[Peace-discuss] American social disease

[C. G. Estabrook]

The Reign of the Psychopaths
by Steven LaTulippe, February 11, 2011

One of the key traits of psychopathic personality disorder is a near-total 
absence of empathy. To the psychopath, other people exist as mere objects, to be 
used and discarded at the psychopath’s whim.

"I had to beat my mother with that baseball bat," claims the typical psychopath. 
"She wouldn’t give me her pension check, and I needed it to buy more beer."

Such statements are made without irony or sarcasm, since the psychopath 
literally cannot imagine that other human beings might have needs distinct from 
his own.

While watching events unfold these past weeks in Egypt, it became apparent to me 
that the United States is suffering from a foreign policy malady frighteningly 
analogous to psychopathic personality disorder.

On one hand, the history of the Mubarak regime is well-documented. For decades, 
the Egyptian people have lived in grinding poverty – on less than $2 per day, by 
some estimates – while Mubarak and his family have amassed vast fortunes. The 
Egyptian government routinely uses torture against its political opponents and 
denies the people even basic freedoms. Election fraud, censorship, and police 
brutality are realities of everyday Egyptian life.

That the Egyptian people have rebelled against such a regime should come as no 
surprise. And one would expect that the American government – itself the 
creation of a revolution against an authoritarian monarchy – would support their 
cause, at least morally if not materially.

Such an assumption, though, presumes the presence of a degree of empathy that 
our government simply no longer possesses. From the very beginning, Washington’s 
reaction to the demonstrations has been creepy and repulsive, with Vice 
President Biden even remarking, preposterously, that Mubarak is not a really a 
dictator at all.

Despite the swerving, the billowing clouds of doublespeak and the confused 
backtracking, the common thread weaving its way through our government’s 
reaction has been one of egocentrism of psychopathic dimensions. Our elite media 
have mostly been neurotically obsessing about the effect that Mubarak’s fall 
would have on America.

What about access to the Suez Canal? What about Israel? What about Egypt’s 
cooperation with our War on Terror? What about those juicy military contracts?

Basically, it’s all about us.

Even the oft-heard accusation that President Obama was going to "lose" Egypt 
reveals volumes about the state of America’s psychology.

But as pathological as America’s response has been, the reaction has been even 
worse in Israel (America’s Middle Eastern "mini-me"), where the government has 
been openly hostile to the demonstrators and has gushed embarrassingly over 
Mubarak and his crony regime.

Forgetting the ruined economy. Ignoring the absence of civil liberties. Denying 
the torture chambers. Bibi seems mostly concerned about the effect that 
Mubarak’s overthrow would have on Israeli foreign policy. (Perhaps someone 
should ask Netanyahu how he would react if someone were to suggest that the 
Israelis should live in grinding poverty and without basic freedoms so that the 
Egyptians should feel more secure?)

That a new government should take power in Cairo is inarguable; Mubarak and his 
cronies have sucked the country dry and have abused the Egyptian people for long 
enough. The downtrodden people have spoken, loud and clear. And now, most 
importantly, the creation of a new government in Cairo should be the sole 
prerogative of the Egyptian people, without interference from foreign interests.

But of course that will never happen. Every day, more details leak into the 
media about the conniving and manipulation, the bribing and the backstabbing, 
swirling throughout Cairo as America attempts to control the succession (which 
is another way of saying that Washington is attempting to replace Mubarak with a 
newer clone who will continue to jump when we whistle).

The Egyptian people may want a new government, but Washington wants more of the 
same.

Psychiatrists say that the treatment of psychopathic personality disorder is 
long and difficult. The psychopath must be relentlessly confronted with the ugly 
consequences of his actions. He will usually resort to anything – denial, 
repression, anger, or even violence – to protect his ego and his dysfunctional 
personality structure. After all, psychopathic behavior is often very effective 
at meeting one’s needs. If the psychopath has successfully fulfilled his desires 
through manipulation and violence for most of his life, why should he stop now?

As the red wheel of our government’s foreign policy rolls its way through the 
Middle East, leaving a bloody trail of death and destruction in its wake, this 
last question is one we should all be asking ourselves.

And if we are relentlessly honest, we may not like the answers.

{Steven LaTulippe is a physician currently practicing in Ohio. He was an officer 
in the United States Air Force for 13 years.}

http://original.antiwar.com/steven-latulippe/2011/02/10/the-reign-of-the-psychopaths/