By John W. Whitehead
\nThe Rutherford Institute<\/p>\n
\u201cPoliticians are more likely than people in the general population to be sociopaths<\/a>. I think you would find no expert in the field of sociopathy\/psychopathy\/antisocial personality disorder who would dispute this… That a small minority of human beings literally have no conscience was and is a bitter pill for our society to swallow \u2014 but it does explain a great many things, shamelessly deceitful political behavior being one.\u201d\u2014Dr. Martha Stout, clinical psychologist and former instructor at Harvard Medical School<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Twenty years ago, a newspaper headline asked the question: \u201cWhat\u2019s the difference between a politician and a psychopath?<\/a>\u201d<\/p>\n
The answer, then and now, remains the same:\u00a0None<\/a>.<\/p>\n
There is\u00a0no difference<\/a>\u00a0between psychopaths and politicians.<\/p>\n
Nor is there much of a difference between the havoc wreaked on innocent lives by uncaring, unfeeling, selfish, irresponsible, parasitic criminals and\u00a0elected officials who lie to their constituents<\/a>, trade political favors for campaign contributions, turn a blind eye to the wishes of the electorate, cheat taxpayers out of hard-earned dollars, favor the corporate elite, entrench the military industrial complex, and spare little thought for the impact their thoughtless actions and hastily passed legislation might have on defenseless citizens.<\/p>\n
Psychopaths and politicians both have a tendency to be\u00a0selfish, callous, remorseless users of others, irresponsible, pathological liars<\/a>, glib, con artists, lacking in remorse and shallow.<\/p>\n
Charismatic politicians, like criminal psychopaths,\u00a0exhibit a failure to accept responsibility for their actions<\/a>, have a high sense of self-worth, are chronically unstable, have socially deviant lifestyles, need constant stimulation, have parasitic lifestyles and possess unrealistic goals.<\/p>\n
It doesn\u2019t matter whether you\u2019re talking about Democrats or Republicans.<\/p>\n
Political psychopaths are all largely cut from the same pathological cloth, brimming with\u00a0seemingly easy charm and boasting calculating minds<\/a>. Such leaders eventually create pathocracies: totalitarian societies bent on power, control, and destruction of both freedom in general and those who exercise their freedoms.<\/p>\n
Once psychopaths gain power, the result is usually some form of totalitarian government or a pathocracy. \u201cAt that point, the\u00a0government operates against the interests of its own people<\/em><\/a>\u00a0except for favoring certain groups,\u201d author James G. Long notes. \u201cWe are currently witnessing deliberate polarizations of American citizens, illegal actions, and massive and needless acquisition of debt. This is\u00a0typical of psychopathic systems<\/a>, and very similar things happened in the Soviet Union as it overextended and collapsed.\u201d<\/p>\n
In other words, electing a psychopath to public office is tantamount to national hara-kiri, the ritualized act of self-annihilation, self-destruction and suicide. It signals the demise of democratic government and lays the groundwork for a totalitarian regime that is legalistic, militaristic, inflexible, intolerant and inhuman.<\/p>\n
Incredibly, despite clear evidence of the damage that has already been inflicted on our nation and its citizens by a psychopathic government, voters continue to elect psychopaths to positions of power and influence.<\/p>\n
According to\u00a0investigative journalist Zack Beauchamp<\/a>, \u201cIn 2012, a group of psychologists evaluated every President from Washington to Bush II\u00a0using<\/a>\u00a0\u2018psychopathy trait estimates derived from personality data completed by historical experts on each president.\u2019 They found that presidents tended to have the psychopath\u2019s characteristic fearlessness and low anxiety levels \u2014 traits that appear to help Presidents, but also\u00a0might cause them to make reckless decisions<\/a>\u00a0that hurt other people\u2019s lives.\u201d<\/p>\n
The willingness to prioritize power above all else, including the welfare of their fellow human beings, ruthlessness, callousness and an\u00a0utter lack of conscience<\/a>\u00a0are among the defining traits of the sociopath.<\/p>\n
When our own government no longer sees us as human beings with dignity and worth but as things to be manipulated, maneuvered, mined for data, manhandled by police, conned into believing it has our best interests at heart, mistreated, jailed if we dare step out of line, and then punished unjustly without remorse\u2014all the while refusing to own up to its failings\u2014we are no longer operating under a constitutional republic.<\/p>\n
Instead, what we are experiencing is a pathocracy: tyranny at the hands of a psychopathic government, which \u201coperates against the interests of its own people except for favoring certain groups<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n
Worse, psychopathology is not confined to those in high positions of government. It can\u00a0spread like a virus<\/a>\u00a0among the populace. As an academic study into pathocracy\u00a0concluded<\/a>, \u201c[T]yranny does not flourish because perpetuators are helpless and ignorant of their actions. It flourishes because they actively identify with those who promote vicious acts as virtuous.\u201d<\/p>\n
People don\u2019t simply line up and salute. It is through one\u2019s own personal identification with a given leader, party or social order that they become agents of good or evil.<\/p>\n
Much depends on how leaders \u201ccultivate a sense of identification with their followers<\/a>,\u201d says Professor Alex Haslam. \u201cI mean one pretty obvious thing is that leaders talk about \u2018we\u2019 rather than \u2018I,\u2019 and actually what leadership is about is cultivating this sense of shared identity about \u2018we-ness\u2019 and then getting people to want to act in terms of that \u2018we-ness,\u2019 to promote our collective interests. . . . [We] is the single word that has increased in the inaugural addresses over the last century . . . and the other one is \u2018America.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
The goal of the modern corporate state is obvious: to promote, cultivate, and embed a sense of shared identification among its citizens. To this end, \u201cwe the people\u201d have become \u201cwe the police state.\u201d<\/p>\n
We are fast becoming slaves in thrall to a faceless, nameless, bureaucratic totalitarian government machine that relentlessly erodes our freedoms through countless laws, statutes, and prohibitions.<\/p>\n
Any resistance to such regimes depends on the strength of opinions in the minds of those who choose to fight back. What this means is that we the citizenry must be very careful that we are not manipulated into marching in lockstep with an oppressive regime.<\/p>\n
Writing for\u00a0ThinkProgress<\/em>, Beauchamp suggests that \u201cone of the best cures to bad leaders may very well be political democracy<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n
But what does this really mean in practical terms?<\/p>\n
It means holding politicians accountable for their actions and the actions of their staff using every available means at our disposal: through investigative journalism (what used to be referred to as the Fourth Estate) that enlightens and informs, through whistleblower complaints that expose corruption, through lawsuits that challenge misconduct, and through protests and mass political action that remind the powers-that-be that \u201cwe the people\u201d are the ones that call the shots.<\/p>\n
Remember, education precedes action. Citizens need to the do the hard work of educating themselves about what the government is doing and how to hold it accountable. Don\u2019t allow yourselves to exist exclusively in an echo chamber that is restricted to views with which you agree. Expose yourself to multiple media sources, independent and mainstream, and think for yourself.<\/p>\n
For that matter, no matter what your political leanings might be, don\u2019t allow your partisan bias to trump the principles that serve as the basis for our constitutional republic. As Beauchamp notes, \u201cA system that actually holds people accountable to the broader conscience of society may be one of the best ways to keep conscienceless people in check.\u201d<\/p>\n
That said, if we allow the ballot box to become our only means of pushing back against the police state, the battle is already lost.<\/p>\n
Resistance will require a citizenry willing to be active at the local level.<\/p>\n