From: Scott Chase (ecphoric@hotmail.com)
Date: Mon 12 May 2003 - 18:36:49 GMT
Dace wrote:
>
>
>
>As Dr. M. Scott Peck pointed out in *People of the Lie*, the very idea of
>"human evil" would not exist were it not for "malignant narcissism."
>Traditionally, what's evil is things like earthquakes and plagues and
>swarms
>of locusts. Human beings aren't supposed to be evil. When they are, like
>Hitler or Saddam or George W. Bush, they probably harbor a personality
>disorder. (For a psychiatric analysis of W., see
>http://www.counterpunch.org/wolman1002.html).
>
If that's what qualifies for a "psychiatric analysis" I think I'll pass. The
speculations about Dubya haing an Oedipal complex, making up a "reaction
formation" or identifying with an archetype are pretty dubious. The usage of
DSM criteria for various disorders were not well supported. It's an obvious
politically biased smear without much depth or substance.
Don't get me wrong. I'm no big fan of Dubya and think the new tax cutting
scheme might be nuts. Asking for hundreds of billions in tax cuts at the
same time that almost 100 billion is being slated for the war effort does
not seem sane to me, but this is not a matter of individual psychosis on
Dubya's part.
Republicans, as a group, tend to be deluded that Reaganomics will work if
given the proper chance and immunize against criticism of the 80's budget
deficits with various tactics, like how the Democrats were in control of
Congress and Reagan's budgets were DOA. They'll point to how JFK trimmed the
top marginal rates long before Reagan was a presidential contender. The
idea, call it "Reaganomics" or "supply side-ism", is that cuuting taxes will
stimulate the economy and boost revenue. It didn't seem to work well in the
80's, but that was the "Golden Age" when the Gipper was at the helm,
previous to "The Fall" when Dubya's dad said to read his lips and then the
philanderer got elected twice.
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