Posted on 04/27/2012 6:57:39 AM PDT by EternalVigilance
April 27, 2012
I deal on a regular daily basis with self-identified conservatives all across America who are addicted to the Republican Party. And when it comes to the impending nomination by their party of the most liberal governor in U.S. history, Mitt Romney, their reactions are overwhelmingly in line with the classic symptoms described below. We can't make them face reality, of course. All we can do is to keep pointing it out to them, in the sincere hope that they will recover in time to help save the country.
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From Wikipedia :
Denial (also called abnegation) is a defense mechanism postulated by Sigmund Freud, in which a person is faced with a fact that is too uncomfortable to accept and rejects it instead, insisting that it is not true despite what may be overwhelming evidence. The subject may use:
The concept of denial is particularly important to the study of addiction. The theory of denial was first researched seriously by Anna Freud. She classified denial as a mechanism of the immature mind, because it conflicts with the ability to learn from and cope with reality. Where denial occurs in mature minds, it is most often associated with death, dying and rape.
In this form of denial, someone avoids a fact by lying. This lying can take the form of an outright falsehood (commission), leaving out certain details to tailor a story (omission), or by falsely agreeing to something (assent, also referred to as "yessing" behavior). Someone who is in denial of fact is typically using lies to avoid facts they think may be painful to themselves or others.
This form of denial involves avoiding personal responsibility by:
Someone using denial of responsibility is usually attempting to avoid potential harm or pain by shifting attention away from themselves.
For example: Troy breaks up with his girlfriend because he is unable to control his anger, and then blames her for everything that ever happened.
Denial of impact involves a person's avoiding thinking about or understanding the harms of his or her behavior has caused to self or others, i.e. denial of the consequences. Doing this enables that person to avoid feeling a sense of guilt and it can prevent him or her from developing remorse or empathy for others. Denial of impact reduces or eliminates a sense of pain or harm from poor decisions.
This type of denial is best discussed by looking at the concept of state dependent learning. People using this type of denial will avoid pain and harm by stating they were in a different state of awareness (such as alcohol or drug intoxication or on occasion mental health related). This type of denial often overlaps with denial of responsibility.
Many who use this type of denial will say things such as, "it just happened". Denial of cycle is where a person avoids looking at their decisions leading up to an event or does not consider their pattern of decision making and how harmful behavior is repeated. The pain and harm being avoided by this type of denial is more of the effort needed to change the focus from a singular event to looking at preceding events. It can also serve as a way to blame or justify behavior (see above).
This can be a difficult concept for many people to identify with in themselves, but is a major barrier to changing hurtful behaviors. Denial of denial involves thoughts, actions and behaviors which bolster confidence that nothing needs to be changed in one's personal behavior. This form of denial typically overlaps with all of the other forms of denial, but involves more self-delusion. Denial at this level can have significant consequences both personally and at a societal level.
Harassment covers a wide range of offensive behaviour. It is commonly understood as behaviour intended to disturb or upset. In the legal sense, it is behaviour which is found threatening or disturbing.
DARVO is an acronym to describe a common strategy of abusers: Deny the abuse, then Attack the victim for attempting to make them accountable for their offense, thereby Reversing Victim and Offender.
Psychologist Jennifer Freyd writes:
...I have observed that actual abusers threaten, bully and make a nightmare for anyone who holds them accountable or asks them to change their abusive behavior. This attack, intended to chill and terrify, typically includes threats of law suits, overt and covert attacks on the whistle-blower's credibility, and so on. The attack will often take the form of focusing on ridiculing the person who attempts to hold the offender accountable. [...] [T]he offender rapidly creates the impression that the abuser is the wronged one, while the victim or concerned observer is the offender. Figure and ground are completely reversed. [...] The offender is on the offense and the person attempting to hold the offender accountable is put on the defense.
Who voted for this putz? If the “conservative” vote is rigged to this extent all over the country - or worse: that “conservatives” would actually vote in such a liberal - we’re finished.
(1) You seem to overlook the shenanigans of Obamination in appointing czars, issuing Exec Orders left and right and basically ignoring BOTH the Constitution AND Congress.
(2) If re-elected, He will screw the US Supreme Court for the rest of our lives and most of our kids’ lives, issue Allah only knows what new pile of exec orders, continue to trash the fabric of this once great nation, etc, etc, etc.
(3) What SIGNIFICANT action have you seen from ANY of the last round of tea party supported bozos that got elected, other than the occasional NO vote on some stupid piece of legislation. The utter and absolute corruption so rampant in DC quite simply infects EVERYONE who is part of that monstrosity called the US Federal Government. With recognition of Edmund Burke’s prophetic principal about the relationship of power and corruption, may I reword it to fit what we have seen in these latter days of the USA:
Power corrupts and ANY SIGNIFICANT amount of power will begin the corruption process, usually not reversible, of most people today beyond any hope of reversal or redemption.
(Just review in your own mind for a few moments, the behavior of any member of the “public service” sector, from local and county through state and up to federal “service”, and count up any SIGNIFICANT players who have NOT been corrupted.)
(4) The ONLY thing of ANY significance about the ‘12 election is to defeat OB or, better yet get him declared ineligible before the election.
(5) And, BTW, OB has set such a horrendous pile of steaming precedents, that I seriously doubt ANY future POTUS will be morally clean enough to resist taking advantage of them, with the possible exception of Sarah Palin.
JMHO
Please riddle me this, cowboy:
Who is more liberal? Mitt Romney or Deval Patrick?
>>Realville. Welcome.<<
I don’t like it in Realville.
I’m in MI so my primary is over. I think I’ll go onto Pinterest.
Part of me wishes I could be in denial at times. Being a cynic isn't always fun. But then I have to admit, I do enjoying spotting the flaws in my and others positions.
Good question. Must be folks who decide what to do based on what they see and hear on television.
May I quote you?
That’s what I’ve been trying to say but couldn’t find the words.
No third-party Presidential candidate has shown the power needed to win the Electoral College vote. Also, my State doesn't allow voting for write-in candidates.
My concern is a simple one: the President of the United States is first and foremost an executive, who is supposed to administrate the laws passed by Congress as interpreted by the Courts. The problem is our existing Chief Executive doesn't like that -- forgetting he is no longer a Senator -- and tries to write regulations (with the force of law) more to his liking. I didn't like that with Bush, and I like it even less with Obama. Yes, the President has veto power over law, a veto that can be overridden by Congress. I don't know how Congress can provide checks and balance against Executive Orders -- I don't see that in the Constitution.
So for me, it's rock-and-hard-place time.
Obama has been President for three years, yet I've not seen any original written articles or work product from him from before he was President. (What work product? Nothing significant from the Illinois legislature, and damn little from his stint in the U.S Senate. And nothing from his college days.) He remains a cipher.
I've not yet started a publications search on Mitt, so I don't know if he is as secretive -- but there is his record as Governor, which means there will be work product to read and analyze.
I prefer facts to crickets, which means that, absent a document dump from Obama, my "choice" is clear.
I just want some assurance that we aren't jumping from the frying pan into the fire...
Anyone that thinks Romney is a conservative isn’t one either.
I will say this: I thought I was pro-life until I saw your posts. You made a fundamental shift in my belief on this vital issue and for that I thank you.
I also trust you are who you say you are.
You are looking through such a narrowed field of vision -- narrowed by pure fear and panic -- that you are only thinking of this election in terms of Obama, nothing else. As would be true in any field, restricting your perception to such a tiny context makes you vulnterable to BIG miscalculations.
We’re not in denial so much as we are realists... Elections have always been about selecting the lesser of two evils...I’ll take my chances on the new guy.
And those of us who have done our due diligence in checking Romney's documented record are also realists in that we recognize that he is fully as evil, intentional or not, as Obama on EVERY MAJOR ISSUE: Global warming, nationalized health care, abortion, activist judges, and the homosexual agenda. You pretend that there is a "lesser evil" in the equation; we TRUE realists understand the fallacy of such thinking in the case of Romney.
And those of you that “see the light” and decide that Romney is just not your guy, can vote for whom?
If it is O vs R in the general, I will be remembering, as should you, what happened to Clinton when he won with a wimpy plurality of 43% -- a full 57% of Americans had voted against him, and it weakened him politically so much that in the mid terms, he got his ass whooped by the Republican Revolution. I am mindful -- and you should be, too -- that when the final tally reveals that the majority of Americans voted against the victor, it hurts the victor politically, makes him weak, and empowers his opposition both in his own party and in the other party.
THEREFORE, I will vote third party for the express purpose of using my vote to make sure whichever disgusting socialist statist wins, Obama or Romney, has the slimmest, most devastating plurality possible. At this point, the thing that would give us the BEST chance of salvaging American freedom would be for Obama to win on a 34% plurality, with 66% of American voters on record as voting against him; it would mean that conservatives won a major battle in recovering the Republican party, it would mean Congress would go hard right in the mid-terms, and it would mean Obama's agenda would be very nearly dead in the water.
You've restricted your thinking to worst-case Obama scenarios. Fine -- now switch gears and start thinking AS A REALIST about what would really happen if, God forbid, Romney won. First, however, you have to acknowledge his documented record.
Romney would be MUCH more damaging to conservatism, and therefore to America, than Obama. I'm voting third party to influence the plurality, but I'll be praying Romney loses. Romney is BAD NEWS for everybody.
Yeah, well, I understand. I’m also no fan of Freud. But the facts about the process we call “denial” are pretty hard to deny.
I know mitt romney... I know exactly what he is... I know exactly who he is and what it is that he believes... and all of this together is why I will NEVER VOTE FOR THAT POS!
LLS
>>Romney would be MUCH more damaging to conservatism, and therefore to America, than Obama<<
Oh bull.
Without an American System of Government, there ARE NO conservatives.
Unless your idea of Conservatism is Sharia. Because that’s where we are headed under Obama.
>>And those of us who have done our due diligence in checking Romney’s documented record are also realists in that we recognize that he is fully as evil, intentional or not, as Obama on EVERY MAJOR ISSUE: <<
Can you please point out which communists Mitt appointed to his cabinet? How many radical Islamics he put into positions of advising law enforcement?
Any Van Jones or Mohamed Elibiary types in the government of MA?
It’s either vote for a hardcore Leftist or for a hardcore Leftist and both will continue to take us up the river of collectivism.
Think I’ll write in Sarah.
EV, those are all good questions at #33, and since you’ve been doing this for some time now, you really should have a page up that lists all of that information.
It’s really hard to take your efforts seriously when that information isn’t already available.
What date certain do you expect page(s) up to give all your background data and information that relevant to any candidate running for office.
There really isn’t such a thing as an anonymous run for the presidency.
Congratulations.
Let’s cut through all the chit.
Romney is a gun-grabbing, baby-killing, big government statist, liberal fellow-traveler, and so is anyone who supports him and urges others to support him.
There it is, like it or not.
If you’re looking for the usual credentials, I’m not your guy.
Bearing in mind that it is the folks with the usual credentials who have gotten us in the mess we’re in.
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