General

Re: Top psychiatrist concludes liberals clinically nuts

Ennio45 — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 23:14:19 GMT

They are both completely rational. They see what they want, and they do whatever they have to to get it. Half-truths and supressed evidence may seem irrational, but in reality they are simply tools of winning the debate for their side, and the reason for being on that side is power. Each version of state and society has power invested in one particular group. In our society it's the "political class", in theocracies it's the clergy, and under communism it's the bureaucratic class.

Re: Top psychiatrist concludes liberals clinically nuts

Inquisitor — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 16:57:13 GMT

Both are trapped in cognitive dissonance, the conservative as much (if not more so) than the 'liberal'.

Re: Top psychiatrist concludes liberals clinically nuts

Geoffrey Allan Plauché — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 16:36:38 GMT

JAlanKatz:
I'd take this as yet another example of what's wrong with psychiatry. If he's free of right-wing bias why isn't he identifying as nuts people who support torture, hate civil rights, and sing songs about bombing countries?

LOL! Good point. So both left-liberals and conservatives are immature adults: the left act like spoiled children and the right like homicidal sociopaths.

Re: Top psychiatrist concludes liberals clinically nuts

Donald Lingerfelt — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 16:19:52 GMT

This is brilliant and make a lot of sence. It explains why liberals (modern) think the way they do. I've often questoned why someone would really think (or rather fail to think) like that. Very short term, emotion based opinions are irrational.

Re: Top psychiatrist concludes liberals clinically nuts

JAlanKatz — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 04:56:30 GMT

I'd take this as yet another example of what's wrong with psychiatry. If he's free of right-wing bias why isn't he identifying as nuts people who support torture, hate civil rights, and sing songs about bombing countries?

Re: Top psychiatrist concludes liberals clinically nuts

DBratton — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 02:56:28 GMT

Echos of Mises' "Fourier Complex"

Top psychiatrist concludes liberals clinically nuts

Inquisitor — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 01:42:03 GMT

WASHINGTON - Just when liberals thought it was safe to start
identifying themselves as such, an acclaimed, veteran psychiatrist is
making the case that the ideology motivating them is actually a mental
disorder.

"Based on strikingly irrational beliefs and emotions, modern liberals
relentlessly undermine the most important principles on which our
freedoms were founded," says Dr. Lyle Rossiter, author of the new
book, "The Liberal Mind: The Psychological Causes of Political
Madness." "Like spoiled, angry children, they rebel against the normal
responsibilities of adulthood and demand that a parental government
meet their needs from cradle to grave."

While political activists on the other side of the spectrum have made
similar observations, Rossiter boasts professional credentials and a
life virtually free of activism and links to "the vast right-wing
conspiracy."

For more than 35 years he has diagnosed and treated more than 1,500
patients as a board-certified clinical psychiatrist and examined more
than 2,700 civil and criminal cases as a board-certified forensic
psychiatrist. He received his medical and psychiatric training at the
University of Chicago.

Rossiter says the kind of liberalism being displayed by the two major
candidates for the Democratic Party presidential nomination can only
be understood as a psychological disorder.

Continued.

Not sure if this is true, but if so it's funny.