You MUST Watch This Before You Vote - Esteemed Shrink Profiles Bush
He also profiles those who support Bush.
This is powerful. I saw this and think it should be required viewing
for all Americans before they go to the polls to vote. It's
rivetting.
Dr. Justin Frank presents a psychological profile of Bush that will
get even the most confused of undecided voters racing to the polls.
CSpan2, BookTV - On Tuesday, November 2 at 12:00 a.m. EST (November 1
at 9:00 p.m. PST):
In His Father's Shadow & Bush on the Couch
Stanley Renshon & Justin Frank
Description: In an event hosted by George Washington University,
Stanley Renshon and Justin Frank discuss and examine the psychological
make-up of President George W. Bush. Dr. Frank, a clinical
psychiatrist at George Washington University Medical Center, writes
that President Bush was disturbed at an early age by what Dr. Frank
describes as an unavailable father and a withdrawn mother. He also
talks about his desire to test President Bush for brain damage as a
result of possible alcohol and drug abuse. Dr. Frank writes about
these and other issues, in "Bush on the Couch: Inside the Mind of the
President." He is joined in conversation by Dr. Stanley Renshon,
director of the clinical psychology program at City University of New
York and the author of "In His Father's Shadow: The Transformation's
of George W. Bush." In it, Dr. Renshon writes that President Bush's
drive to see America succeed is a direct result of his own
transformation into a confident and powerful politician. The author
also chronicles instances in President Bush's early life that helped
shape who he is now.
Author Bio: Stanley Renshon is the author of "High Hopes: The Clinton
Presidency and the Politics of Ambition" which won the Political
Science Association's Neustadt Award for best book published on the
presidency. He is currently a political science professor at the City
University of New York Graduate Center as well as the director of the
political psychology program at CUNY. Justin Frank has worked as a
teaching analyst at the Washington Psychoanalytic Institute for more
than twenty years and is a clinical psychiatry professor at George
Washington University.
http://www.booktv.org/General/index.asp?segID=5132&schedID=316
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An excerpt from "Bush on the Couch" by Justin Frank, M.D.:
If one of my patients frequently said one thing and did another, I
would want to know why. If I found that he often used words that hid
their true meaning, and affected a persona that obscured the nature of
his actions, I would grow more concerned. If he presented an
inflexible worldview characterized by an oversimplified distinction
between right and wrong, good and evil, allies and enemies, I would
question his ability to grasp reality. And if his actions revealed an
unacknowledged even sadistic indifference to human suffering,
wrapped in pious claims of compassion, I would worry about the safety
of the people whose lives he touched.
For the last three years, I have observed with increasing alarm the
inconsistencies and denials of such an individual. But he is not one
of my patients. He is our President. He wants to remain our President
for four more years, and he intends to do so on his own terms. On
August 27, the eve of the Republican Convention, Bush said to New York
Times reporters Sanger and Bumiller that "he would resist going on
the couch' to rethink decisions."
Since the Swift Boat controversy hit center stage in mid-August both
the ads and Bush's refusal to take responsibility for them we again
see his reluctance to examine his conscience. Instead he remains mired
in his long-standing pattern of denial and blame. Responsibility is
something this president flees at all costs. It is a behavior pattern
that began long before Bush became president, governor, or even a
college student. It even began before Bush had become an alcoholic (he
finally stopped drinking at age forty, with the help of his religion),
though his response to criticism is typical of untreated alcoholics.
Read more of this excerpt (including stories about Bush I'd never
heard about) at:
http://www.cojoweb.com/book-bush-on-the-couch.html
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What is going on in the White House?
by Dan Froomkin, on-line, The Washington Post
June 16, 2004
What's going on inside the White House? Ask Dan Froomkin, who writes
the White House Briefing column for washingtonpost.com. He'll answer
your questions, take your comments and links, and point you to
coverage around the Web.
Today Dan was joined by Justin Frank, Georgetown psychoanalyst and
author of Bush on the Couch: Inside the Mind of the President, an
unauthorized "applied psychoanalysis" of the president. Here is an
excerpt from Chapter One.
Dan Froomkin: Justin, Thanks for much for joining us today. Your book
is clearly generating some buzz. Before we get to the reader
questions, give me a quick sense of what sort of reaction you've
gotten thus far.
Justin Frank: Thank you for having me online. So far the reaction I've
received has been positive from colleagues as well as media people. I
had an interview last evening on Air America on the Garofolo/Seder
show which was lively and informed. Reviews of the book are just
starting to come in.
Email from Arlington, Va.: Do you think your initial bias against the
President has caused you to grasp for facts that fit a preconceived
conclusion? I think I see this happening in at least excerpt from the
linked summary of your book:
"His comfort living outside the law, defying international law in his
presidency as boldly as he once defied DUI statutes and military
reporting requirements."
I don't think Bush has lived outside international law any more than
other world leaders (Clinton fighting in Kosovo without UN approval,
Chiraq sending troops to Africa without UN aproval, Truman going to
Korea without UN approval). I also don't think, as sad as it is, that
he is all that uncommon for getting a DUI. The "military reporting
requirements" bit is just absurd in my mind because there is
substantial evidence that he did fulfill these requirements.
Do you really have a scientific methodology for coming to your
conclusions, or are you just on a fishing expedition to make the
President look bad?
Justin Frank: You raise some very important questions. I was concerned
about policies promulgated by President Bush before I started my study
of him. However, there have been other presidents whose policies I
have also disagreed with. What was different about Bush was his
patterns of behavior -- to use your question, a pattern of living
outside the law. Other people have been arrested for DUI, as you note.
Not many go on drinking for ten years after that, nor do they run for
president. But I agree, he is not unique as a person. He is unique as
a president, however.
Email from Boone, N.C.: To Justin Frank: Has your assessment of Bush's
behavior received endorsements from your colleagues and/or other
psychologists or psychoanalysts?
Justin Frank: I have received endorsements from other psychoanalysts
and psychiatrists, most notably from Dr. James Grotstein, MD who is
Professor at UCLA Medical Center. He gave high praise for the book and
for its scholarship. I also received endorsement from Dr. Irvin Yalom,
MD, Professor Emeritus at Stanford University Medical School. He wrote
that the book is "compelling and persuasive and downright
frightening."
Email from Coral Gables, Fla.: What's your response to this Blog Post
by "Respectful of Otters"?
Quote:
"....Frank told us yesterday that his opinions are based on publicly
available materials, adding, "I've never met the president or any
members of his family."
This kind of garbage is forbidden by the ethics code of my own
profession. It took about ten minutes with Google to determine that it
also violates the ethical code of psychiatrists.
" On occasion psychiatrists are asked for an opinion about an
individual who is in the light of public attention or who has
disclosed information about himself/herself through public media. In
such circumstances, a psychiatrist may share with the public his or
her expertise about psychiatric issues in general. However, it is
unethical for a psychiatrist to offer a professional opinion unless he
or she has conducted an examination and has been granted proper
authorization for such a statement."
You don't diagnose a patient you haven't examined. You don't discuss
your diagnoses without the patient's permission. And if your only
defense against the latter rule is that the person you've publicly
diagnosed isn't really your patient, that alone ought to let you know
that you've strayed far from the requirements of professional ethics.
A psychiatric diagnosis is a clinical tool, not a rhetorical device;
to treat it otherwise substantially undermines the reputation of
psychiatry and psychology. Frank is a former leader of the Physicians
for Social Responsibility, but there is simply nothing socially
responsible about using psychiatric terminology as a stick with which
to beat your political enemies. There's nothing socially responsible
about misusing the mantle of the professional expert. I am appalled.
Justin Frank: This is an important question concerning the fact that I
never met with George W Bush personally. I am using the technique of
applied psychoanalysis which was first introduced by Freud in his
analyses of Leonardo, Moses, and Little Hans. That technique, applying
psychoanalytic principles to available material, is now used by CIA
psychiatrists hired by the US Government who work at the George H.W.
Bush Center in Langly VA. I think these techniques should be available
to the American public as well. Therefore the APA guidelines you cite
do not pertain to my work -- Bush on the Couch is not about being
"asked for an opinion about an individual" but rather it is an in
depth study of writings, videotapes, biographies, news reports, of an
individual.
Dan Froomkin: After his speech at MacDill Air Force Base near Tampa,
Fla., today, Bush was to have met with 11 families of troops who died
in Iraq or Afghanistan. He's done this about a dozen times, all told.
But he's not attended a single funeral. He banned photographs of the
coffins returning from Iraq. And he has really, by and large, avoided
talking about the dead. Some people think that's not very
presidential.
You write in your book that "Bush's behavior strongly suggests an
unconscious resentment toward our own servicemen, whose bravery puts
his own (nonexistent) wartime service record to shame." But that's a
pretty brutal thing to say about the Commander in Chief, isn't it?
Justin Frank: President Bush has not attended a single funeral --
other than that of President Reagan. In my book I explore some
possible reasons for that, whether or not it is "presidential". I am
less interested in judging his behavior on political grounds than I am
in thinking about its meaning both to him and to the rest of us. He
has spent a lifetime of avoiding grief, starting with the death of his
sister when he was 7 years old. His parents didn't help him with what
must have been confusing and frightening feelings. He also has a
history of evading responsibility and perhaps his not attending
funerals has to do with not wanting to see the damage his policies
have wrought.
It would take too long for me to answer your question about his
unconscious resentment toward our own servicemen -- probably the rest
of this online session. Too many playwrights describe old men sending
the young to die, making Bush not at all unique. But there is
something about envy of the young, envy of their strength, envy of
their courage. He also envied his father who was a military hero
himself. It is a complex issue but one worth exploring.
Email from Tinseltown: Forget that cue card reading figurehead George
W. Bush: let me ask about someone American really care about. How
would you analyze Tony Soprano?
Justin Frank: There is already a book written analyzing Tony Soprano,
written by Glen Gabbard, MD.
Email from Harrisburg, Pa.: Freud made psychological observations of
famous people without personally observing them. How accurate is this
field of psychological observation from a distance, what are its
limitations, and what are its advantages?
Justin Frank: Thank you for this question. The limitations of not
making direct clinical observations of patients are great: we are not
able to avail ourselves of the powerful tools of transference and
countertransference -- the patient's feelings about us and ours in
relation to them. We do not get to see what is replayed from their
childhood conflicts that get expressed in the consulting room.
On the other hand, I never get to observe my patients outside the
consulting room. With Bush I get to see all his speeches, press
conferences, photo ops, read his speeches, read biographical material
as well. I find that much of applied psychoanalysis is "accurate" in
that it helps us see patterns of behavior and gives us tools to think
about those patterns. It is not conclusive -- and therefore functions
in the realm of interpretation. Interestingly enough, Bush seems to
continue to write my book after it has been printed -- just two weeks
ago he denied knowing the now-discredited Chalabi despite having
invited him to sit with Laura at the State of the Union address this
year. I called this denial mechanism the KWD, or the "Kenny Who
Defense" which he used so widely when asked if he knew Ken Lay of
Enron. That was the same Ken Lay who was a chief contributor to Bush's
2000 election bid.
Email from Arlington, VA: You replied to me that George Bush is
"unique as a president" because of his "pattern of living outside the
law." The problem is, you are starting out with a set of assumptions
that are colored by your political views. Many people would not agree
that Bush is displaying this pattern of behavior. Some might argue
that Bill Clinton had even greater troubles with the law, leading him
to commit the felony of perjury. I don't recall your book on his
psychological background.
Justin Frank: I am answering this because you are concerned about my
bias.
I did not analyze Clinton, and he certainly had/has his share of
character flaws. He did not take money earmarked for Afghanistan and
use it to prepare for a war in Iraq. This is not just outside the law
but outside the Constitution. There are numerous examples of similar
behavior seen in Bush. But I am not here to compare but to look in
depth into What we see in this president.
Email from Washington, D.C.: Let me see if I've got this straight: one
can't quit drinking, except with the help of 12-steppers or a
professionals such as yourself? Sounds like more blather from the
Recovery Industry.
Justin Frank: I don't think anybody makes money from 12-step recovery.
It is not much of an industry. But what is important is that the "ism"
part of alcoholism was not treated ever and he has no capacity to take
responsibility for his behavior which he dismisses as "youthful
indescretions". Until forty?
One needs a president who can look inside himself and think about
matters of grave importance to the nation and to the world. Black and
white thinking results most often from untreated alcoholism.
Email from Santa Clara, Calif.: Dr. Frank, A few weeks ago we learned
that Pres. Bush has Saddam's handgun in a case in a room off the oval
office. Apparently he proudly shows it off to visitors. Given all the
negative events that have transpired since Hussein's capture what do
you make of this disconnect?
Justin Frank: I think that the Bush who proudly shows off Saddam's
handgun to visitors is the same Bush who proudly pranced aboard the
aircraft carrier last year declaring that the war in Iraq was over.
His behavior is similar to that of an eight-year-old boy playing
superman and believing that he won a war all by himself, that he
captured Saddam by himself. The behavior is "disconnected" not only
from current events, but from a fundamental understanding of self.
Email from Washington, D.C.: What do you hope to accomplish with this
book? Is it your conclusion that the President's psychiatric
limitations should disqualify him from holding the office -- or at the
very least, that voters should conclude from your analysis that
alternative candidates should be selected?
Justin Frank: I hope to enrich the discussion about our choices for
president in 2004. Until this book there has been a sense that
employers at MacDonalds know more about the psychological profiles of
their employees than we do about the people we select to hold the most
important job in our nation.
I hope that the book will help us think about patterns of behavior
that we see, that it will help us watch our leaders more closely. And
that it will help us think.
Email from Columbus, Ohio: Is Chapter I about Bush or Reagan? After a
week of nauseating tributes to the president who claimed ketchup is a
vegetable for poor children in the school lunch program, and who
unilaterally kicked people off disability until they could prove
eligibility (during which time some people died), I am intrugued --
and terrified -- by the parallels.
Justin Frank: I appreciate your comment comparing Bush's behavior
toward children with Reagan's. Both were relatively absent fathers,
detached from their own children. What Reagan started in the 1980s
(really in the 1970s in California) Bush is continuing, though the
chapter was explicitly about George W. Bush.
Email from Philadelphia, PA: This is more of a comment than a
question, but I read a review of your book yesterday that mentioned
the death of Bush's sister and the possible effects of the suppression
of his feelings about that. Frankly, it's one of the few times I've
felt some real compassion for him. I also lost a sister, when I was 8
and she was 7, more than 40 years ago, and it was also true in my
family that no one seemed to notice that I might feel responsible for
death. With some help I managed to figure it out too many years later.
(Fortunately, I wasn't holding an important public office during the
time I was struggling with it unconsciously.) I have since learned
that the most important thing a parent can do is to help a child be
responsible for his or her feelings. I don't forsee any help like that
for Bush, since he's already been "saved," but hopefully your book
will raise others' awareness of how much damage one repressed person
can accomplish.
Justin Frank: Your comment is so moving that I want to include it in
my response: "I have since learned that the most important thing a
parent can do is to help a child be responsible for his or her
feelings. I don't forsee any help like that for Bush, since he's
already been "saved," but hopefully your book will raise others'
awareness of how much damage one repressed person can accomplish."
I, too, was moved when reading about what Bush must have gone through.
He did have nightmares for several months afterward, but from what I
can tell there was no discussion of his feelings -- no place to talk
about guilt, normal aggression and relief, and terrible loss itself.
Parents must pay attention to their children, and I have the feeling
that Bush received little, if any, such attention. I also think that
helps me understand why it is easy for him to pay little attention to
the real and palpable losses of the American people -- from 911 to
Afghanistan to Iraq. He thinks only of revenge for 911 or else of
continuing to live life as one normally might do.
Email from Houston, Texas: I'm not a Bush fan, but your approach does
seem like shooting fish in a barrel. By applying various psychological
symptoms and neuroses from such an external standpoint, couldn't you
make virtually anyone look a little crazy?
Justin Frank: Yes I could make anyone look crazy. And I'm a target for
that as well. We all are.
I hope that if you read the book you will see that I am not just
pulling out all the psychiatric stops to "get" Bush.
His behavior calls for examination.
Email from Pomona, Calif.: I would be interested in seeing your
methods of analysis applied to John Kerry's pattern of changing his
position on issues based on the political expediency of the moment.
Surely there must be some deep wound from his childhood that prevents
him from developing a principled position and sticking with it in the
face of criticism. And what are the implications for how he would
govern, given this pattern of indecision?
Justin Frank: I would love to apply my method of analysis to John
Kerry. I think this kind of exploration is warranted with all people
who hold such immense responsibility.
Again, I am not looking for causes as much as for patterns and meaning
of those patterns.
Email from Chicago, Ill.: I've read articles about Bush that describe
him as a "dry drunk." Do you think he's still an alcoholic, or that
the stress of not drinking contributes to his problems?
Do you think there's a point when the straw will finally break the
camel's back and Bush will start decompensating?
Dan Froomkin: Lots of readers are asking about this "dry drunk"
hypothesis.
Justin Frank: I was concerned in the April 13 Press Conference that
Bush had begun to decompensate. He was unable to anwswer the question
about whether or not he thought he'd made mistakes in the prosecution
of the Iraq war. In some ways he gave his most honest answer -- a
halting and defensive one, but genuine. He couldn't think and needed
written questions in advance.
I have no idea whether or not Bush is drinking -- I would doubt it as
he must be under scrutiny by so many people. But the issue again is
about the "ism" part of alcoholism -- the need he has to order his
internal chaos. This need at times borders on the desperate -- rigid
schedules, repeated prayer meetings, excessive time away from
Washington, and even fears of testifying alone in front of the 911
Commission.
Email from Long Beach: Greetings from California,
May I suggest to those who question your ability or right to observe
the president that they remember the fate of Vladimir Bekhterev, who
diagonosed Stalin as a paranoid, and was quickly poisoned by his
"fearless leader"? BTW, Bekhterev would be a good dedication in your
book.
Justin Frank: Thank you for your warning. Several of my firends said
that they would consult during the writing but did not want to be
acknowledged by name in print.
I hope that is an acceptable response to your comment.
I do get anxious more about followers than about Bush himself. Stalin
he is not.
Email from Monticello, New York: Dr. Frank,
I understand you learned that Bush exploded firecrackers inside of
frogs as a youngster. How did you learn that, what does it indicate to
you about the pathology of the youngster, and how do you think that
pathology has manifested itself in the behavior of the adult? Thank
you.
Justin Frank: There were several articles about Bush's childhood in
which his friends were interviewed describing his having blown up
frogs. This was after rainy periods in the otherwise dry Midland
world. He also used beebee guns to shoot them, one friend reported. A
group of them did.
As a fraternity man at Yale he branded pledges on the buttocks with a
hot coat-hanger. This was written up in the NYTimes in 1967 and he was
interviewed then about it.
His smirk as an adult, his mimicry of patients on death row while he
was Governor are all part of a similar pattern.
Everyone has sadistic bits in his personality. The job of a mature
person is to recognize those elements and control them or channel them
in some way other than inflicting harm on others.
Email from Undisclosed Location, Suburban Maryland: My more
psychodynamically-informed co-workers and I have from time to time
engaged in debate as to exactly where our president fits into the
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for mental disorders (DSM-IV). So I
herald the arrival of your book (and this chat) with great interest.
My personal take on Mr. Bush has been one of Antisocial Personality
Disorder (DSM code 301.7) as he meets the threshold of three criteria
for that diagnosis: deceitfulness (item 2), impulsivity or failure to
plan ahead (3), and consistent irresponsibility (6) -- although
evidence for lack of remorse (7) is certainly in abundance as well.
However, I will concede that his association with the neocons who
hijacked our foreign policy (flushing 40 years of multilateralism down
the drain in favor of a "high country sheriff" game) suggests Shared
Psychotic Disorder (297.3).
Then there is a nagging sense, too, of something on the Autistic
Disorder spectrum (299.90). He appears to meet five criteria: (1b)
failure to develop peer relationships (see diplomatic failures); (2a)
delay in, or total lack of, the development of spoken language; (2c)
stereotyped and repetitive use of language (responds "9/11 changed
everything" to any questioning of his policies); (3a) encompassing
preoccupation with one or more interest that is abnormal in intensity
or focus (see Iraq obsession); and (3b) apparently inflexible
adherence to specific, nonfunctional routines (see same).
And finally, there is the unclassifiable, but intense, sense of
arrested development. The insistence on seeing the world in black and
white is characteristic of a child who simply hasn't yet begun to
perceive the complexities of the adult world.
You've obviously done a lot of thinking on this as well. So we'd be
grateful if you could help us sort all this out (and maybe settle some
bets?). Thanks!;
Justin Frank: In my book I did not make a DSM diagnosis of President
Bush.
My book is about character and behavior patterns to take note of, not
about diagnosis. It is aimed at helping people to think about his
competence to govern and his method of governing rather than to put
him in a category.
As much has I have been willing to examine his character in depth, I
do not feel that trying out a diagnosis will serve any useful purpose.
Email from Hunsterville, NC: Justin, any word from the White House on
your book? Official or otherwise?
Justin Frank: No official word form the White House, other than twice
being told they "don't do book reviews."
I have no idea. I am talking about Bush in a different way, but I
think the White House is more concerned with people who have specific
goods on them -- people like O'Neill and Clarke.
Dan Froomkin: Justin, thanks for joining us today. You sparked a great
conversation here, and I suspect in many other places as well.
Readers, thanks for all your terrific questions -- sorry we couldn't
get to all of them. Justin Frank: Thank you for having me. I enjoyed
this format -- something completely new to me. I hope it hasn't been
too argumentative but is rather in the service of deepening discussion
and thought.
http://www.unknownnews.net/insanity061704.html
http://www.rense.com/general58/bcouch.htm
http://www.ariannaonline.com/columns/column.php?id=722
http://www.unknownnews.net/insanity080202.html
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/07/27/world/main632065.shtml
Watch Dr. Frank's presentation on CSpan2 - It's only our country and
our lives that are at stake.