Markham's Behavioral Health

Karl Rove got it wrong - in contempt of congress

Will congress do anything or allow powerful white men in high places to get away with crimes against the country?

Video lasts 3:27

McCain gets it wrong on birth control

Many insurance companies cover prescriptions for Vigara but not for birth control. John McCain doesn't know what he thinks about the issue, needs to check with his handlers, before he takes a position.

This is not a difficult issue. Birth control definitely should be covered by health insurance. It clearly is in the patient's interest and society's interest for people to be able to control their fertility. McCain gets it wrong.

Video lasts 2:14

Pharmaceutical companies disease monger to detriment of society

Catherine Arnst had an interesting article published in the May 8, 2006 issue of Business Week entitled "Hey, You Don't Look So Good: As Diagnoses Of Once-Rare Illnesses Soar, Doctors Say Drugmakers Are 'Disease Mongering' To Boost Sales".

Here is a snippet from the article:

Click on article to enlage for easier reading.

 

Home of the Brave, the film

Home of the Brave is a documentary about the murder of Viola Liuzzo who was killed on March 25, 1965 in Selma, Alabama as part of the civil rights march there from Selma to Montgomery.

The story is told from the perspectives of her five children. Viola was 39 when she was killed and was survived by her husband and the five children. It appears that the F.B.I. was involved and that an F.B.I. informant actually perpetrated the murder.

This documentary depicts the heroic efforts of a courageous woman and the effect her death and its circumstances has on her children.

I highly recommend this film.

Home of the Brave (2004).

Bush tours country surveying the damage of his presidency

Onion video lasts 2:56

Bush legacy tour - Getting it wrong with Bush and the Republicans

Video lasts 4:46 and well worth watching.

Prosperity preaching is the path to hell

It is ironic that when the economy gets bad people turn to religion.

The major religion in America today, but you will not see it listed as a major religion or denomination in the Pew Research Polls, is consumerism. The God of consumerism is Mammon. President Bush is consumerism's main prophet when he encourages people to engage in the sacred practice of shopping.

Joel Osteen and books such as The Secret promote an economics of spirituality promising people that if they have enough faith and get right with their God material and financial benefits will flow. With a paradoxical theology the proponents of economic spirituality promise that the more money you give to them, the more money the universe will send back to you.

As people have come to believe the economics of spirituality, the rich have gotten richer and the poor have gotten poorer and the middle class has shrunk.

People have not caught on that the economics of spirituality is a scam, a con, worthy of P.T. Barnum and the snake oil salesman of old.

People are not stupid but they are anxious and scared. Scared people will latch on to any hair-brained ideas hoping that by whistling in the dark and being distracted by engaging entertainment and hopeful ideas, no mater how false, will help them feel better and make things better.

None of the great religious leaders preached consumerism, not Jesus, not Buddha, not Krishna, not Mohamed. In fact, they preached the opposite. Jesus said, "It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to get into heaven."

It's not that money and material things are bad, it's that they have there place and there are plenty of things more important like loving your neighbor and caring for our planet and mother, Mother Earth.

As J. Paul Getty said, "The meek shall inherit the earth but not the mineral rights." and as Jesus said, it is hard, if not impossible for the rich to get into heaven, but the prosperity preachers who encourage an economics of spirituality create a hell on earth in the long run. As one wag said when asked his definition of Irish Diplomacy, "Irish diplomacy is telling a person to go to hell in such a way that they enjoy the trip." President Bush must be part Irish when he told Americans that the antidote to their worries is to go shopping. By all means shop til you drop, and let the plutocrats and preachers run the world.

Americans are not stupid, but emotional disturbed and morally corrupt

"I have treated many patients who have been painfully gaslighted in family, work, or organizational settings. I have seen whole organizations undercut by manipulative CEOs. But when gaslighting is done to an entire country as it has been done to the United States, the stakes are chilling. The political use of gaslighting has led to a psychologically impaired and unstable American electorate. The resulting policy decisions have had devastating implications for all Americans and the world."

Dr. Bryant Welch, The Assault On The American Mind, pp. 6-7

Rick Shenkman's book is entitled, Just How Stupid Are We? I have come to understand that it is not that Americans are stupid but that they are emotionally unstable and morally corrupt. We usually don't think of ourselves that way but if this were not true how do you explain the acquiescence to the nation's policies over the last 8 years?

How could Americans support a disastrous and immoral war in Iraq, the abandonment of 1 million fellow citizens in Katrina, the lack of health insurance for over 46 million Americans, the destruction of our planet by driving gas guzzling SUVs, a President who tells the citizens to cope with their anxiety about the terrorist threat which he overplayed by going shopping?

It is immoral to not help one another and the dog eat dog mentality where every person is expected to shift for himself is destroying our sense of security and thereby our emotional stability and moral fitness.

Further, there is a cognitive and intellectual belief in creationism denying evolution, faith based policies have taken over for good public health programs such as abstinence based sex education, a dismantling of governmental programs and then when they don't work because they are underfunded and under resourced turning them over to private contractors with no-bid contacts at exorbitant costs.

When we vote for our leaders and representatives, we pick appallingly unfit candidates. These choices are based on bogus emotional and moral issues and America as a nation has lost its way. We vote against our interests when it comes to financial policy, foreign relations, domestic policy over silly issues like gay marriage and reproductive rights.

A nation which is frightened of bogeymen, impoverishment, inability to obtain health care, education, and a prosperous future for their children is a nation easily manipulated by gaslighters.

A frightened nation is a nation at high risk for harming itself and others. We need to build a nation which is secure, where there is a safety net, where we care for one another, and overcome the dog eat dog mentality where it is every person for himself. We can help each other and in so doing build a better today for ourselves and tomorrow for our children and grandchildren. It is in the security of community which comes from helping each other that our emotional health and positive morality will be restored.

This emotional instability and moral corruption is a curious thing. How is it that two DUI offenders get chosen to be President and Vice President? How does a man who is a self admitted drug abuser until he was 40, who bankrupted several businesses, and was a lackluster student only admitted to Ivy League schools because of legacy admission policies get to lead the richest, most powerful nation on earth into a disastrous war? The whole thing seems nuts, and it is.

Video lasts 24 seconds

How to deal with deceit and dishonesty in people who have power over you?

"Gaslighting exploits weaknesses in the human mind and has a debilitating effect on the victim's ability to think rationally and to function independently of the gaslighter. It can take many forms. In all instances, however, it involves the clever manipulation of 'reality' by the predator that undermines the victim's independent mental functioning for the gaslighter's own political, financial, or psychological motives."

Dr. Bryant Welch, Assault On The American Mind, p. 6

One of the more difficult things for me to deal with as a psychotherapist is to sit in the counseling room and watch a spouse swear up and down that he/she is not having an affair, being unfaithful, and lying when it fact there is proof positive evidence that the spouse is having an affair and is lying about it. Sometimes I watch parents tell their children that things are one way when they are in fact another and they are wanting the child's cooperation, compliance, and loyalty. I have worked in organizations when supervisory personnel only told employees what was going on on a "need to know basis" to maintain control over the workforce which might otherwise object to the company's operational procedures.

When politicians lie to their constituents, there is a break down in democracy because constituents can no longer play an authentic role in the life of their community, state, and nation. They are kept blind to what the real agendas are and why things are happening in their name which do not have their agreement and assent. Lying, saying one thing and doing another, creating a charade to project one reality when something else is going on, is a crazy making experience.

It is cause for great concern that the reality projected to the American people has been distorted for political purposes. It has made us all anxious, depressed, confused, and dependent. This is good for the pharmaceutical industry but not good for our democracy.

There are some positive signs with fake news shows like The Daily Show and Colbert Report which daily poke fun at the hypocrisy, duplicity, and inanity which passes these days for leadership. There are the Scott McClellan's whose conscience would no longer allow him to not speak up and openly admit to the deceit. This is hardly news because we all knew it all along, but to have an administrative official publicly admit it, is the first step in recovery.

The ability to recognize gaslighting is a higher level skill. Not all Americans are emotionally capable of reflecting on their own experience, and observing this communication dynamic. Back in the 60s we called gaslighting a "mind fuck" which means that we knew we were being fucked with. Gaslighting works best, of course, when it is so subtle that it cannot be observed, when it is not noticed. The national therapeutic effort is to help people recognize gaslighting and hold the gaslighters accountable. Individually, in our families, our communities, and our nation we would be much better off psychologically, socially, and politically.

This will require a level of literacy never before achieved in a society. And more than just literacy, it will require a level of emotional intelligence never before achieved as well. The major question which needs answering is how to manage deceit and dishonesty in people who have power over you? The answer is very carefully. I will write more about this in the next few days.

Cindy and John McCain seem to have a problem with the truth. If John can't get things right in his marriage how can he get things right for the country?

Cindy and John McCain have an interesting marriage. Cindy tells Jay Leno that she learned to fly an airplane and kept it secret from John, and the two of them lied to each other about their ages, she saying she was 4 years older than she was, and he saying he was 4 years younger than he was. She said they never found out the truth about each others ages until they had to apply for their marriage license and give their correct ages. She also says she became addicted to pain killers after back surgery and John never suspected a thing, but her parents noticed that she had a problem. It sounds like they are skilled at gaslighting each other. If John has trouble with truthfulness in his marriage how can he be honest as leader of the free world? Expect the gaslighting to continue whenever it's to his advantage.

Video of Cindy's appearance on Jay Leno lasts 2:25