doesn't have them or get to keep them.

Or, if they do want those things, it is a desire that comes in a distant second to their desire to destroy the good that others

ENVY is, without doubt, the underlying emotion behind the Marxist trope, "from each according to his ability; to each according to his need". The "enlightened" and morally bankrupt left has always believed that economic self-interest means simply voting yourself a share of the money earned by others. They wouldn't know how to create wealth if their lives depended on it; that's why they seek power over others--they see it as the only way they can survive in the real world; but since they cannot admit that to themselves, they will seize other people's wealth with one hand, while signing the political bills that make it impossible to create the wealth on which they themselves depend.

The truth is that they deeply hate those who create the wealth they want to steal, and seek to destroy them--even though at some level, they understand they cannot survive without them.

They count on the fact that this reality never spoken of in polite society.

The envy of the postmodern progressive left is palpable. It is malignant and it consumes them. But they don't care. They have convinced themselves that they stand for things like "peace" and "freedom" and "truth"--but they have really chosen to ally themselves to the side of darkness and despair, slavery and oppression, lies and distortions; and they can no longer even appreciate when a truly magnificent achievement takes place before their very eyes unless they can claim credit for it.

RESENTMENT is closely allied with ENVY. Professor Sowell has written about the politics of resentment, too, and the creation, back in the 1960s, of a whole government-supported industry of race hustling:

Pres. Lyndon Johnson’s “war on poverty” — a war that we have lost, by the way — bankrolled all kinds of local “leaders” and organizations with the taxpayers’ money, in the name of community “participation” in shaping the policies of government.

These “leaders” and community activists have had every reason to hype racial resentments and to make issues “us” against “them.”

One of the largely untold stories of our time has been the story of how ACORN, Jesse Jackson, and other community activists have been able to transfer billions of dollars from banks to their own organizations’ causes, with the aid of the federal government, exemplified by the Community Reinvestment Act and its sequels.

Racial anger and racial resentments are the fuel that keeps this lucrative racket going.

The modern Democratic party is almost entirely based on hyping both envy and resentment, and appealing to the worse of human nature. By doing so, they have created destructive and wealth-destroying armys of entitlement whose goal, whether they admit it or not, is to destroy wealth and the source of wealth.

Without envy, there would be no Democratic Party today.

And when Sowell says that, "Whole totalitarian governments have risen to dictatorial power on the wings of envy and resentment ideologies", it is clear to even the least observant that this is the destructive path which is being foisted on this country by the mostly clueless minions of the political left.

I have to ask again with some exasperation, why aren't Republicans making a case for the essential morality of capitalism? An entire cultural war is being fought against capitalism, and instead of making the case for why economic freedom and the free market is the best possible means to economic betterment for ALL PEOPLE, regardless of whether they are rich or poor; black or white; gay or straight; male or female or along any other divide the progressives can think of.

Instead, Republicans are busy legitimizing the narrative of the Democrats and their progressive left leaders. This is sheer stupidity and represents (sadly) how ubiquitous such narratives (such as "the 1% vs the 99%") have become.

Only in a free economic system within a free political system is it even possible to be moral, since benevolence toward others, compassion, charity, and generosity cannot exist without freedom. Benevolence, generosity, charity, and compassion that are mandated by the state, or by a religion (on pain of death or other consequence); or by any regulations on behavior; or by force--are meaningless insofar as individual morality is concerned.

So yes, we must make the moral case for capitalism. We must continually put forth these ideas in debate and argument because they are good ideas and shining through them is the essential morality of America and Americans.

ENVY and RESENTMENT are the bane (or should I say "Bain"?) of civilized society. In fact, these negative human emotions are essentially de-civilizing for those individuals who freociously cling to them and to their own sense of entitled victimhood.

Societies that are based on the emotions of envy and resentment are doomed to descend into "tragedies written in the blood of millions", as each individual and special interest group fights all the others for their "share" of an ever shrinking amount of wealth. Eventually, they run out of other people's wealth to steal .

For proof of this, all you have to do is look at human history.

YES WE CAN'T !

RE: Obama on jobs

RE: Obama on energy dependence

RE: Obama on talking out of both sides of his mouth


[Cartoons by Lisa Benson]

Sheesh. This should be a no-brainer. Instead it is the President who demonstrates that he has no brain, only his precious progressive ideology crammed between his ears.

THE COST OF WARS UNWON

Mark Steyn writes about the Ron Paul phenomenon and wonders if it denotes a fracture in conservatism. In particular, he says the following:

It’s traditional at this point for non-Paulites to say that, while broadly sympathetic to his views on individual liberty, they deplore his neo-isolationism on foreign policy. But deploring it is an inadequate response to a faction that is likely to emerge with the second-highest number of delegates at the GOP convention. In the end, Newt represents Newt and Huntsman represents Huntsman, but Ron Paul represents a view of America’s role in the world, and one for which there are more and more takers after a decade of expensive but inconclusive war. President Obama has called for cuts of half a trillion dollars from the military budget. In response, too many of my friends on the right are demanding business as usual — that the Pentagon’s way of doing things must continue in perpetuity. It cannot.

Steyn goes on to talk about why we are not getting enough bang for the buck when it comes to the military and sugguest that it has to do with the idea that, ..."not unreasonably, serving soldiers are weary of unwon wars — of going to war with everything except war aims and strategic clarity."

Bullseye.

What can be said of a military superpower who, after a decade of "expensive but inconclusive war" has not much to show for it? Iraq is unraveling before our eyes after our hasty departure; and there is little reason to believe that Afghanistan will do better when we get the hell out of there. Our tails won't be between our legs, but they might as well be.

And this record of "inconclusiveness" hardly began in the last decade (remember the first war in Iraq? Remember the handwringing and mea culpas; the anguishing about civilian casualties; as well as the daily televising of any US military dead? Remember Abu Ghraib (where, incidentally no one was killed--but these days humiliating the enemy and treating them sans dignity is considered far worse than actually killing them)?
Steyn again:

I would hazard that the recent video of U.S. Marines urinating on Taliban corpses is a coarser comment on the same psychosis, and the folly of fighting a determined and murderous enemy by distributing to your officers bulk orders of that charlatan’s bestseller Three Cups of Tea. There is a logical progression from three cups of sweet tea to those acts of micturition that the Pentagon would do well to ponder.

I submit that it is this record of "inconclusiveness" and attempting to wage politically correct war that has so many people, including those in the military, who support Ron Paul's candidacy.

Why in the hell do we bother going to war these days if we don't intend to win decisively? Why have all this military might and be afraid of killing the enemy and bringing them to their knees?

I'm not even in the military, yet the rules of engagement that our servicemen and women have to work under; the worry that they have to be so politically correct and nice to those who would ruthlessly cut off their heads or publically humiliate them without a moment's thought, is rather oppressive and completely unreasonable.

Instead our troops are expected to have tea with the Taliban and show some respect to Al Qaeda.

Victor Davis Hanson writing about the micturition outrage, picks up the many paradoxes of the current preferred manner of waging war in these glorious days of progressive enlightment:

The incident, though, reminds us of the contradictions of the American experience since 9/11, warped by both technology and politics. Abu Ghraib, where a few guards humiliated Iraqi prisoners (most of them terrorists with blood on their hands), was rightly condemned as both immoral and harmful to our mission. But it was a product of poor officer command and control at the prison, and no more a reflection of George Bush’s supposedly aberrant ideology than are urinating Marines of Barack Obama’s Afghan policy — and yet Abu Ghraib was often portrayed in the media as the touchstone to the Bush follies and crimes. One of the advantages of Obama as commander-in-chief (one at least) is that we will not see the Taliban corpses on posters throughout Europe and on American campuses as conveying some existential “truth” as we did the Abu Ghraib photos.

We are in an Orwellian situation when the media seems to think that the unfortunate but common dark side of war is somehow a carry-over from the Bush administration, one that now burdens Laureate Obama with responsibilities not of his own making. We’ve seen that assumption repeatedly over the last three years, when war critic Obama campaigned on blasting the Bush anti-terrorism protocols, then decided as president that they were useful and so adopted or expanded them, and then never quite explained to the American people the turn-around, but most certainly felt he was not a fair target for the anti-war fury he had a bit earlier helped to create but which mysteriously vanished in late January 2009.

One final example of the paradox: While we must ensure that urinating on enemy dead is an isolated and one-time occurrence, it seems to me, in terms of flesh and bone, as morally ambiguous or unambiguous as sending a Predator targeted assassination drone — its use expanded sevenfold by Barack Obama — as judge, jury, and executioner, to take out suspected terrorists — and everyone in their general vicinity, in a foreign country that we are not formally at war with. Selective outrage is a dangerous thing....

But selective outrage is one of the hallmarks of our current Administration and its media sycophants. If war is Hell; then unwon wars, like the politically correct kind we have been waging since 9/11 are endless Purgatory.

We all know the cost of war in terms of lives and treasure. But as we are beginning to see, the cost of wars unwon go on and on and on as this last decade has shown us. The slow attrition of human life; the inordinate cost of waging a PC war and the "nation building" that makes our professional soldiers perform all sorts of duties other than soldiering; the lack of accountability by a Congress and several Administrations that won't formally declare war and be done with it; and finally, the lack of ability of the American public to sustain interest in, or committment to, a half-hearted "overseas contingency operation" where "winning" is considered shameful to our PC politicians.

Ron Paul is entirely correct in this, at least: such decisions should be made based on our national interest and for our defense; and if we decide to get in it, then we should be doing our damnded to win it--no apologies.

The cost of wars unwon is far to high in terms of American lives and treasure, to do otherwise.

UPDATE: More from The Corner:

After Vietnam, our politicians demanded that our armed forces be trained to wield the most lethal weapons ever made, with the moral and cultural sensitivity of Peace Corps volunteers. To anyone who knows history, our troops have met this challenge with overwhelming and unprecedented success — as our real record in Iraq and Afghanistan attests.

But it has left our military trapped in a strange double bind, one reflected in the furor over this video. If Somalis drag our dead through the streets or Iraqi insurgents dismember captured Marines or the Taliban gang-rape and mutilate women to enforce their vicious version of sharia law, the media treat it as irrelevant to understanding who we are fighting, or why. They even suppress those stories and images — such as the beheadings of Daniel Pearl and Nick Berg. Their grounds for that censorship is that such reporting might “inflame hatred” — in other words, make us fight harder.

On the other hand, if an American warrior oversteps civilized bounds, his behavior becomes proof that our mission is a moral failure and no longer deserving of support.

A "BAINFUL" REALITY INDEED

According to Power Line, the U.S. is slipping in economic freedom:

The source of America’s prosperity is no secret: our economy has historically been freer than those of almost all rivals. Unfortunately, that advantage–the essence of what America is all about–is being lost.

The Heritage Foundation has released its annual Index of Economic Freedom, and the United States has slipped to tenth place, trailing Hong Kong, Singapore, Australia, New Zealand, Switzerland, Canada, Chile, Mauritius and Ireland

Somebody should mention this to several of the idiot Republican Presidential candidates. You know the one's I'm talking about--the ones who are so obsessed with becoming the nominee, that they have abandoned even the pretense of supporting economic freedom and capitalism.

In their way of thinking, no one should ever be inconvenienced or upset when the impersonal market works its economic magic for the benefit of us all, i.e. when the creative destruction that is its hallmark brings constant change--and hope. Take Bill Gates and Microsoft, for example:

Bill Gates, with Microsoft Office, ended the need for thousands of accounting firm employees and typing pools (there are more than 1/3 fewer secretaries today than in 1980, totaling roughly 1.5 million jobs). Apple's Steve Jobs, well he probably ended the jobs of quite a few of Bill Gates' former employees by out-teching the master of tech.

If you only count jobs lost as a measure of success, then you are not understanding the way the Market works.

The problem with the entire discussion is that jobs are being used as the only measure of the "good" done by Romney. Profits are also good as they allow companies to grow and as they return capital to investors who can then fund the creation or growth of other companies. Indeed, despite our being surrounded by Keynesian-thinking politicians who believe that nothing is as important as consumers having spending money, the indirect benefits to society of profits to investors are arguably at least as large as the indirect benefits of employment.

The free market is always in a state of change, which for some may be a "Bainful" reality.

Progressives like Obama always say they want to "streamline" government, but they are lying or delusional or both. In fact, they are very regressive because they think they can accomplish efficiency and productivity without change, i.e., without ever anyone losing a job or economically suffering in the least.

But in capitalism there are winners and losers in the moment. The winners succeed, and, if they are capable of learning, the losers learn what they need to do to become winners next time around.

"Vulture" capitalism they call it; and they condemn Mitt Romney for practicing it when he was at Bain. But even vultures serve a useful purpose in life, though they get little credit for it and some find their function distasteful.

Let me be clear. I have not decided who I support in the Republican field; but this latest bit of disgusting emulation of all the egalitarian progressives who want everyone to always be equal--not in opportunity, but in outcome--is completely destructive without an ounce of creativity, i.e., it is utter delusional pandering.

It proves that even those on the right who trumpet being "pro-Market" have no idea how the Market works; and that they fully intend to continue to interfere with it in the same way the our current Dear Leader is doing.

Mona Charen captures the essence of the duplicity and hypocrisy heartlessness at issue:

So the president has proposed to streamline a number of agencies in the federal government. He claims to be trying to eliminate redundancy and duplication, but it’s clear that something else is going on.

Clearly President Obama has decided to join the Republicans in throwing widows and orphans into the snow. By suggesting that we cut vital government services, he wants to tell autistic children “You’re on your own.” He has decided to diminish “who we are” as a nation — a people who do “great things together.”

But, it is exactly a "Bainful turnaround" that is needed right now to save us all:

There’s a very troubled company out there called U.S. Government, Inc. It’s teetering on the edge of bankruptcy. And it badly needs to be taken over and turned around. It probably even needs the services of a good private-equity firm, with plenty of experience and a reasonably good track record in downsizing, modernizing, shrinking staff, and making substantial changes in management. Yes, layoffs will be a necessary part of the restructuring.

A quick look at the income statement of this troubled firm tells the story. Just in the past year (FY 2011) the firm spent $3.7 trillion, but took in only $2.2 trillion in sales revenues. Hence its deficit came to $1.5 trillion.

Advertisement Just in the first three months of the new year (FY 2012), the firm’s troubles continued. Outlays for all purposes came in at $874 billion, but income was only $554 billion. So the shortfall was $320 billion. No hope of a self-imposed turnaround here. Indeed, both the senior management and the board of directors show no signs of making major changes to their business strategy.

Hope for future profits? That’s out of the question. The firms only chance of survival is a takeover.

No wonder our economic freedom is declining in America!

I have no problem with those who want to act compassionately to help people whose lives are turned upside down because reality cannot be faked.

Right now, the biggest faker of reality is our own government and its representatives.

Think for a minute about all those who lost their jobs at Solyndra. Or all the other companies that the Obama Administration invested your and my money in who are going to go bankrupt any day now? Or, how about those who lost their livings when the US Government takeovers of the auto companies forced the closure of small plants and dealerships?

Obama's sudden fascination with "streamlining" the government is just another bit of fakery. And, frankly, I expect it from the likes of him and his cronies. No amount of reality will ever convince them that their policies lead to more suffering and pain than any venture capital firm could possibly imagine doing.

Because a venture/vulture capital firm is only in it for profit--and rightly so. The market is neutral. It doesn't care if you are black or white or yellow or green; it doesn't care if you have good intentions and want to save the earth or if you want to destroy it. It only cares about supply and demand. And whatever companies can meet the demand and supply what the consumer wants for the best possible price/quality ratio.

But your typical leftist progressive, social justice/redistributionist types are in it for far far more than some piddling profit! In fact, they turn up their noses at the idea of money (even as they cash their government checks) and disdain financial profit openly and loudly and repeatedly. What they get out of their particular brand of looting is power over others and a transcendant feeling of superiority as they contemplate their own wonderfulness.

It's bad enough to watch Obama and his crew engage in this narcissistic behavior. It's sickening to witness those who supposedly support the free market and claim to want to get the government off our backs strike at the core of how the market works.

The free market is the essence of "hope and change" in the real world not some progressive postmodern fantasy world.

How, pray tell, do they intend to get us out of debt and streamline government without being able to fire people--especially incompetent people; or lazy people; or people who have jobs that are not needed any more? How do they intend to do it without letting inefficient or badly run companies fail without bail outs from you and me?

No wonder people are seriously considering a nominee like Ron Paul, who for all his shortcomings and crackpot ideas and refusal to face reality in the foreign policy area, is at least firmly entrenched in economic reality.

It is a "Bainful" reality indeed that there are winners and losers in life. The good part is that the composition of each group changes constantly. Change and suffering go hand in hand. The forces of Nature (i.e., reality), like those of the Market, are indifferent to how any one of us might feel about it.

Reality can be very painful at times; but to ignore it always causes more pain and suffering for more people in the long run.



[More cartoons by Lisa Benson here}

OCCUPIETY, EUROTRAGEDY, AND THE WORLDWIDE NARCISSISTIC CRISIS

Most people would agree, at least theoretically, that is is quite natural for parents to want to give their children a good life and even sacrifice in the present so that their children's future would be better than their own. Supposedly this is a key tenet of the American Dream.

But that's just an old-fashioned and outdated perspective. Under the auspices of Hope and Change, The American Dream is being transformed into cradle-to-grave dependence on the State. We have pius and (presumably) serious people occupying our cities demanding to be taken care of. All they want is free food, free housing, free education and so on. Not too much to ask of a free society, after all!

Their European counterparts, a few years ahead of them evolutionally, are rioting and are just a little pissed off that the gravy train is ending because they have run out of other people's money to spend on themselves.

Quelle Tragédie! A crisis of megalomaniacal proportions! A triumph of psychological denial!

If you want to understand how the extremely malignant form of entitled narcissism which is prevalent today--the same psychopathology, BTW, that got us into the current economic meltdown in this country and worldwide--then you need look no further than the following two articles.... It never has been about the children...it's all about MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

First, from Greece :

Children are being abandoned on Greece's streets by their poverty-stricken families who cannot afford to look after them any more.
Youngsters are being dumped by their parents who are struggling to make ends meet in what is fast becoming the most tragic human consequence of the Euro crisis.

Got that? This is a "tragic" consequence of the Euro crisis! That parents would abandon their small children, leaving them in the street because they can't afford to take care of them anymore.

The crisis is that these self-absorbed parents have always put their own needs and self-fulfillment and satisfaction above the needs of their children. Otherwise they would not be where they are. And, of course, by dumping the children on the streets, they are still doing so.

Who is responsible for their children except for them?

Then we have this, from the Annals of Occupiety:

A man is facing child cruelty charges after his 13-month-old daughter was found alone in a tent in the Occupy DC camp at McPherson Square.

This isn't the first instance of children's needs taking a remote second to the narcissistic antics of their loving, compassionate parents.

But..but...but, you might say, isn't "social justice" and all the leftist and Democratic bullsh**t propaganda (reference the ravings of Nancy Pelosi) all about the children??

No.

It's all about narcissism, victimhood, entitlement, self-indulgence, and the unwillingness to face the consequences of their own choices.

Sadly, children will suffer and there will not be much of a future for them when their parents are more interested in their own comfort and satisfying their every whim and desire.

We are in the midst of a worldwide narcissistic crisis; and, I can assure you that the consequences of this "tragedy" are going to be devastating to civilization.