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| I seems to me that the political arena is a natural for bullies, and the current political season seems to be ample confirmation. A look at the recent Republican Presidential Primaries shows a lot of what I would call bullying: Vicious ad hominim TV attacks on other candidates - browbeating and ridiculing during debates (If you could call them debates), and widespread use of PAC ads - which are encouraged by the candidates. Historically there is some evidence that the presumed Republican candidate, Mitt Romney, was a bully in school and his direction of Bain Capital seems to indicate continued tendencies. I don't know his record as governor of Mass. - does anyone here? Do we want to elect a bully as President of the U.S.? | | |
| I have been reading about sociopathic/psychopathic personalities and was surprised to find that it is estimated that almost 40% of major company CEOs probably are - or at least exhibit sociopathic/
psychopathic personality traits. I am wondering about politicians.
How many politicians - past and current - exhibit these traits? Names?
Here is a list of ways to identify a sociopath. This list is from "Profile of a Sociopath." Is is a pretty good list of sociopathic indicators.
•Glibness/superficial charm
•Manipulative and conning
•Grandiose sense of self
•Pathological lying
•Lack of remorse, shame or guilt
•Shallow emotions
•Incapacity for love
•Need for stimulation
•Callousness/lack of empathy
•Poor behavioral controls/impulsive nature
•Early behavior problems/juvenile delinquency
•Irresponsibility/unreliability
•Promiscuous sexual behavior/infidelity
•Lack of realistic life plan/parasitic lifestyle
•Criminal or entrepreneurial versatility
•Contemptuous of those who seek to understand them
•Does not perceive that anything is wrong with them
•Authoritarian
•Secretive
•Paranoid
•Only rarely in difficulty with the law, but seeks out situations where their tyrannical behavior will be tolerated, condoned, or admired
•Conventional appearance
•Goal of enslavement of their victim(s)
•Exercises despotic control over every aspect of the victim's life
•Has an emotional need to justify their crimes and therefore needs their victim's affirmation (respect, gratitude and love)
•Ultimate goal is the creation of a willing victim
•Incapable of real human attachment to another
•Unable to feel remorse or guilt
•Narcissism, grandiosity (self-importance not based on achievements)
•May state readily that their goal is to rule the world
(These are from Dr. Robert Hare's list of psychopathic personality traits - he's the one who suggested the high number of socio/psychopaths in big business)
(Obviously, in order to be a sociopath a person doesn't have to exhibit anything like all the above. Usually, the lack of a conscience, the manipulation of others, dishonesty and the inability to love and/or have lasting and profound personal relations and cruelty are key symptoms and often much more revealing than having been in trouble with the courts.)
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| Well, so far the alligator hasn't eaten any of the children. The next-door neighbor not only feeds the alligator - he also wades around in the lake while fixing his dock.
This part of North Florida has only the one large town - Tallahassee (The state capital). The town is, as you might expect, kept very well landscaped and has lots of green spaces and what are called canopy roads - these are roads the live oaks meet over - they can't be widened which irritates commuters - but they are beautiful to drive down.
Tallahassee is about 20 miles from the Gulf of Mexico and this part of the Gulf Coast is known as the "Forgotten Coast" because there are no large - or even medium sized - towns and very attractive barrier islands. St. George Island is quite well known - sits about six miles off the mainland. Of its twenty-mile length, a full half is state park.
It's just off-shore from Apalachicola - which has one traffic light.
This part of Florida reminds me of the Florida I grew up in - a long time ago. | | |
| My nephew and his new wife recently bought a cottage on a cypress lake here in North Florida. It has all the resident wildlife you would imagine, including a rather large resident bull alligator (8-10 foot range) who lets them know when he is hungry or horny with very loud bellows. He generally stays over on the other side of the arm of the lake they live on, but lately their neighbor has taken to feeding him and he has become quite friendly (?).
The problem is, they have grandchildren coming to visit - and they like the grandkids.
Any suggestions?
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| Last week's Supreme court discussions seemed to point out the questionable constitutionality of attempting universal healthcare by requiring citizens to purchase commercial health insurance and fining them if they don't.
As the justices seemed to indicate, this might open the door to government assuming unlimited power over the private economic life of citizens - i.e. requiring citizens to economically interact with other private citizens - and telling them how they should do it.
There is, however, no doubt that the government has the power to tax. That power is controlled by Congress and it's limits are strictly political. Congress could, if it chooses, make health care available to all citizens and tax them to pay for it; this is how universal health are is handled in most developed countries.
Opponents of this have grumbled about how if government controlled our health care, then bureaucrats could ration it out and individual citizens' doctor-patient relationships would be somehow damaged. These critics seem to ignore the present situation.
Most citizens already have their healthcare bureaucratically controlled - but most of those bureaucrats work for private for-profit insurance companies. Those senior citizens on Medicare (the existing single-payer, government-controlled healthcare system) are generally better served and happier than those of us still in the private system - a system which goes much further than government would ever dare in rationing care. The citizen on Medicare may select his doctors without much limitation. Few private programs are as flexible. The present Medicare system is paid for partly through direct deduction from Social Security payments and partly through FICA tax withholding. Presumably a universal single-payer system would simply be a rise in FICA/IRS tax payments with a corresponding drastic drop in the cost of health insurance to the individuals and their employers - who could them give their workers a considerable raise.
The US presently leads the world in only one segment of citizen's healthcare. It is twice as expensive for the individual citizen as the next most expensive nation. In all other segments, other nations do a better healthcare job than the US. | | |
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