I am not a psychiatrist, but it seems to me that Bush is exhibiting a lot of strange behavior lately. He seems out of it, distant, and unable to cope with the reality of what Iraq has become like. At what point do we need to ask if this guy is in fact, loony toons crazy. Do we literally have a madman in charge at the White House.
Symptoms:
- We have his refusal to accept reality. He insists that he is always right, that there is no possibility that he would ever be wrong. He stubbornly and consistently refuses to accept the truth.
- When people tell him the truth he reacts vengefully, he is unable to cope with their assertions and locks them out, often taking their truth telling as a sign of disloyalty. He then seeks revenge on them, and works to destroy them professionally.
- He believes he was given the Presidency by God.
- He has a constant need to seek approval from others and also to dominate them.
- He has a general lack of insight and often seems confused by simple concepts.
- Alcoholism and drug drug use.
What might be wrong with him. I am not sure, but he seems like a real screwball. If I had to say what was wrong with him, my money would be on some kind of mild bipolar disorder that has been left untreated and that over time led to some psychotic tendencies. This would explain his need to disappear and go on long vacations as he was in a depressive phase, and his manic behavior in front of the press. It would also explain some of his psychotic behavior, as an outgrowth of untreated problems. It would explain his alcohol and drug use. If he was psychotic, it would explain his failure to grasp what he is being told. His goals and objectives seems messianic and unrealistic, again, symptoms of a possible psychosis. He seems to be filled with paranoia and fear.
Bush has also surrounded himself with people who will prop him up and use his incapacity as an opportunity to take what they can from the government. We have lobbyists running amok, we have political appointees doing blatantly corrupt acts. Bush seems unable to reign them in and seems unaware of the malfeasance that is going on. These people may be feeding his disease.
There is a simple test to see if Bush is indeed loony toons crazy. We ought to ask if he has had any medication, or if Bush has had a psychological examination or hospitalization at any time in his life.
Here are a few classifications that might account for Bush's behavior.
Bipolar Disorder, Anxiety Disorder, Delusional, Paranoia
Here is what I think most accurately describes Bush:
Thought Disorder
In psychiatry, thought disorder or formal thought disorder is a term used to describe a pattern of disordered language use that is presumed to reflect disordered thinking. It is usually considered a symptom of psychotic mental illness although occasionally appears in other conditions. It is also known as knight's move thinking referring to the nonlinear way a knight moves in chess.
It describes a persistent underlying disturbance to conscious thought and is classified largely by its effects on speech and writing. Affected persons may show pressure of speech (speaking incessantly and quickly), derailment or flight of ideas (switching topic mid-sentence or inappropriately), thought blocking, rhyming, punning, or 'word salad' when individual words may be intact but speech is incoherent.
Eugen Bleuler, who named schizophrenia, held that its defining characteristic was a disorder of the thinking process.[1] It is important to note however that the delusions and hallucinations of psychosis could also be considered as disorders of thought, but that the term formal thought disorder applies specifically to the presumed disruption in the flow of conscious verbal thought that is inferred from spoken language. This is typically what is referred to when the strictly less accurate, more commonly used but abbreviated term, 'thought disorder', is used.
***Update***
We need to add Narcissistic Personality Disorder, after hearing the symptoms it makes perfect sense. Paul Minot has a great post on this, as a psychiatrist he ought to know. Thanks for the heads up.