Psychopathic Invasion of Political Leadership

In George Monbiot's post on outer turmoil he lists and analyzes the biggest problem of our age: the corruption of leadership.

"A few years ago, the psychologist Michelle Roya Rad listed the characteristics of good leadership. Among them were fairness and objectivity, a desire to serve society rather than yourself, a lack of interest in fame and attention, and resistance to the temptation to hide the truth or make impossible promises."

The Journal of Public Management & Social Policy list the characteristics of leaders with psychopathic, narcissistic or Machiavellian personalities which is something I have observed even in non-profit societies and has deeply disturbed me. Manipulation and a talent for deceit without remorse which has turned the world from one where we struggle for social fairness to one that reveals a complete contempt for life.

We must be vigilant to the ways that politics (with the support and help from media) misrepresents trends in human values. The display of hate towards women in Congress in the US during a Trump rally is a captured moment "showing support" for his racist ideas.

If we are willing to believe that this president has majority support in the US he can keep behaving like a pop star instead of the leader he is supposed to be, while the masses accept the degradation of the nation, under the pretence that this is what greatness means.

People who support movements of hate either want power at the cost of social justice and freedom for their community kin, or they don't know what they want and are happy to follow whatever trends are presented to them. People who believe that celebrity is leadership and those who rise to the top must be worthy of the adulation promoted by their publicity teams are dangerously naive.

It's past time for us to evolve beyond the circus trickery of politics and understand that the easy way out is never out but down. This means taking responsibility for our part in the drama.

Petty Cruelty in the World's Greatest Country?

"No, this is about petty cruelty turned into a principle of government. It’s about privileged people who look at the less fortunate and don’t think, “There but for the grace of God go I”; they just see a bunch of losers. They don’t want to help the less fortunate; in fact, they get angry at the very idea of public aid that makes those losers a bit less miserable.

And these are the people now running America." Paul Krugman. NYTimes.

This is a clear article to read, but I wonder why anyone wants to see people starve and suffer?  What values have generated in such a social climate that the Republicans and Trump supporters are for this. Are people generally this cruel or is the state simply manufacturing consent? How does this benefit the American nation?

Confronting Evil

by Russell McNeil

"Then they came for me — and there was no one left to speak for me." ~ Martin Niemöller


While I appreciate that a few of my friends are supportive of the US President, I have reached the end of my own psychological rope on this. My own personal daily reaction to the outrages of this imbalanced man is visceral. I have tried to understand your points-of-view. But I can no longer tolerate your positions. For me this man is my daily nightmare. I wake every morning and go to the news feeds to see what new desecrations Donald Trump has committed. I am never disappointed.

I do not believe that people are inherently evil. I do believe that the actions that Donald Trump have taken are having evil consequences. I was raised in a religious environment. I was taught the differences between right and wrong. I was taught that bullying defenseless people is wrong. I was taught that words have consequences. I was taught that preying on the weak, the young, the voiceless and the powerless is wrong. These are things Donald Trump and his sycophants do daily. This is the definition of raw cowardice.

I am speechless that a few of you still support this man. I can only conclude that you - my friends - are living in a state of permanent delusion. This is the 21st century - not the 2nd when the Roman Emperor Commodus (a man with a frighteningly similar temperament to Trump) succeeded Marcus Aurelius and began a reign of terror that ended with the disintegration of Rome.

Donald Trump is a cancer on the human family (a cancer that is now metastasizing as seen clearly in Trump's immoral speech to 40,000 cheering boy scouts this week). If you are unable or unwilling to see this I can only feel sorry for you. But I will no longer tolerate your myopia. My friends also include many who are the daily targets of Donald Trump. I can no longer remain silent while my other friends - women, minorities, LGBTQ, scientists and academics (I am one of those), and journalists (I am proud to have been one too) - are assaulted daily by this Presidential demon. Enough! #TheResistence

If Hate Should Win Over Love in America

The narrative coming out of media has inflamed rage, alienation and despair among the American people, and so the land is ripe for draconian measures. This will ensure absolute power for the tribe who have funded xenophobic movements, government lobbies and media, in countries all over the world.  If the haters win it means a large enough portion of American society is ready for bloodletting and the scapegoats have already been identified.  If the haters win based on their promises it means America has given up on social justice - which is not socialism but shared responsibility through civil society.

1. Planned parenthood and women's rights will be shut down along with women's voices, as promised by candidates. 
2. Same sex marriage will be banned and the LGBT community will be forced underground or targeted with violence. 
3. Abortion will be made illegal even in cases where a woman's life is at risk.
4. Medicare and social assistance will be stopped.
5. Environmental pollution will rise exponentially wiping out many species through toxic poisoning. 
6. Education funding will run out, public schools shut down and communities will be required to build and pay for their own education.
7. Libraries will be closed.
8. Psychiatry and counselling will be outlawed and mental illness viewed as a lack of morality and self-discipline. 
9. Family breakdown will be blamed on the work of feminists and liberals.
10. Worker's unions will be outlawed.
11. Civic leaders, journalists and liberal religious leaders will be arrested and placed in prisons without trial.
12. All government departments will be merged and the only services funded by taxpayers will be the police force and the military, which will eventually be contracted out to private security companies. 
13. Extreme poverty will erupt in more gang activity, and municipalities will be sponsored by corporations and run by drug cartels.
14. A war will be started with Iran, Russia and China, to employ the frustrated young men who have lost hope of making a living. 
15. Civil war will divide the country.
16. Citizens who build local economies in their workshops and gardens will have their property confiscated. 
17. The one percent will become the .5 percent and they will be much richer than they are now.
18. Current party leaders will not see this coming.

Most Americans would deny this is possible mainly because there are so many community activities built and run by good, hard working, people.  But the tribe who have employed the CEO's, the military personnel  the politicians and the experts, have already managed to erode civil society by alienating humanity from their natural power and re-creating reality through the media they sponsor.  This tribe are so powerful we will know them not by name but by their fruits - totalitarian regimes in South America and Europe since the beginning of the Twentieth Century.

The only way we can take back the power we have is to nurture what sustains us. There is no solution, no ideology, and no guaranteed strategy to fight back against the absolute rape of our psyche through the worship of power. Our hope, if there is any to be had, lies in our practice of compassion and mindfulness.

Power Stupidized

The issue of Barack Obama's birth certificate is not about the truth of his birth or about getting silliness out of the way so that US leaders can get on with the important things - it is, I believe, aimed at destroying civil society, democracy, justice and the future of America.

It creates suspicion and fear among Americans - not just whether their President is legally their President or not, but that a poll somewhere indicates 40% believe he might not be. It's another one of those media loops that make people look stupid, another device of division and alienation just like bad television sitcoms. It's an extension of shared shame witnessing the behaviour of dupes in 'reality' shows, video footage of men parading in white hoods burning down the homes of frightened black families, or the fall of adored celebrities going out without underwear, getting drunk and drugged. 

There is nothing redeeming or intelligent in the video of Donald Trump congratulating himself on his anti-Obama campaign; it is the basest form of racism, as Baratunde Thurston points out, which puts all African Americans back in the defensive position of having to prove they are American.

A nation divided by whipped up rage deposes its leader, and eventually. as dehumanizing rhetoric becomes more inflamed, the war of words becomes war - the ultimate in disaster capitalism.  It worked in Europe, in South and Central America, in Africa, in the Middle-East and now its coming to North America. But the only winners will be the arms industry.