By Sam Vaknin — Author of “Malignant Self Love – Narcissism Revisited“

“I came here to see a country, but what I find is a theater … In appearances, everything happens as it does everywhere else. There is no difference except in the very foundation of things.” (de Custine, writing about Russia in the mid-19th century)

Four decades ago, the Polish-American-Jewish author, Jerzy Kosinski, wrote the book “Being There.” It describes the election to the presidency of the United States of a simpleton, a gardener, whose vapid and trite pronouncements are taken to be sagacious and penetrating insights into human affairs. The “Being There Syndrome” is now manifest throughout the world: from Russia (Putin) to the United States (Obama).

Given a high enough level of frustration, triggered by recurrent, endemic, and systemic failures in all spheres of policy, even the most resilient democracy develops a predilection to “strong men,” leaders whose self-confidence, sangfroid, and apparent omniscience all but “guarantee” a change of course for the better.

These are usually people with a thin resume, having accomplished little prior to their ascendance. They appear to have erupted on the scene from nowhere. They are received as providential messiahs precisely because they are unencumbered with a discernible past and, thus, are ostensibly unburdened by prior affiliations and commitments. Their only duty is to the future. They are a-historical: they have no history and they are above history.

Indeed, it is precisely this apparent lack of a biography that qualifies these leaders to represent and bring about a fantastic and grandiose future. They act as a blank screen upon which the multitudes project their own traits, wishes, personal biographies, needs, and yearnings.

The more these leaders deviate from their initial promises and the more they fail, the dearer they are to the hearts of their constituents: like them, their new-chosen leader is struggling, coping, trying, and failing and, like them, he has his shortcomings and vices. This affinity is endearing and captivating. It helps to form a shared psychosis (follies-a-pleusieurs) between ruler and people and fosters the emergence of an hagiography.

The propensity to elevate narcissistic or even psychopathic personalities to power is most pronounced in countries that lack a democratic tradition (such as China, Russia, or the nations that inhabit the territories that once belonged to Byzantium or the Ottoman Empire).

Cultures and civilizations which frown upon individualism and have a collectivist tradition, prefer to install “strong collective leaderships” rather than “strong men.” Yet, all these polities maintain a theatre of democracy, or a theatre of “democratically-reached consensus” (Putin calls it: “sovereign democracy”). Such charades are devoid of essence and proper function and are replete and concurrent with a personality cult or the adoration of the party in power.

In most developing countries and nations in transition, “democracy” is an empty word. Granted, the hallmarks of democracy are there: candidate lists, parties, election propaganda, a plurality of media, and voting. But its quiddity is absent. The democratic principles are institutions are being consistently hollowed out and rendered mock by election fraud, exclusionary policies, cronyism, corruption, intimidation, and collusion with Western interests, both commercial and political.

The new “democracies” are thinly-disguised and criminalized plutocracies (recall the Russian oligarchs), authoritarian regimes (Central Asia and the Caucasus), or puppeteered heterarchies (Macedonia, Bosnia, and Iraq, to mention three recent examples).

The new “democracies” suffer from many of the same ills that afflict their veteran role models: murky campaign finances; venal revolving doors between state administration and private enterprise; endemic corruption, nepotism, and cronyism; self-censoring media; socially, economically, and politically excluded minorities; and so on. But while this malaise does not threaten the foundations of the United States and France – it does imperil the stability and future of the likes of Ukraine, Serbia, and Moldova, Indonesia, Mexico, and Bolivia.

Many nations have chosen prosperity over democracy. Yes, the denizens of these realms can’t speak their mind or protest or criticize or even joke lest they be arrested or worse – but, in exchange for giving up these trivial freedoms, they have food on the table, they are fully employed, they receive ample health care and proper education, they save and spend to their hearts’ content.

In return for all these worldly and intangible goods (popularity of the leadership which yields political stability; prosperity; security; prestige abroad; authority at home; a renewed sense of nationalism, collective and community), the citizens of these countries forgo the right to be able to criticize the regime or change it once every four years. Many insist that they have struck a good bargain – not a Faustian one.

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Also Read:

• Narcissistic Leaders

• Resources regarding Leadership Styles

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I am not calling it for Obama yet, because I cannot gauge accurately the ferocity of McCain’s Stealth Weapon – The BIGOT Vote.

It is now pretty clear that Sarah Palin is unfit for the job of Vice-President. She is damaged goods.

The debate scheduled for tomorrow night will not vindicate her in anyway, no matter how much McCain’s ReTHUGlican handlers spin it.

There are no low or high debate expectations. Sarah is just a miserable mess.

Contrary to the “usually wrong” advice a cross-section of pundits have been dishing out in the air-waves, I think Joe Biden should zero in for the kill.

To hell with that sexism nonsense!

We are talking Alkaida, Osama Bin Laden and Putin here — there is no room for weakness, and if she wants to be a heartbeat away from the presidency of the United States, she must jump through ALL the hoops. She is not running for Miss Alaska!

Palin is a severely “Wounded Moose,” with broken arms and legs. All she can do now is stare hopelessly into the headlights beaming on her.

An old disease ridden 72 year old and a severely “Wounded Moose,” ….Oh please!

Sarah’s Greatest Hits

Top 10 Things Overheard At Sarah Palin’s Debate Camp

The gamble of selecting Palin in order to woo Clinton voters (which insulted scores of women), is going to prove to be the costliest blunder of McCain’s “Maverick Express” career.

Sarah Palin has become the bridge to the White House for Barack Obama and Joe Biden.

Paul Campos of The Rocky Mountain News Opinionates: “Palin has spent almost her whole life in a very small town in a sparsely populated and extremely isolated state. For reasons that remain obscure, she attended five colleges in six years where, if her public performance to date is any indication, she seems to have learned nothing.”

In typical capitalist fashion, everyone is milking “Sara-Mania” to the “Moose-Bones,” including an Ohio company that now offers the “Sarah-Cuda” hunting bow. Lakota Industries, the manufacturer, in a statement issued through their CEO Dick Williamson said:

“We are so pleased to introduce the “Sarah-Cuda” to the bow-hunting and archery community.” “In addition to honoring Ms. Palin’s historic achievement, we wanted to pay tribute to all the women who bear the responsibility of family and work while strengthening the moral fiber of society.”

Sorry Mr. Williamson, Sarah is a humongous political tragedy — worse than a sub-prime mortgage lent to a jobless home-owner wannabe.

Meanwhile, John McCain continued his insolent behavior last night on the Senate floor — “dissing” Obama as the Illinois senator tried to make nice with him:

Barack Obama approached John McCain on the senate floor — he walked over to where McCain was chatting with Republican Sen. Mel Martinez of Florida and Independent Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut. And he stretched out his arm and offered his hand to McCain. McCain shook it, but with a “go away” look that no one could miss. He tried his best not to even look at Obama. Finally, with a tight smile, McCain managed a greeting: “Good to see you.” — Reported Here.

[VIDEO PENDING]

Also, the post debate polls [TIME poll] are out, and Obama is rolling — he has opened a formidable 7-point lead over John McCain, reaching the 50% threshold among likely voters for the first time in the general campaign for President. Obama now leads McCain 50%-43% overall, up from 46%-41% before the parties’ conventions a month ago. Obama’s support is not just broader but sturdier; 23% of McCain supporters said they might change their mind, while only 15% of Obama’s said they could be persuaded to switch.

Among the poll’s most dramatic findings: McCain is losing female voters faster than Sarah Palin attracted them after the Republican National Convention. Obama leads McCain by 17 points with women, 55%-38%. Before the conventions, women preferred Obama by a margin of 10 points, 49%-39%. After McCain picked Palin as his running mate, the gap narrowed to a virtual tie, with Obama holding a 1-point margin, 48%-47%…..[READ MORE]

RealClearPolitics.com which averages all available polls concurs. Obama is also ahead in the critical Electoral Count.

The situation is getting bad for McCain, and the right-wing NUTBAGS, notably the Syphilitic Goons at Fox News who have been “moving mountains” to stop Obama. Short of uprooting their own teeth, these PROPAGANDA EXTORTIONISTS are “gnashing” at everything in their path, like starved “lactating Hyenas” in the wild.

They have attacked the beautiful “Obama Singing Kids.”

The Obama Singing Kids

[VIDEO REMOVED FROM YOUTUBE]

….And Gwen Ifill, the moderator of tomorrow’s Vice Presidential debate. Also busy “working the referee” were McCain and Palin — sowing seeds doubts about Ifill.

The vicious former mayor of New York, Mr. 911, Rudy Giuliani joined them saying: “If the moderator of this debate were someone who was writing a book that basically was ‘The Age of McCain,’ I have a feeling that a lot more of these publications would be saying that the person should not be doing it,” said Giuliani. “Now it might be totally unfair to do that. Just as I think it’s totally unfair to do this. But it’s just one more indication of how there is a double-standard in the way this campaign is treated.”

“But on the basic question,” he continued, ‘Should Gwen Ifill do the debate?’ Yes, she should. But the question, ‘If you put the shoe on the other foot what kind of outcry would there be?’” — Read More Here.

Ms. Ifill is black, and is the managing editor of PBS’s Washington Week, and the senior correspondent for NewsHour with Jim Lehrer (Jim moderated the first Obama-McCain Debate)

O’Wino and O’Hannity — the two resident NAZI “Piss-Throwers” at Fox News also attacked Gwen, claiming that she will not be impartial — because she has written a book entitled The Breakthrough: Politics and Race in the Age of Obama, set to be released on Inauguration Day.

I don’t think Gwen is about to loose her impeccable journalistic integrity over a hopless case like Sarah Palin.

Shut Up O’Reilly!, …..I have never witnessed Ms. Ifill “FIX” news they way you do on a daily basis. She is exactly what you are not — a faultless and honorable newscaster with an un-impeachable character.

References:

1. The End of Reaganism – Harold Meyerson, Washington Post
2. The Ronald Reagan Home For The Criminally Insane

Writes: Earl Beal in Terre Haute, Indiana

In the power politics of international relations, superpower behavior is governed by the concept of geopolitical spheres of influence. When a superpower nation meddles in the internal affairs of another and attempts to exert undue political or economic influence in its perceived sphere, that’s when trouble starts.

The trouble started when President Bush pressured Poland and the Czech Republic to establish a missile-defense system in their territories. This policy was then, and continues to be, seen by some as a direct threat to Russia, not to mention Bush’s push for democratic reforms in former Soviet Republics still considered vital to Russia’s national security interests.

Also, if Russia placed ballistic missiles in Cuba and/or Venezuela, this would constitute a direct threat to the U.S. Washington’s hue and cry over such a move would be surpassed only by Bush’s hypocrisy when he and his Pentagon took the "dramatic," "brutal" and "disproportionate" measure of invading a sovereign Iraq in 2003.

As a result, what do we have?

• The hemorrhaging of our national treasure in terms of lives lost.

• Thousands of courageous people wounded.

• A cost of more than $10 billion a month to finance this fiasco.

• 5 million Iraqi refugees scattered and without homes.

…..and today secretary Rice ushered in the new COLD WAR:

References:

1. The Cuban Missile Crisis — was a confrontation between the United States, the Soviet Union, and Cuba during the Cold War. In Russia, it is termed the “Caribbean Crisis,” (Russian: Karibskiy krizis) while in Cuba it is called the “October Crisis.” The crisis ranks with the Berlin Blockade as one of the major confrontations of the Cold War, and is often regarded as the moment in which the Cold War came closest to a nuclear war….[ MORE >> ]

2. Abkhazia, Ossetia, Georgia, Russia, Europe, USA, Turkey, and the Yet Untold Truth — Russia may certainly have ceaselessly tried to oppose NATO’s expansion up to the Russian borders, but this does not imply that the West has to take this Russian policy into consideration. However, the Western inconsistent and biased stance, interpreted as grave threat by Russia, only damages the chances of the West to diffuse the Western values, ideas and principles among the numerous oppressed peoples who form a sizeable — and traumatized — minority in Russia, being however the local majority either on small (like the Abkhazians) or vast (like the Yakutians) territory. …[ MORE >> ]