Is George Bush A Psychopath?

[zonmoy]

I make the effort to share this information because it gives me, at last, a plausible answer to a long-unanswered question: Why, no matter how much intelligent goodwill exists in the world, is there so much war, suffering and injustice? It doesn't seem to matter what creative plan, ideology, religion, or philosophy great minds come up with, nothing seems to improve our lot. Since the dawn of civilization, this pattern repeats itself over and over again.

The answer is that civilization, as we know it, is largely the creation of psychopaths. All civilizations, our own included, have been built on slavery and mass murder. Psychopaths have played a disproportionate role in the development of civilization, because they are hard-wired to lie, kill, cheat, steal, torture, manipulate, and generally inflict great suffering on other humans without feeling any remorse, in order to establish their own sense of security through domination. The inventor of civilization, "the first tribal chieftain who successfully brainwashed an army of controlled mass murderers," was almost certainly a genetic psychopath. Since that momentous discovery, psychopaths have enjoyed a significant advantage over non-psychopaths in the struggle for power in civilizational hierarchies -- especially military hierarchies.



Behind the apparent insanity of contemporary history, is the actual insanity of psychopaths fighting to preserve their disproportionate power. And as their power grows ever-more-threatened, the psychopaths grow ever-more-desperate. We are witnessing the apotheosis of the overworld -- the overlapping criminal syndicates that lurk above ordinary society and law just as the underworld lurks below it.

During the past fifty years, psychopaths have gained almost absolute control of all the branches of government. You can notice this if you observe carefully that no matter what illegal thing a modern politician does, no one will really take him to task. All of the so called scandals that have come up, any one of which would have taken down an authentic administration, are just farces played out for the public, to distract them, to make them think that the democracy is still working.


http://www.opednews.com/articles/1/Is-George-Bush-A-Psychopat-by-Dr--Kevin-Barrett--080602-915.html

[leftofcool]

1. You need to ask?

[AndyA]

2. Is George Bush A Psychopath?

At least.

He's also an alcoholic.

A liar.

A hypocrit.

A bigot.

Corrupt.

Power hungry.

A murderer.

A thief.

A traitor.

And those are just his GOOD QUALITIES!

[zonmoy]

4. of course he is.

now for the important question. are any of the candidates that we have to vote for not psychopaths.

[yurbud]

38. that's an insult to psychopaths. I'm not sure how, but comparing Bush to anything

insults the thing compared.

[1Hippiechick]

39. Do bears sleep in the woods?

:eyes:

[MedleyMisty]

3. I would say that most Americans are

Maybe not genetically, although Bush and his associates I think were born psychopaths. But most Americans adopt psychopathic tendencies to survive in our psychopathic culture.

[Mist]

5. Good point, sleebarker. I tend to think many adopt the outward behavior

of psychopaths, but, hopefully, not the soulless interior qualities.

[crikkett]

12. It's all about being a good

German American.

[electropop]

6. I can't agree. Many were fooled for a time, but that doesn't make us psychopaths.

Clearly, those at the highest levels in our government are severely psychopathic. Had they not been born wealthy, all would have been languishing in mental institutions or prisons.

[eridani]

27. It's like living inside a giant Milgram experiment

There is situational psychopathology and inborn psychopathology, just as there is situational depression and depression due to wonky brain chemistry. Luckily, Milgram did a second set of experiments in which just one confederate saying "Stop! This is intolerable!" could get the other subjects to back off.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

7. Does a bear pee in the woods?

Is the Pope a Nazi?

Does a klansman buy white sheets?

Is Christmas in December?

Is the ocean wet?

Sorry. Couldn't resist.

Of course, Bush is a psycho. He meets or exceeds almost all the criteria from the DSM-IV, both for psychopath AND sociopath.

[zonmoy]

8. what other american leaders also meet those criteria.

in both parties.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

9. Not sure

I just remember having a psychotherapist on my show who walked me through the characteristics, with me citing known instances of Bush behavior to match each one. Only after he was done did he tell me we'd just applied the characteristics of a sociopath.

The business with Bush cramming firecrackers up the butts of frogs and blowing the up was a BIG red flag, as I recall.

[Mist]

11. Absolutely--that firecracker/frog thing freaked me out but good. nt

[Forrest Greene]

13. The Frogs and The Firecrackers

That anyone running for President would admit that, or allow it to be admitted, & that voters did not walk away en masse in disgust says, I think, all that really needs to be said about psychopathy in G.W. Bush or in the American electorate. "Boys will be boys," won't they?

Keep an eye on those bodily fluids, Group Captain.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

15. I only drink pure grain alcohol and rainwater n/t

[raccoon]

19. Three qualities of a mass murderer: they tortured animals, played with fire,

and wet the bed. A study of mass murderers came up with this some time ago.

[Daveparts]

10. The Case for Insanity

We bandy around the word insane, we call those who disagree with use crazy. We have a stereotyped image of a crazy person cowering in a fetal position gibbering incoherently. But mental illness and insanity are real, and at the highest levels of government are more than just debilitating they are threatening for the peaceful existence of the planet it’s self.

What sets mental illness apart is from physical illness is the ability of the person to hide the symptoms of the disease. For example, if you have the flu sooner or later someone will catch on that your ill, either you’re sick or you’re well. If you have cancer, you have cancer it is rated by what stage the cancer is in but with a mental illness everyday is different. Today all the symptoms are completely under control and the individual appears normal. A bad day at work or an unexpected bill and the symptoms emerge from the peaceful persona like an enraged Bengal tiger.

One of my favorite expressions in life is, “The whole worlds crazy except for you and me but sometimes I don’t know about you.” It’s funny because it’s very true, we see ourselves as the picture of sanity and judge the rest of world accordingly. Our personality traits, our foibles our actions and prejudices are the benchmarks by which we judge our own sanity. We laud that in our humanity it is our differences that make the world go round but the benchmarks themselves are open to interpretation. We would not accept from anyone that a body temperature of 103 is just being different or a free spirit.

I was once involved in a court case where the defendant was ordered to have a psychological evaluation, the doctor then testified in court that the patient scored outside the norms in several areas. The patient was somewhat paranoid and borderline manic-depressive and though not delusional had a narrow view on the motivations of others. As I listened I thought to my self this looks bad but I was confounded when the doctor then concluded that the patient was completely acceptable as a parent and should be allowed to roam the streets unhindered.

That the patient was ill was agreed by all but to run even a finer comb through it, ill but not ill enough to be dangerous. That doctor was a brave man in my eyes, to attach his name to the paperwork acknowledging that the patient was mentally ill but testifying for their release on the grounds that the bomb probably wouldn’t explode any time soon. For the patient knew that they that were being evaluated and the purpose of the questioning given under clinical conditions and I thought to myself, if left alone will they get better or worse unsupervised?

Of course a lot has to do with class and money if the person had been without funds to hire their own doctor rather than the states maybe the diagnosis would have been different? Howard Hughes was an eccentric while the homeless man down town is crazy. Pretty is as pretty does and crazy is as crazy does, growing up in the seventies I have seen people with drug problems. Years later as a manager I was compelled to deal with employees with both mental and drug problems. Some had drug problems exacerbated by mental problems while some had mental problems and were self-medicating themselves with drugs merely discontinuing the drugs didn’t solve the problems.

But in the circles of the affluent or the powerful or celebrity there is what I call the Elvis syndrome. The people around Elvis were all loyal to the king and the king was loyal to them, when Elvis told a joke everyone laughed even if it wasn’t funny. No one dared tell the king he didn’t need second helpings or maybe he should kick the sleeping pills. The king was their ticket to the good life and there was no sense upsetting the apple cart by telling the king he was fat or a drug addict. That’s what your friends do, not employees pretending to be your friends their jobs is to laugh at your jokes and say, “Good idea Elvis.”

This crew of enablers is common among the rich and successful, the corporate yes men and the hangers on. Upon reaching the pinnacle of power it’s hard to determine, is the rocking horse rocking the child or is the child rocking the rocking horse? Much has been written about the Presidents childhood development, his torturing of small animals his burning of plebs in his fraternity. These issues are facts and they are serious indicators of the most dangerous kind of mental illness the sociopath. Listed below are the accepted tendencies of a sociopath and one need not get a perfect score to qualify.

1. Glibness/superficial charm.

2. Grandiose sense of self-worth.

3. Need for stimulation/proneness to boredom

4. Pathological lying

5. Conning/manipulative

6. Lack of remorse or guilt

7. Shallow affect

8. Callous/lack of empathy

9. Parasitic lifestyle

10. Poor behavioral controls

11. Promiscuous sexual behavior

12. Early behavior problems

13. Lack of realistic, long-term plans

14. Impulsivity

15. Irresponsibility

16. Failure to accept responsibility for own actions

17. Many short-term marital relationships

18. Juvenile delinquency

19. Narcissism

20. Criminal versatility

http://www.geoffmetcalf.com/psychopath.html

What makes the sociopath so dangerous is the contempt for which they hold for the rest of the world. They can appear to be completely normal to all the world because they understand what it takes to appear to be normal. The see themselves as super intelligent and by conning you it reinforces that belief, like serial killers that leave behind clues just to taunt the police. They are insane but like a savant they have a cunning clarity for self-preservation they hide like a submarine and act in stealth.

Is the President a sociopath? In my mind there is no doubt of it. Is the President a serial killer? In my mind there is no doubt of it. Should the President be impeached? There is no need too, the President is mentally disabled and unfit to hold office and should be removed on those grounds. Is the President competent to stand trial? I don’t know but I do know that those who abet him are. What better alias could the President assume then the dullard being control by sharpies rather than the other way around?

We see only the public persona of the President with only fleeting glimpses behind the scenes. It was generally assumed early in the administration that the President was no more than Charlie McCarthy or Mortimer Snerd and that Cheney and Rumsfeld were the Edgar Bergen’s. But after the November elections, after Rumsfeld was fired, it was perceived as a token that the administration was willing to negotiate with Congress. But lost in the media hoopla were Rumsfelds claims that he had tried to change the Presidents mind and that he had disagreed with the President.

Like wise Cheney with Plamegate has been cast adrift, Scooter Libby is caught in limbo and must maintain his silence for any hope of a pardon. But we have attorney gate with Alberto Gonzales is their any other administration in American history where this guy would still be employed? To go before Congress and give testimony more befitting Jimmy Hoffa at Robert Kennedy’s hearings into organized crime. The President must protect him he is one of the enablers in the inner circle that never disagree, “Good idea, Mr. President!”

“They misunderestimated me.” I don’t think the President has ever said any truer words. We have misunderestimed him; the Presidents new war czar is a perfect example of this. The Pentagon more than any other branch of the government has stood up to the President, they warned him before the invasion of Iraq during the invasion and after the invasion. And who was the first to go? Colin Powell to be followed by a host of other Generals. The President wants a war czar to shield him from reality brought in by those pesky generals in the field. He claims it is to coordinate the actions of the services but isn’t that what the joint chief of staff are for?

Last week the President gave a news conference in the rose garden warning the public to expect more US casualties in Iraq. Curiously disconnected, like an actor who didn’t quite understand his motivation for the scene, the President presented this like it was news to the American public at least it seemed to be news to him. “There has been a spike in enemy activity” he explained. Forgetting that his surge policy was intended to pacify the very area he was discussing. He seemed befuddled unable to connect cause and effect of his own polices.

We bandy around the word insane, we call those who disagree with use crazy. But we have before us an executive crisis of worldwide proportions, bigger than politics or party and even of institution. Can we as a nation sit back and say, “Well yes, he’s insane but what can you do? To literally hand over the keys to the gates of hell to a madman so as not to look bad politically. These politicians who are playing chicken with a sociopath and think they know more about how the game is played than he does are fools. For as the President said himself, “If you're sick and tired of the politics of cynicism and polls and principles, come and join this campaign.”

[windoe]

24. Your post should be in letters to the editor in major newspapers

and it should be in a post by itself. VERY well written!!

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

30. I completely agree with your post.

Now, the DSM-IV breaks down sociopathy into very discrete and neat types of sociopathic disease, but frankly, at evaluation time, where the rubber meats the road, it's not as clear-cut. A real sociopath is generally a melange' of the DSM-IV discrete classifications. You got you some NPD, some anti-social, some adjustment disorder, some BPD...it gets confusing. It also makes the eval terribly hard. Sometimes you have to pick one from column A, for the Axis one and one from column B for the axis two and order some extra appetizers to make the kids happy. Or maybe the Pupu Platter.

When you start drilling down into the long-term behavior of Dear Leader...well, this is a guy who was clearly raised, from zygotal stage, as a sociopath. A shitload of his "inner dialogue" was instilled in him by his parents and family traditions. Think about it: a family who has based itself and it's philosophies on sociopathic behavior and succeeded. Chilling. One of the great illuminating pieces on that is the writings and interviews by his Harvard Business School professor, who describes Dear Leader's behavior and utterences in class. Essentially, this is someone who has no empathy, no sympathy and no real understanding of anyone who is not him. His aggressive use of humor and familiarity in the service to ingratiate himself with people, his use of nicknames which are ultimately diminutive and dismissive, in that they are, in fact, classifications of the people upon whom he bestows these nicknames, and his propensity for utterly cold and ruthless behavior in the crunch times(until he cannot get his way and then he goes to sleep or biking or on vacation)...man. Classic stuff.

Ultimately, it doesn't leave the people observing and/or treating the sociopath which much. They have more moves that Jet Li. They slip, they slide, they deny, they denigrate. They are smarter than everyone, just ask them: no one understands them or their genius. They have things worked out, they see things as they really are and it's just too goddamned bad that others are not as smart as them and share their masterful insights.

They worst thing is that they attract ambitious people around them who are also credulous and those people adopt the sociopath's disease, so essentially, the sociopath's disease can become self-repicating. And, the sociopath, in his or her desire to get what they want, when they want it, can be manipulated by a bigger sociopath.

I think we know how that has turned out.

[Faygo Kid]

14. I see that Texecutions resume tonight. Must be a time of nostalgia for W.

He must really miss those days when he could kill people by never staying an execution. You know, the good old days when he could ridicule Karla Faye Tucker for asking for mercy from him, then have the satisfaction of knowing she died when he had the power to stop it. Fun stuff for him.

Made him feel important, kinda. Like an unnecessary war in Iraq.

You don't even have to ask this question. His entire life provides an answer to it, and an exclamation point.

[MasonJar]

16. You left out sociopath. He has to be a sociopath because he is so

totally engrossed in himself to the exclusion of even his family or so it appears; he has no empathy for anyone. That was apparent while he was okaying every death sentence while governor of Texas, as well as the destruction of the people and country of Iraq.

[Narkos]

25. Sociopath and psychopath are interchangeable terms

[Paranoid Pessimist]

31. Not to everyone are the terms interchangable

I work in a mental health clinic where, once a month or so, a psychiatrist comes and speaks to us, usually at the behest of a drug company pushing their medication, but nevertheless, they are usually interesting.

One we had a year or so ago ran the psych ward at Rykers in New York. He said he distinguished between sociopaths and psychopaths. Sociopaths don't mind killing you. Robbers who execute potential witnesses, organized crime hit men who commit murder as part of their job, and who aren't bothered by it are sociopaths. Psychopaths, on the other hand, WANT to kill you. Ted Bundy, The Freeway Stranglers Richard Ramirez the Night Stalker . . . people like that are psychopaths, the ones who are into what is called "recreational murder."

Incidentally this same guy said, for those of you who know the DSM categories, that people with narcissistic personality disorder were far more problematic and potentially dangerous than people with antisocial personality disorder, or borderline personality disorder.

That's what I think George W. Bush has: narcissistic personality disorder. Tom Englehart's piece published Sunday in his dispatch describes perfectly someone with narcissistic personality disorder:

http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/174938

There is no medication or talk therapy cure for this particular affliction. When they become frustrated because they are not able to live out their warped dreams, they tend to up the anty, which is why I do believe we have to watch out for President Junior's final days.

[mwb970]

17. bush is obviously sick in the head.

Normal people just don't act like he does.

[Phred42]

18. Where the hell have you been the last 8 years?

Ever read Bush on the Couch?

[zonmoy]

21. I saw his nature when he ran for his first term

What I couldn't understand was why nobody else could see things that were so obvious.

The shrinks should have been pointing this out when he ran for texas Governor or even earlier.

[pipi_k]

22. Strangely enough, I did too

And it was so hard trying to explain to people exactly what I saw...even as far back as October of 2000

It's like trying to explain to someone what the color pink smells like...


I saw the sickness in his face and in his eyes and that nasty little smirk of his...his shitty attitude toward people who didn't kowtow to him.

And when he mocked Karla Faye Tucker just before her execution, I knew that he was either without human conscience or just plain Evil. No matter what he felt personally, to have mocked her so publicly was obscene and I have been disgusted by him ever since.

[lolly]

32. It was like a dream world, wasn't it?

With everybody thinking you were "seeing things."

I've told this story before here, but I remember seeing him on the night he "accepted" Gore's concession. After his first sentence, I exclaimed out loud--"Oh my G-d. He's drunk!"

My husband thought I was being too partisan--but I grew up with an alcoholic, and it was clear as day to me that he was under the influence of something. Subsequent appearances of his these last 7 years have shown more and more evidence that he is "medicated," perhaps to control his mental problems, but I knew it immediately back then just by looking at his expression and listening to him talk.

[rebel with a cause]

34. The first time I saw him I knew he was dangerous

and I told people that and they asked me how I knew. I told them there was just something about him that screamed it out to me. I was like you, I could not understand how people could not see through him, he was so transparent. That people voted for him for his second term just told me that 51% of USA was idiots. :P

[Doctor_J]

20. Is John McCain a doddering old philanderer?

:eyes:

[windoe]

23. New rules!!! All presidents have to have an MRI

first to screen for lunacy, and if you have tortured animals, you don't even have to have an MRI.

[Narkos]

26. Absolutely!

[zeos3]

28. Does this look like a psychopath to you?

[Conyersfan]

29. A psychopath? Maybe. The worst president ever? Definitely

[santamargarita]

33. Psychopath...War Criminal. Thief...Liar. Sociopath...Asshole...

Did I miss anything?

[codjh9]

35. Yep, from Day One I thought not only was he an idot, and unqualified, but only

cared about little green pieces of paper, and not a shit about anyone or anything else, save perhaps his precious little Laura.

[sallyseven]

36. YUP

[LongTomH]

37. Great post and great comments. Can I add...........

First: The OP and the referenced OpEdNews article does seem to draw a link between power and psychopathy. Could we extend that to great wealth. Who said: "Behind every great fortune lies a great crime."

The Bush family is a prime example: We could start with Prescott Bush who helped finance Hitler, dealt with the Nazis even after the start of the way, and tried to depose FDR. Actually, I doubt the trail of high crimes in the Bush family started with Prescott Bush. Has anyone been tracing the Bush family tree and looking for the vultures roosting in the branches.

Second: This really should provide another good argument against capital punishment. Bush's earlier incarnation as "The Texecutioner" is the example seen in earlier post; but, how many people remember Bill Clinton leaving the campaign trail back in '92 to sign a death warrant for a retarded young man? We're seeing the ruthlessness of the Clinton clan coming out in this campaign.

And, yes, I spent years defending him against attacks from the right like most of the rest of you!

The question is, what are we selecting for when we make support for capital punishment virtually a litmus tests for state and federal office or even the Presidency?

[1Hippiechick]

40. He's an alcoholic with personality disorders....but read my post- I am NOT bashing alcoholics.

I have a son who is a recovering alcoholic (5.5 years) who was a binge drinker in private. Through his involvement in AA and mine in Al-Anon I have learned a lot about alcoholism and would never demean the seriousness of the disease. HOWEVER, I have also learned that alcoholism and personality disorders/deficiencies are closely related. AND,there is a difference between those who are recovering and those who are not even attempting. Dubya falls into the latter, in my opinion. His omnipotent attitude and speech are nothing more than the false bravado of his alcoholism talking.
:banghead: