Dr Bandy Lee is one psychiatrist, on the nature of violence, who really has stuck her neck out and been punished by the American Psychiatric Association (#AmericanPsychiatricAssociation) for violating the 'Goldwater Rule' (i.e., making a professional evaluation without direct contact with the analysand who is a public figure).
She is writing a series of essay about what she labels as the #TrumpContagion, of which Mr Carlson is a manifestly both a carrier and symptom, in defiance and as an exile from the A.P.A.
Needless to say, Dr Lee has the bravery of a whistle-blower in facing adverse professional consequences. What the #APA overlooks is that . . .
> readers of analyses like those of Dr Lee can think for themselves; as well as,
> one can detect when a professional crosses the invisible line-of-bias line between opportune counsel for the rest of us AND opportunism at the expense of the rest of us.
Given the results of some latest polls in Trump's favor, the situation remains bizarre, to say the least. Apparently, there are enough selfish, scapegoating, ignorant, thrill-seeking people (read: totally immature) in the voting public to have these kinds of results. I believe in maintaining this dialog here, as a way of providing some relief among ourselves. I also try to comment on relevant articles in the NY Times and include mention of WMHC. It still might largely go to like-minded (sane!) people, but it's something. Vote Blue! I maintain that one of the best, hilarious though frightening ways of describing Trump supporters is the following (strong language alert): https://medium.com/bigger-picture/the-13-types-of-donald-trump-supporters-f463670578b2
HOW NEUROSCIENCE AND NEUROPOLITICS MAY HELP TO EXPLAIN THE RISING TIDE OF POLARISATION IN POLITICS AND WHY SO MANY RECENT AND CURRENT POLITICIANS BEHAVE IN DYSFUNCTIONAL WAYS
1. The worldwide ACE( Adverse Childhood Experience ) research program, 1985 and ongoing, is revealing that up to 40% of the population studied so far experienced either extreme or significant child hood trauma
2. Neuroscience is indicating that such levels of childhood trauma can cause the Amdygla to overproduce Cortisol and Adrenaline, the fight, flight or freeze hormones, leading to fear, anger, aggression, splitting and dissociation in later life.
3. The Amdyglas high demand for the requisite neurophysiological resources to create this oversupply of adrenaline and cortisol reduces the capacity of the Prefrontal Cortex to produce dopamine and serotonin which are required for empathic, relational and rational behaviour.
4. Neuropolitics can help to explain the rising tide of polarisation and dysfunctional politicians by recognising that a significant number of current and recent political figures themselves had high levels of childhood trauma which through their language and behaviour resonates unconsciously with, and attracts the traumatised 40 % in the relevant countries.
5. The neo liberal agenda in the western world of the past 40 years has made child bearing significantly more stressful with up to 60% of parents having to both work, the cost of housing becoming out of reach for those of child bearing age, maternity/paternity care provisions being cut, good child care being unaffordable, increasing foster care , increasing divorce rates, increasing drug, alcohol and addictive behaviour and heightened stress and anxiety levels conveyed in the social media channels.
6. The data coming from neuroscience and neuropolitics indicates a high need for policy makers and leaders at all levels to become aware of this research and to explore ways and means of reducing childhood trauma especially as the levels of childhood trauma are on the increase which may create an even more polarised and dysfunctional political world. The cost benefits arising from such action could well outweigh the social and economic costs of the consequences of traumatic childhoods.
Thank you, Sol. Since I am untrained in medicine, psychiatry, and psychology, I can only say that what you *write (ugg my faculties decline) here has an intuitive appeal for me. The wide-spread childhood traumas may be dormant in adulthood. What may be making them manifest -- as you observe -- is an discrete stimulus like 'anomie' (i.e., the sense that the world is falling apart).
I remember students in Africa asking me what the HELL was wrong in the U.S. in 2019. The question was about what they saw on the news. I would answer with something like, "Well, the American Century is over and we are having a hard time adjusting to not being 'King of the Mountain' any longer."
Next, often, they would note, flatteringly I must admit, that I was not like other Americans. To which, and wit, I would respond with something like, "Those are the few you see on TV. Most Americans are not like that. I would like to introduce you to three hundred million of my closest friends in the United States."
While mental pathology in the Trump contagion is clear and Dr. Lee's warnings are appropriate, this is more of a political problem rather than a mental health one. The fact that half the country still views Trump as appropriate for the highest office in the land is not a problem that can be addressed by the mental health community alone. A political solution is required, and considering the widespread contagion and decay of our civil society, this will be a long, difficult, and likely violent process.
I basically agree, while noting the accent on the word "alone." There are multiple avenues to addressing this terribly difficult and dangerous situation.
I agreed for several years. Now I do not. There is a national sickness surfacing and threatening to to engulf us. So, I no longer see the mental health issue to be addressed and political solutions needed as being concurrent; to me at least, they are sequential.
That sickness, enabled by Trump, is now independent of him. I am not trained to understand mental illness but, to paraphrase Justice Potter Stewart, I know it when I feel it.
The reason why I believe that this a mental health issue on a cultural level is the difference between trumpers 'en masse' and the individual trumper one-on-one.
The former seeks a surly significance for millions of needy and alienated citizens; the latter tends to be a decent human being wanting the respect to which (s)he is entitled and which each one of us desires.
Once the mental health issue is faced squarely and the sickness starts shrivelling under the sun-light of exposure across the society, the return to balance and equanimity will manifest through political solutions addressing genuine grievances of the overlooked.
Well, it is a mental health issue, but that does not mean that the mental health professional community has the resources to correct it. Much of the alienation is due to the development of radical wealth inequality that had developed over the past 40+ years due to social and political policies. People no longer feel they have any stake in the system, so why not burn it down? Other tools will be necessary to give these people a stake in their own governance if we are going to get out of this.
So much of this alienation Trump supporters feel is based on misinformation though, and requires a disinformation industry to sustain it. Current Democratic policies (and policy proposals) do a lot to address wealth inequality, to take just one example, the Child Tax Credit would help the vast majority of Trump supporters. Yet they do not know this, and compulsively vote against their own interests, perpetuating their state of victimhood and grievance. How do we counter the information control cult manipulation techniques Trump uses so effectively?
"Donald Trump is not the most severe case of dangerous personality pathology that I and many of my colleagues have encountered in our careers; indeed, in my work specializing in treating violent offenders, he is the most mundane."
However, by viral standards, he is the most highly contagious, a PT Barnum mutation of toxic testosterone ooze painted over with clown makeup, constantly spewing aggressive drama to demand attention, mimicking both anti-hero & victim to con his cult followers out of cash.
An abusive, disturbed individual who could not pass a background check to work at a local school, bank, daycare, let alone a security clearance for military or police- has no business being given a platform for presidency, "Commander in Chief" of the deadliest military in human history...
'Pure evil': De Niro on Trump: "The guy's a monster. He wants to do the most horrible things he can think of. It's about right & wrong."
Lamentations 2:15-16 from King James: “All that pass by clap their hands at thee; they hiss and wag their head at the daughter of Jerusalem, saying, Is this the city that men call The perfection of beauty, The joy of the whole earth? All thine enemies have opened their mouth against thee: they hiss and gnash the teeth: they say, We have swallowed her up: certainly this is the day that we looked for; we have found, we have seen it.”
📣
Dr Lee, you mission is clear: get the word out across the country with a focus on those who like neither President Biden nor Trump to understand that holding one’s nose and pulling the lever for Trump – putatively for policy reasons – loads the shot-gun that will blow the Republic’s head off. Perhaps, a cross country tour in large cities and a few town halls in rural America, is essential to doing this.
======
Military Oath for the U.S. Army: “I, _____, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God.” https://ucmj.us/disobeying-lawful-order/
⚖️
Dr Lee, three groups that contain many people intuitively pre-disposed toward Trump are the National Guard, the active duty field Army, and veterans. Your mission is clear: permeate the officer corps with the necessity of defying Trump if re-elected and reinforcing the duty of the foot soldier not to obey unlawful orders spawned by a contagion bent on nullifying each citizen’s liberty.
======
Acts 7:54: “When they heard these things, they were cut to the heart, and they gnashed on him with their teeth.”
🤝
Dr Lee, again, as you have stated previously, your mission is clear: reach out to the alienated, bellicose trumpers to remind them – and, more fruitfully, the rest of us by your example set in reaching out – that a republic’s life starts with the individual upward through the family through to the larger society and governments. We are all, like it or not, statesmen in our own little ways with attendant republican responsibilities.
Dr Bush, my apologies for not thanking you earlier. 🙏 If I want civility and politeness in political discourse, well then, that behavior has to start with me. ✌️ So, thank you, again. 🤝
The Trump contagion has taken on a life of its own, independent of political opponents or particular policies. It is now a general sickness of the soul about which Senator Kennedy and Reverend Doctor King warned us so many years ago.
This sickness has to do with the gall accumulated with frustrated entitlement or with waning opportunities. Trumper tantrums empower this belligerent alienation with a patina of nominal Xianity. ‘Xian nationalism’ is Anti-Xian nihilism.
What we see today with the nattering nabobs of narcissism in both Chambers of Congress, is not conservatism. It is attention-seeking by a bottomless neediness by anti-intellectual and anti-democratic nihilists.
If there be a G-D, (S)He must be cringing at the destructiveness of those infected with the virus, people created in His or Her own image. As you have written, Dr Lee, one-on-one, almost all of these Trumpers are decent if treated with the respect due anyone.
Personally, I grew up in a conservative home with the blessed example set by my parents of the democratic necessity of an open mind; trying walk in the other fellow’s moccasins; and, placing principles before personalities (especially my own).
😇
¿Do I practice ‘honor’ consistently and unerringly? Of course not.
Letter of warning written from me to me eight years ago.
🙏
But I do know in what direction I seek to proceed over time. Honor is a Platonist ideal-as-asymptote toward which I "stride toward freedom" (M.L.K.) haltingly. I will never get there but I will continue to go there.
Thank you Ned. There is a lot of neuroscience out there nowadays . Two good popular reads if you are interested are Dr Bessel van de Kolk "The body keeps the score" and "The Myth of normal" by Dr Gabor Mate. Alice Miller in her book "For your own good" also has a close look at the way childhood upbringing in Germany in the early 20th century shaped the rise of Nazism to which I understand Trump has recently admired.
Once our extended family gathered and a family member, an accomplished physicist with 50 patents, became intently angered when I asked a good-faith, reasonable and rational question about Covid research. He didn't know biochemistry, but he found my question enraging and for the rest of the evening dominated the room with misguided Egoic certainty as my wife and I quietly listened not poking the bear.
The next day he apologized for his behavior. Grateful, I asked what he was apologizing for and he replied that I'd said something that had infuriated his respect for logic.
Dr. Lee concludes her essay, "Education is what allows us to gain knowledge of possibilities and of our own power."
There are many types of education. What kind of knowledge allows us to ethically observe ourselves inwardly? Dr. Lee mentions "existing norms and standards of medicine and law." Generally, we use the word "norm" when referring to what is deemed as appropriate social behavior. I'd take it a step further and say norms are implicit guidelines for identifying, sidelining, seeing-through, and taming Ego. They're implicit because our education does not yet include how to do so.
When I converse with my physicist relative I'm struck how he regards "looking inward" as a repugnant activity. While he's usually a wonderfully pleasant man in society, he adamantly rejects self-reflective activities. Perhaps he's ethically self-reflective in privacy, but after years of conversing about ethical behavior with him I still wouldn't know whether that's the case and believe its not my place to go where he doesn't want to go.
Unless we have a conscious desire to ethically evaluate our own behavior, our norms will remain norms and not knowledge.
Ed. There are two forms of logic: Egoic and Non-Egoic. Non-Egoic logic comprehends Egoic logic, but Egoic logic does not comprehend Non-Egoic logic. Pascal phrased this as "The heart has reasons of which reason knows nothing." The weakness in our academic and professional education driving us to the predicament we're now in is ignorance about Non-Egoic logic. There is inherent logic in nature separate from Ego we know as Tao, Atman, Anatman, and Logos.
I would propose to you that knowledge alone is insufficient. How do we build up the fragile or even nonexistent ego of a person who was once a shamed, tortured or neglected child?
Alice Miller
Bruce Perry
John Bradshaw
And from James Gilligan: “So preventing future violence and tools for self-respect—are those the core of the work that you are doing?
JG: Certainly that was, at the level of emotions, prerequisite to everything else. For example, I felt that certainly one thing that had been missing that had made it possible for them to commit serious harm to others was their lack of a capacity for empathy with the suffering of others, and a lack of the capacity to care about others or to love others. But what struck me was they couldn't respect other people or treat other people with esteem if they were lacking in self-esteem and self-respect. So helping them reach the point where they gained self-respect and self-esteem was really a prerequisite to their being able then to care about others enough so that they would not violate the rights or inflict harm on other people. But that is all at the emotional level. At a more cognitive level, one major thing that we did in the jails of San Francisco when I worked there over a ten-year period was to focus on cognitive issues—namely what we call the Male Role Belief System, which we felt had underlain the violence these men had committed. And by that we meant all of the assumptions they had been taught as to how you define masculinity and what you need to do in order to be a man, what you are entitled to do, what you are obligated to do, how should women treat you, how should you treat them, and on and on—the whole set of assumptions that almost all men in our society are raised with. The assumption underlying this very skewed patriarchal, somewhat misogynistic view is that the social universe, that is, the whole population, is divided into the superior and the inferior. In that division, men are supposed to be in the superior part and women in the inferior part. And, in fact, the really superior man has also got to be superior to other men. So they are also inferior. This is a recipe for violence because most people don't want to be cast into the role of the inferior.
RA: And it is a roadmap for feeling disrespected.
JG: Exactly. So we engaged in intensive group therapy with these jail inmates—all of them were in for a violent crime. I was amazed how quickly they grasped that point. And not only did they get the point, they began to say things like, "I've been brainwashed by the society I have grown up in." They would want to then start educating the new inmates about what they had learned. So we said, "Great," and we would train them to lead the groups themselves, kind of like Alcoholics Anonymous where the people suffering from the problem are sometimes the best therapists. So we trained them to lead these groups, and we found the level of violence in the prison dropped to zero, and the level of recidivism after they left the prison was down 83% compared with people who had been in an ordinary jail without these kinds of programs. So that is a concrete example.” https://www.psychotherapy.net/interview/gilligan-violence
What helps a shamed, tortured, and neglected child heal from abuse? An abused child often has little knowledge how to empathize or respond to others in a healthy way. By itself, the knowing of knowledge can be hollow or useless. By itself, feeling can overwhelm a child into violence. Both thinking and feeling are rational functions that allow us to evaluate our experience inwardly and outwardly so we can navigate the world around us.
Egoic thinking and feeling only sees itself and is often destruction and abusive. Non-Egoic thinking and feeling are highly empathic in oneness where each of us is paradoxically a unique presence. Mental health means we nourish life in one's self and others within oneness.
How does an abused child become able to Non-Egoically think and feel the equality of others? There's something in us, in our root, in the child's root, from which thoughts and feelings arise. Among other things, pursuing this root takes a willingness to go far enough inward observing what we encounter, knowledge how to do so and survive, and luck to find ourselves in such an environment to help guide. This is the process children undergo when they mature into healthy adults. Maturing is easier for those who grow up in a supportive environment and hell for those who don't.
Thanks, Ric, as always, for your conscientious sensitivity and nuanced optimism.. As a former risk manager and life-long Pisces, I tend to assign subjective probabilities or percentages of conviction to my beliefs. I am 55-60% confident that President Biden will be re-elected; l believe 55-60% that the contagion will begin to recede. Precarious as those assigned (and arbitrary) numbers are, I am slightly more optimistic not out of intuition, but out of necessity.
Trump is a reflection of those who support him. Discourteous, rebellious, no respect for the rule of law and those who enforce it. Don't know how any police organizations can support a man whose mission is sowing chaos, disharmony, and violence to serve his agenda. Don't know how he gets so many to do his bidding. https://thelegaledition.substack.com/p/roe-v-wade-was-foundation-for-other He and his handpicked Supremes are eroding everyone's rights while in plain sight, and they still revere him. Amazing Mind Control.
You can have the wealth of a nation in the hands of a few, or you can have a democracy, but you cannot have both.
Follow the money. Because politicians, Supreme Court justices and corporations do.
The latest polling shows the average voter does not have a clue about the actual condition of the country. Propaganda works, particularly on an audience that doesn’t give a shit about knowing the truth about the disappearing America Dream.
Dr. Lee I found there are even more insider details about Trump's actions leading up to Jan 6 revealed in testimony to the Colorado 14th Amendment civil trial from last November/December. The full trial and appeal to the Colorado Supreme Court are in video on C-SPAN, but have not been widely reported on. The trial follows all the issues covered in the January 6 Committee Hearings and provides new witness testimony, and additional insight into the Committee findings. It also adds analysis of the response of Trump supporters to right-wing extremist triggers which Trump used to manipulate his followers into attacking the Capitol.
For example the trial highlights the question of the 10,000 National Guard troops that Trump claims he ordered and that he says other officials like Nancy Pelosi refused. Witnesses including national security experts and former Trump staffers reveal that Trump did not make any preparations to protect the Capitol, but did have a fantasy plan to use 10,000 National Guard troops as part of a PROCESSION from his speech at the Ellipse to the Capitol, in order to further intimidate Congress into keeping him in power. There is no doubt he incited the insurrection, as the Colorado Judges found. And almost all of his enablers from 2020 have escaped justice, so they are planning now to build on what they accomplished then.
I recommend to everyone watching the Colorado trial and appeal in its entirety, about 6 days
No one will be asking you and your experts to adjudicate over tRump’s fitness—he is where he is because of MAGAt madness that LIES, LIES, LIES AND DENIES. Libertarian fascists aren’t looking for truth.
The real question is: Why isn’t the Federal Government taking action to protect this democracy from the clear and present danger of stochastic terrorists? The Fix is already in re: the November election—They are already denying its validity and lining up their electoral votes. The SCOTUS has gone rogue with its shadow dockets, its unwarranted procedural moves, unmoored legal theories (Alito loves his hypotheticals), and unchecked politicalization, has resulted in an unprecedented power grab.
Libertarian Fascists install puppets—the more pliable the puppet, the more useful they are. Trump’s declining cognitive state is a bonus to them. . . Rather like Reagan’s Alzheimer’s.
Responsible Dialogue on the “Goldwater Rule” Must Continue | Psychology Today https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-pacific-heart/202405/responsible-dialogue-on-the-goldwater-rule-must-continue
Thank you for the link to that excellent article.
Thanks for your kind comment, and reading :)
Posted elsewhere:
---
Dr Bandy Lee is one psychiatrist, on the nature of violence, who really has stuck her neck out and been punished by the American Psychiatric Association (#AmericanPsychiatricAssociation) for violating the 'Goldwater Rule' (i.e., making a professional evaluation without direct contact with the analysand who is a public figure).
https://bandyxlee.substack.com/p/trump-contagion-past-and-future/
She is writing a series of essay about what she labels as the #TrumpContagion, of which Mr Carlson is a manifestly both a carrier and symptom, in defiance and as an exile from the A.P.A.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-pacific-heart/202405/responsible-dialogue-on-the-goldwater-rule-must-continue
Needless to say, Dr Lee has the bravery of a whistle-blower in facing adverse professional consequences. What the #APA overlooks is that . . .
> readers of analyses like those of Dr Lee can think for themselves; as well as,
> one can detect when a professional crosses the invisible line-of-bias line between opportune counsel for the rest of us AND opportunism at the expense of the rest of us.
Thank you!
You are very welcome; really appreciate what you said and remain indebted to you for that article. 🙂
Thank you! Will read for sure.
Great article. Thank you.
Given the results of some latest polls in Trump's favor, the situation remains bizarre, to say the least. Apparently, there are enough selfish, scapegoating, ignorant, thrill-seeking people (read: totally immature) in the voting public to have these kinds of results. I believe in maintaining this dialog here, as a way of providing some relief among ourselves. I also try to comment on relevant articles in the NY Times and include mention of WMHC. It still might largely go to like-minded (sane!) people, but it's something. Vote Blue! I maintain that one of the best, hilarious though frightening ways of describing Trump supporters is the following (strong language alert): https://medium.com/bigger-picture/the-13-types-of-donald-trump-supporters-f463670578b2
HOW NEUROSCIENCE AND NEUROPOLITICS MAY HELP TO EXPLAIN THE RISING TIDE OF POLARISATION IN POLITICS AND WHY SO MANY RECENT AND CURRENT POLITICIANS BEHAVE IN DYSFUNCTIONAL WAYS
1. The worldwide ACE( Adverse Childhood Experience ) research program, 1985 and ongoing, is revealing that up to 40% of the population studied so far experienced either extreme or significant child hood trauma
2. Neuroscience is indicating that such levels of childhood trauma can cause the Amdygla to overproduce Cortisol and Adrenaline, the fight, flight or freeze hormones, leading to fear, anger, aggression, splitting and dissociation in later life.
3. The Amdyglas high demand for the requisite neurophysiological resources to create this oversupply of adrenaline and cortisol reduces the capacity of the Prefrontal Cortex to produce dopamine and serotonin which are required for empathic, relational and rational behaviour.
4. Neuropolitics can help to explain the rising tide of polarisation and dysfunctional politicians by recognising that a significant number of current and recent political figures themselves had high levels of childhood trauma which through their language and behaviour resonates unconsciously with, and attracts the traumatised 40 % in the relevant countries.
5. The neo liberal agenda in the western world of the past 40 years has made child bearing significantly more stressful with up to 60% of parents having to both work, the cost of housing becoming out of reach for those of child bearing age, maternity/paternity care provisions being cut, good child care being unaffordable, increasing foster care , increasing divorce rates, increasing drug, alcohol and addictive behaviour and heightened stress and anxiety levels conveyed in the social media channels.
6. The data coming from neuroscience and neuropolitics indicates a high need for policy makers and leaders at all levels to become aware of this research and to explore ways and means of reducing childhood trauma especially as the levels of childhood trauma are on the increase which may create an even more polarised and dysfunctional political world. The cost benefits arising from such action could well outweigh the social and economic costs of the consequences of traumatic childhoods.
Thank you, Sol. Since I am untrained in medicine, psychiatry, and psychology, I can only say that what you *write (ugg my faculties decline) here has an intuitive appeal for me. The wide-spread childhood traumas may be dormant in adulthood. What may be making them manifest -- as you observe -- is an discrete stimulus like 'anomie' (i.e., the sense that the world is falling apart).
I remember students in Africa asking me what the HELL was wrong in the U.S. in 2019. The question was about what they saw on the news. I would answer with something like, "Well, the American Century is over and we are having a hard time adjusting to not being 'King of the Mountain' any longer."
Next, often, they would note, flatteringly I must admit, that I was not like other Americans. To which, and wit, I would respond with something like, "Those are the few you see on TV. Most Americans are not like that. I would like to introduce you to three hundred million of my closest friends in the United States."
While mental pathology in the Trump contagion is clear and Dr. Lee's warnings are appropriate, this is more of a political problem rather than a mental health one. The fact that half the country still views Trump as appropriate for the highest office in the land is not a problem that can be addressed by the mental health community alone. A political solution is required, and considering the widespread contagion and decay of our civil society, this will be a long, difficult, and likely violent process.
I basically agree, while noting the accent on the word "alone." There are multiple avenues to addressing this terribly difficult and dangerous situation.
I agreed for several years. Now I do not. There is a national sickness surfacing and threatening to to engulf us. So, I no longer see the mental health issue to be addressed and political solutions needed as being concurrent; to me at least, they are sequential.
That sickness, enabled by Trump, is now independent of him. I am not trained to understand mental illness but, to paraphrase Justice Potter Stewart, I know it when I feel it.
The reason why I believe that this a mental health issue on a cultural level is the difference between trumpers 'en masse' and the individual trumper one-on-one.
The former seeks a surly significance for millions of needy and alienated citizens; the latter tends to be a decent human being wanting the respect to which (s)he is entitled and which each one of us desires.
Once the mental health issue is faced squarely and the sickness starts shrivelling under the sun-light of exposure across the society, the return to balance and equanimity will manifest through political solutions addressing genuine grievances of the overlooked.
Well, it is a mental health issue, but that does not mean that the mental health professional community has the resources to correct it. Much of the alienation is due to the development of radical wealth inequality that had developed over the past 40+ years due to social and political policies. People no longer feel they have any stake in the system, so why not burn it down? Other tools will be necessary to give these people a stake in their own governance if we are going to get out of this.
So much of this alienation Trump supporters feel is based on misinformation though, and requires a disinformation industry to sustain it. Current Democratic policies (and policy proposals) do a lot to address wealth inequality, to take just one example, the Child Tax Credit would help the vast majority of Trump supporters. Yet they do not know this, and compulsively vote against their own interests, perpetuating their state of victimhood and grievance. How do we counter the information control cult manipulation techniques Trump uses so effectively?
"Donald Trump is not the most severe case of dangerous personality pathology that I and many of my colleagues have encountered in our careers; indeed, in my work specializing in treating violent offenders, he is the most mundane."
However, by viral standards, he is the most highly contagious, a PT Barnum mutation of toxic testosterone ooze painted over with clown makeup, constantly spewing aggressive drama to demand attention, mimicking both anti-hero & victim to con his cult followers out of cash.
An abusive, disturbed individual who could not pass a background check to work at a local school, bank, daycare, let alone a security clearance for military or police- has no business being given a platform for presidency, "Commander in Chief" of the deadliest military in human history...
'Pure evil': De Niro on Trump: "The guy's a monster. He wants to do the most horrible things he can think of. It's about right & wrong."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1y_-rLWozIo&ab_channel=MSNBC
Lamentations 2:15-16 from King James: “All that pass by clap their hands at thee; they hiss and wag their head at the daughter of Jerusalem, saying, Is this the city that men call The perfection of beauty, The joy of the whole earth? All thine enemies have opened their mouth against thee: they hiss and gnash the teeth: they say, We have swallowed her up: certainly this is the day that we looked for; we have found, we have seen it.”
📣
Dr Lee, you mission is clear: get the word out across the country with a focus on those who like neither President Biden nor Trump to understand that holding one’s nose and pulling the lever for Trump – putatively for policy reasons – loads the shot-gun that will blow the Republic’s head off. Perhaps, a cross country tour in large cities and a few town halls in rural America, is essential to doing this.
======
Military Oath for the U.S. Army: “I, _____, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God.” https://ucmj.us/disobeying-lawful-order/
⚖️
Dr Lee, three groups that contain many people intuitively pre-disposed toward Trump are the National Guard, the active duty field Army, and veterans. Your mission is clear: permeate the officer corps with the necessity of defying Trump if re-elected and reinforcing the duty of the foot soldier not to obey unlawful orders spawned by a contagion bent on nullifying each citizen’s liberty.
======
Acts 7:54: “When they heard these things, they were cut to the heart, and they gnashed on him with their teeth.”
🤝
Dr Lee, again, as you have stated previously, your mission is clear: reach out to the alienated, bellicose trumpers to remind them – and, more fruitfully, the rest of us by your example set in reaching out – that a republic’s life starts with the individual upward through the family through to the larger society and governments. We are all, like it or not, statesmen in our own little ways with attendant republican responsibilities.
Well said
Dr Bush, my apologies for not thanking you earlier. 🙏 If I want civility and politeness in political discourse, well then, that behavior has to start with me. ✌️ So, thank you, again. 🤝
The Trump contagion has taken on a life of its own, independent of political opponents or particular policies. It is now a general sickness of the soul about which Senator Kennedy and Reverend Doctor King warned us so many years ago.
This sickness has to do with the gall accumulated with frustrated entitlement or with waning opportunities. Trumper tantrums empower this belligerent alienation with a patina of nominal Xianity. ‘Xian nationalism’ is Anti-Xian nihilism.
What we see today with the nattering nabobs of narcissism in both Chambers of Congress, is not conservatism. It is attention-seeking by a bottomless neediness by anti-intellectual and anti-democratic nihilists.
If there be a G-D, (S)He must be cringing at the destructiveness of those infected with the virus, people created in His or Her own image. As you have written, Dr Lee, one-on-one, almost all of these Trumpers are decent if treated with the respect due anyone.
Personally, I grew up in a conservative home with the blessed example set by my parents of the democratic necessity of an open mind; trying walk in the other fellow’s moccasins; and, placing principles before personalities (especially my own).
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¿Do I practice ‘honor’ consistently and unerringly? Of course not.
https://nedmcdletters.blogspot.com/2016/05/letter-116-b-getting-historical.html
Letter of warning written from me to me eight years ago.
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But I do know in what direction I seek to proceed over time. Honor is a Platonist ideal-as-asymptote toward which I "stride toward freedom" (M.L.K.) haltingly. I will never get there but I will continue to go there.
Trump uses the domestic abuser’s playbook…many people have been abused and cannot leave their abuser.
Thank you Ned. There is a lot of neuroscience out there nowadays . Two good popular reads if you are interested are Dr Bessel van de Kolk "The body keeps the score" and "The Myth of normal" by Dr Gabor Mate. Alice Miller in her book "For your own good" also has a close look at the way childhood upbringing in Germany in the early 20th century shaped the rise of Nazism to which I understand Trump has recently admired.
Once our extended family gathered and a family member, an accomplished physicist with 50 patents, became intently angered when I asked a good-faith, reasonable and rational question about Covid research. He didn't know biochemistry, but he found my question enraging and for the rest of the evening dominated the room with misguided Egoic certainty as my wife and I quietly listened not poking the bear.
The next day he apologized for his behavior. Grateful, I asked what he was apologizing for and he replied that I'd said something that had infuriated his respect for logic.
Dr. Lee concludes her essay, "Education is what allows us to gain knowledge of possibilities and of our own power."
There are many types of education. What kind of knowledge allows us to ethically observe ourselves inwardly? Dr. Lee mentions "existing norms and standards of medicine and law." Generally, we use the word "norm" when referring to what is deemed as appropriate social behavior. I'd take it a step further and say norms are implicit guidelines for identifying, sidelining, seeing-through, and taming Ego. They're implicit because our education does not yet include how to do so.
When I converse with my physicist relative I'm struck how he regards "looking inward" as a repugnant activity. While he's usually a wonderfully pleasant man in society, he adamantly rejects self-reflective activities. Perhaps he's ethically self-reflective in privacy, but after years of conversing about ethical behavior with him I still wouldn't know whether that's the case and believe its not my place to go where he doesn't want to go.
Unless we have a conscious desire to ethically evaluate our own behavior, our norms will remain norms and not knowledge.
Ed. There are two forms of logic: Egoic and Non-Egoic. Non-Egoic logic comprehends Egoic logic, but Egoic logic does not comprehend Non-Egoic logic. Pascal phrased this as "The heart has reasons of which reason knows nothing." The weakness in our academic and professional education driving us to the predicament we're now in is ignorance about Non-Egoic logic. There is inherent logic in nature separate from Ego we know as Tao, Atman, Anatman, and Logos.
I would propose to you that knowledge alone is insufficient. How do we build up the fragile or even nonexistent ego of a person who was once a shamed, tortured or neglected child?
Alice Miller
Bruce Perry
John Bradshaw
And from James Gilligan: “So preventing future violence and tools for self-respect—are those the core of the work that you are doing?
JG: Certainly that was, at the level of emotions, prerequisite to everything else. For example, I felt that certainly one thing that had been missing that had made it possible for them to commit serious harm to others was their lack of a capacity for empathy with the suffering of others, and a lack of the capacity to care about others or to love others. But what struck me was they couldn't respect other people or treat other people with esteem if they were lacking in self-esteem and self-respect. So helping them reach the point where they gained self-respect and self-esteem was really a prerequisite to their being able then to care about others enough so that they would not violate the rights or inflict harm on other people. But that is all at the emotional level. At a more cognitive level, one major thing that we did in the jails of San Francisco when I worked there over a ten-year period was to focus on cognitive issues—namely what we call the Male Role Belief System, which we felt had underlain the violence these men had committed. And by that we meant all of the assumptions they had been taught as to how you define masculinity and what you need to do in order to be a man, what you are entitled to do, what you are obligated to do, how should women treat you, how should you treat them, and on and on—the whole set of assumptions that almost all men in our society are raised with. The assumption underlying this very skewed patriarchal, somewhat misogynistic view is that the social universe, that is, the whole population, is divided into the superior and the inferior. In that division, men are supposed to be in the superior part and women in the inferior part. And, in fact, the really superior man has also got to be superior to other men. So they are also inferior. This is a recipe for violence because most people don't want to be cast into the role of the inferior.
RA: And it is a roadmap for feeling disrespected.
JG: Exactly. So we engaged in intensive group therapy with these jail inmates—all of them were in for a violent crime. I was amazed how quickly they grasped that point. And not only did they get the point, they began to say things like, "I've been brainwashed by the society I have grown up in." They would want to then start educating the new inmates about what they had learned. So we said, "Great," and we would train them to lead the groups themselves, kind of like Alcoholics Anonymous where the people suffering from the problem are sometimes the best therapists. So we trained them to lead these groups, and we found the level of violence in the prison dropped to zero, and the level of recidivism after they left the prison was down 83% compared with people who had been in an ordinary jail without these kinds of programs. So that is a concrete example.” https://www.psychotherapy.net/interview/gilligan-violence
What helps a shamed, tortured, and neglected child heal from abuse? An abused child often has little knowledge how to empathize or respond to others in a healthy way. By itself, the knowing of knowledge can be hollow or useless. By itself, feeling can overwhelm a child into violence. Both thinking and feeling are rational functions that allow us to evaluate our experience inwardly and outwardly so we can navigate the world around us.
Egoic thinking and feeling only sees itself and is often destruction and abusive. Non-Egoic thinking and feeling are highly empathic in oneness where each of us is paradoxically a unique presence. Mental health means we nourish life in one's self and others within oneness.
How does an abused child become able to Non-Egoically think and feel the equality of others? There's something in us, in our root, in the child's root, from which thoughts and feelings arise. Among other things, pursuing this root takes a willingness to go far enough inward observing what we encounter, knowledge how to do so and survive, and luck to find ourselves in such an environment to help guide. This is the process children undergo when they mature into healthy adults. Maturing is easier for those who grow up in a supportive environment and hell for those who don't.
Thanks, Ric, as always, for your conscientious sensitivity and nuanced optimism.. As a former risk manager and life-long Pisces, I tend to assign subjective probabilities or percentages of conviction to my beliefs. I am 55-60% confident that President Biden will be re-elected; l believe 55-60% that the contagion will begin to recede. Precarious as those assigned (and arbitrary) numbers are, I am slightly more optimistic not out of intuition, but out of necessity.
That's honest!
The Bloated Yam may be sick, demented, and a dangerous narcissist, but he is a menace to our nation's survival.
And millions of Americans grovel over him....
Trump is a reflection of those who support him. Discourteous, rebellious, no respect for the rule of law and those who enforce it. Don't know how any police organizations can support a man whose mission is sowing chaos, disharmony, and violence to serve his agenda. Don't know how he gets so many to do his bidding. https://thelegaledition.substack.com/p/roe-v-wade-was-foundation-for-other He and his handpicked Supremes are eroding everyone's rights while in plain sight, and they still revere him. Amazing Mind Control.
You can have the wealth of a nation in the hands of a few, or you can have a democracy, but you cannot have both.
Follow the money. Because politicians, Supreme Court justices and corporations do.
The latest polling shows the average voter does not have a clue about the actual condition of the country. Propaganda works, particularly on an audience that doesn’t give a shit about knowing the truth about the disappearing America Dream.
Dr. Lee I found there are even more insider details about Trump's actions leading up to Jan 6 revealed in testimony to the Colorado 14th Amendment civil trial from last November/December. The full trial and appeal to the Colorado Supreme Court are in video on C-SPAN, but have not been widely reported on. The trial follows all the issues covered in the January 6 Committee Hearings and provides new witness testimony, and additional insight into the Committee findings. It also adds analysis of the response of Trump supporters to right-wing extremist triggers which Trump used to manipulate his followers into attacking the Capitol.
For example the trial highlights the question of the 10,000 National Guard troops that Trump claims he ordered and that he says other officials like Nancy Pelosi refused. Witnesses including national security experts and former Trump staffers reveal that Trump did not make any preparations to protect the Capitol, but did have a fantasy plan to use 10,000 National Guard troops as part of a PROCESSION from his speech at the Ellipse to the Capitol, in order to further intimidate Congress into keeping him in power. There is no doubt he incited the insurrection, as the Colorado Judges found. And almost all of his enablers from 2020 have escaped justice, so they are planning now to build on what they accomplished then.
I recommend to everyone watching the Colorado trial and appeal in its entirety, about 6 days
https://www.c-span.org/video/?531489-1/president-trump-14th-amendment-hearing-colorado-day-1-part-1
I have often questioned where were the citizens of Germany as millions of Jews and others were murdered? The answer is NOW in clear view.
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Thank you Dr. Lee. You are intelligent, brave and kind to continue to share your insights! Please know you are appreciated!
No one will be asking you and your experts to adjudicate over tRump’s fitness—he is where he is because of MAGAt madness that LIES, LIES, LIES AND DENIES. Libertarian fascists aren’t looking for truth.
The real question is: Why isn’t the Federal Government taking action to protect this democracy from the clear and present danger of stochastic terrorists? The Fix is already in re: the November election—They are already denying its validity and lining up their electoral votes. The SCOTUS has gone rogue with its shadow dockets, its unwarranted procedural moves, unmoored legal theories (Alito loves his hypotheticals), and unchecked politicalization, has resulted in an unprecedented power grab.
Libertarian Fascists install puppets—the more pliable the puppet, the more useful they are. Trump’s declining cognitive state is a bonus to them. . . Rather like Reagan’s Alzheimer’s.