oh say can you see

Following my own advice to learn about brain and behavior, I started searching for something to explain the actions of the people we have in power. The state we find ourselves in this fourth of july can't possibly be due to run of the mill greed. I searched various sources on brain and behavior research to see if the actions of our leaders today is in anyway DSM-IV classifiable.

Study after study shows that the behaviors exhibited by our leaders are similar to those exhibited by a certain class of people-narcissistic psychopaths. I also found an interesting link on Laura Knight Jadczyk's site about a narcissistic, psychopathic kid who killed his grandparents. Jadczyk also has pages upon pages devoted to the topic of psychopathy. Diminishing freedom for most while wealth increases for a select few reminds me of how little we have to celebrate. Could "the few" that are leading us today be mostly psychopaths? If you don't know read on.

As I research psychopaths, I can see how important it is to have some knowledge about such people. We must know what we are dealing with if we want to avoid further victimization by people of the lie as Dr. M Scott Peck called them.

According to the linked article on psychopaths;

They are manipulative, confrontational, show a lack of empathy and are pre-occupied with success, power, brilliance, ideal love and beauty.

When you read the research below which is just one of many, which formerly alcoholic leader do you think of?

Alcoholism may therefore be part of a spectrum of disinhibitory psychopathy which is characterized by reduced central serotonergic activity, and has a familial or genetic component.

Of not then consider Brian Blackwell in a different light as the article proposed

....Yet imagine for a moment that Brian Blackwell was the CEO of a corporation or a member of the government of one of the world's most powerful nations. In such a case, he would be in a much better position to not only cover up his crime, but to cover up the fact that he was a psychopath. Armed with access to a controlled press and with a national security apparatus at his beck and call, he could commit the most heinous crimes on a massive scale and still convince most of the world that he was an good and decent individual.

Oh say can you see.....