Well, the psychs are at it again. A bunch of shrinks — who get together at conventions, have a few drinks, listen to a pharmaceutical marketing expert and then vote on what’s crazy and what isn’t — have diagnosed the President of the United States as nuts in a new book. And a few thin-skinned media pundits who have been verbally taken to task for slanted or anti-Trump reporting have joined the “Trump is nuts” crowd.
Perhaps what tipped the scale was when Merck CEO Kenneth Frazier quit the President’s Manufacturing Council after the President’s condemnation of the Charlottesville tragedy was slow in coming. In a notable swipe at big pharma, Trump tweeted: “Now that Ken Frazier of Merck Pharma has resigned from President’s Manufacturing Council, he will have more time to LOWER RIPOFF DRUG PRICES!” That must have sent a shiver of alarm through the $1 trillion global pharmaceutical markets.
The “Trump is nuts” movement is just the latest episode of a long history of psychs of various stripes lusting for the authority to decide who should be in charge, and who is “defective” and should be marginalized or institutionalized. There are crazy people, of course, but psychiatrists have no idea how to diagnose them and have yet to cure anybody. Instead, they prescribe drugs that amp up “homicidal ideation,” increase the risk of death by 33%, and which are no more effective at curing anybody than sugar pills. Nevertheless, they issue their pronunciamentos as if they knew what they were doing.
What they are doing is wedging their way into key decision-making posts, becoming gatekeepers at choke points to a better life. In education, for example, psychologists developed standardized tests to put a stamp of scientific legitimacy on racism and discrimination.
Psychs want the authority to decide who is admitted to university and who is rejected, who gains a scholarship and who should stay home, who is hired and who is unemployed. In the past, intelligence tests were used to exclude racial groups from immigration, higher education and employment. Those judged feebleminded were often sterilized.
Psychiatry has also been used to discredit individuals who rebel or are critical of leaders. Whistleblowers are prime targets. Edward Snowden and Julian Assange, for example, were labeled “narcissistic” over and over again, painting them with a personality disorder.
And after all, who in their right mind would disagree with some “Dear Leader” but the insane? The Soviets, Chinese, North Koreans, and others put political dissidents into mental institutions where they may be locked up , drugged, electroshocked and removed from the normal course of legal protection.
In 1964, the American Psychiatric Association polled members to see if Barry Goldwater was fit to become president. They showed their hand a bit early on that one, and the “Goldwater Rule” was thereby enacted which states that psychiatrists may not comment on the mental health of a public figure they have not personally examined and been granted permission to disclose the findings.
Last year, an NPR Morning Edition segment titled “Hidden Factors in your Brain Help to Shape Beliefs on Income Inequality” was a bit more subtle. It cited a research study that supposedly shows that political opinions are actually a matter of brain function, and — by implication — people who tolerate income inequality have a mental defect.
Nevertheless, in the era of President Donald Trump, a few psychs have decided to break their own code of ethics and pronounced Trump afflicted with “grandiosity” and “narcissism,” among others.
Head shrinkers and snake-oil salesmen may not override the decision of the American people as to who is qualified to be president, and any attempts to do so should be seen in context as an attack on the credibility of the presidency and a forwarding of the psych agenda. Like the high priests and witch finders of old they deal in suspicion and accusation and would increase their control and their power at the expense of the Constitution. The latest move is a bill by Rep. Ted Lieu to require a White House Psychiatrist who would evidently have some authority if a President did or said unusual things.
Any position as powerful as President of the United States is always a target of detractors, people with an axe to grind, as well as outright enemies. In the Constitution are enshrined mechanisms whereby Congress can impeach and remove a President from office for cause. That standard has not been reached, and no group of witch finders, gourd rattlers and snake oil salesmen need be consulted.
Recent Comments