Brief Politico-Therapies: A Tour Of The Psych-Bloggers

I've been struggling with work related issues these last couple of weeks, and that means that blogging has been light and the Brief Politico-Therapy series has been on hold. But, here we are once again with a little time in the early AM (How early? Well, let's just say that the time stamp on the post is accurate) For those of you who are new to this "project" the Brief Politico-Therapy series is a spin-off of Dr. Sanity's "Touch and Goes," I asked her for permission to continue the series and she most graciously allowed me to do so. So, without further ado, let us look in on: Dr. Helen, Dr. Sanity, Shrinkwrapped, neo-neocon, Assistant Village Idiot, One Cosmos (Gagdad Bob), Sigmund, Carl and Alfred and last, but never leastIron Shrink.

First up is, of course, Dr. Sanity. Pat Santy, M.D. was one of my very first friends made when I started blogging and she has been one of my very favorites as well. She does not suffer fools lightly and this would seem to include an awful lot of folk on the left. This weeks selection (and a must read) from Dr. Sanity is "A Critique of Pure Bullshit." Dr. Sanity at her best:

From all perspectives, postmodernism is pure bullshit."

“Anti-war protesters echo Vietnam.” The accent is on the word “echo”—as in “a distant, fainter, repetition.”

The anti-Iraq War demonstrations in DC over this weekend were self-consciously and purposefully designed to mimic the protests of yesteryear. But like all retro fashions, they didn’t quite resemble the originals.

The Assistant Village Idiot has two connected posts on deconstruction that are certainly worth reading, in fact, certainly worth reading twice. Some important stuff here and here:

To note that Plato, Shakespeare, Aquinas all had views conditioned by their surrounding cultures – yes, yes of course. But so too do you, my postmodernist, or marxist feminist friend. You also are conditioned by your culture. Not the Western popular culture which you so easily despise, but your culture, the ideas hidden underneath the words of your postmodernist and marxist feminist associates. You are not a prisoner of your father’s values, but of your friends’ values.

Now we turn to Dr. Helen, who, in her own inimitable style writes "Don't Talk About It, Be About It." a delightful essay about getting off of your keister and doing something, without the need to attend a seminar on how to do it. Oh, you gotta read this one:

Why waste valuable time at a seminar getting your courage up when for free, you can go to the local library, get a book on how to write a persuasive argument and read it in your spare time--all in the same amount of time it would take you to get to a seminar that may cost a bundle?"

And now, we come to ShrinkWrapped, that delightful paragon of mental-healthiness on "Be[ing] Careful of What You Wish For!" noting that the Democrats of this decade are making the same mistakes the Republicans did in the last decade:

The Republicans, with the unwitting complicity of the Clintons, in their tone deaf exercise of their powers, began the series of investigations which, following the Republican sweep to victory in the House in 1994, became a flood and culminated in Clinton's Impeachment.
[...]
As I have pointed out many times, Narcissists (and who doubts that the average Senator and House Chairman has a surfeit of Narcissism) have a great deal of trouble learning; the Democrats have not learned form their colleagues and are likely to over-reach in much the same way the Republicans did with Bill Clinton. The result is most likely to be disastrous for the Democrats, who will come off looking strident, petty, and nasty and evoke the question, "Don't these people know there's a War going on?"

Following ShrinkWrapped, we come to Gagdad Bob writing in One Cosmos and taking on "Bloggin' on the Backroads by the Rivers of My Memory." I had to read this twice to glean all the gold from the pun, and boy, was it worth it:

There is an inevitable reason why conservatives and religious people are so much happier than leftists and irreligious people. They also live considerably longer, probably as a result of the deadly stress hormones produced by trying to live in a manner that is unnatural to -- and unworthy of -- human beings.

Iron Shrink takes on the task of answering if it is possible to increase your IQ with his entry "Is it Possible to Raise My IQ?

Barring misfortune, we can keep our brains operating at peak efficiency by challenging them throughout our lives. I wouldn’t waste time on gimmicky exercises. Instead, use your brain the way it was meant to be used: learn a language, join a sports league, get that degree in quantum physics that you’ve always wanted. In short, engage in the world around you, be curious, and have fun. It’s no more complicated than that."

And last, but never least, that triune psychotherapist Sigmund, Carl and Alfred take on the left and their identification with anti-Americanism with his entry "Starbuck’s Marxists, American Hitlers, Jerusalem And Babylon."

For a leftist, there can be no Hitler other than an American Hitler. There can be no real Nazis other than Jews. No matter the excesses or evil that is in full view everyday, they must be denied so as to make America, American policy, Israel and Jews the real problem."

"A million dead in Rwanda? Who cares. A two plus decades long slaughter in Sudan that has left over 2 million dead- never mind. George Bush is Hitler, profiling at airports is fascist. The ever escalating dysfunction of the Arab world? So what- it isn’t as if leftists cared about Arabs and the oppression they suffer. As long as the Arab world hates America and hates Jews, well, that’s good enough for the leftists. After all, when was the last time you heard of leftists packing their bags and going into the Arab world to teach democracy, farming or sanitation protocols in Yemen?"

"In the mindset of a leftist, the Jerusalem of reality is a backwater when compared to the excitement of Babylon. The justice of Jerusalem requires work, effort and an honest assessment of what needs to be done so that justice might be achieved. The distractions of Babylon are deliberately crafted and presented so as to take the focus off justice and off an honest look at reality."

And there you are my friends, another tour of the Psych-bloggers. I hope you read every word of every link, I do and I learn so much from these wise folk. Oh, and by the way, I was reminded that I don't link to any of my own psych-blogging, so here goes. I posted my take on "Consequences, Very Real Consequences" with the theme of rewarding the behaviors you want to see increased including, of course, what may very well happen if we listen to the Democrats and really do pull out of Iraq.

So, once again, thanks and take care of yourselves, because for sure the Nanny-State won't do it.