Obama's Sociopaths

In recent weeks I have been receiving a stream of hostile posts from Obama supporters. The posts' crude content has forced me to enable the moderator feature on replies. I've been getting about 500 views a day for the past week or two but I don't get a huge number of replies. Most of those that I do get, including the ones that argue with my views, are first rate. The exceptions are the pro-Obama posts, whose tone, lack of intellectual back-up and vulgarity are consistent with my assessment of the candidate. As well, the now-defunct New York Sun covered a shut-down of this blog, apparently due to complaints by Obama supporters.

Obama's supporters reflect the candidate's pathology. As I have previously blogged, Barack Obama is a sociopath, that is, someone with an incomplete conscience. He is far from unique among politicians, which is part of the reason why laissez-faire and limited government are necessary, and their weakening by Progressivism poses a serious threat to civil liberties. I would venture to guess that a good 10% of Congresspeople are sociopaths, and a good proportion of corporate executives as well. Fortune once reported that 8% of corporate executives given a written integrity test failed, which is not quite the same thing as saying they are sociopaths, but not far off. In the general population, the percentage of sociopaths is about 2%.

David Warren has posted on Obama's preposterous messianic pretensions (h/t Larwyn). Please allow me to quote from Warren's excellent post:

"...Obama has presented himself from the start as a messianic, "transformational" leader -- and thus played deceitfully with ideas that belong to religion and not politics. That he has done this so successfully is a mark of the degree to which the U.S. itself, like the rest of the western world, has lost its purchase on the Christian religion. Powerful religious impulses have been spilt, secularized.

"In this climate, people tend to be maniacally opposed to the sin to which they are not tempted: to giving Christ control over the things that are Caesar's. But they are blind to the sin to which they are hugely tempted: giving Caesar control over the things that are Christ's.

"'Faith, hope, and charity' are Christ's things. They apply, properly, outside time -- to a "futurity" that is not of this world. They must not be applied to any earthly utopia. A Caesar who appropriates otherworldly virtues, is riding upon very dangerous illusions. Follow him into dreamland, and you'll be lucky to wake up."

This kind of illusion is the stock in trade of con men and totalitarian dictators. It was true of Hitler, Marx, Stalin, and Castro. More generally, sociopaths tend to be charismatic or transformational. As well, they frequently engage in self-pity. We have heard repeated self-pitying complaints from both Barack and Michelle Obama about his (in my opinion kid gloves) handling by Fox News and by bloggers. There is little doubt in my mind that this sociopath cum "messiah" is capable of silencing mainstream media outlets like Fox as well as bloggers through suppressive executive action. I do believe that all Americans who might disagree with Obama's thuggery are in danger.

PS--Welcome back Larwyn. Keep slugging away!

George Washington on Religion, Morality, Isolationism and Foreign Policy

"Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of men and citizens. The mere politician, equally with the pious man, ought to respect and to cherish them. A volume could not trace all their connections with private and public felicity. Let it simply be asked: Where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths which are the instruments of investigation in courts of justice? And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.

"It is substantially true that virtue or morality is a necessary spring of popular government. The rule, indeed, extends with more or less force to every species of free government. Who that is a sincere friend to it can look with indifference upon attempts to shake the foundation of the fabric?

Promote then, as an object of primary importance, institutions for the general diffusion of knowledge. In proportion as the structure of a government gives force to public opinion, it is essential that public opinion should be enlightened...

"Observe good faith and justice towards all nations; cultivate peace and harmony with all. Religion and morality enjoin this conduct; and can it be, that good policy does not equally enjoin it? It will be worthy of a free, enlightened, and at no distant period, a great nation, to give to mankind the magnanimous and too novel example of a people always guided by an exalted justice and benevolence. Who can doubt that, in the course of time and things, the fruits of such a plan would richly repay any temporary advantages which might be lost by a steady adherence to it ? Can it be that Providence has not connected the permanent felicity of a nation with its virtue ? The experiment, at least, is recommended by every sentiment which ennobles human nature. Alas! is it rendered impossible by its vices?

George Washington's Farewell Address, 1796.