Getting Inside The Brain Of George Bush (Where Presumably There's Plenty Of Room)

Over on the Daily Beast, psychiatrist Justin Frank has an interesting take on the mind of W. A few choice excerpts:

George Bush’s presidency is the culmination of a lifelong history of sadistic practices that he must deny in order to maintain his fragile psychological equilibrium. Since childhood, Bush was labeled a bad child, a troublemaker, and a delinquent. He stuck firecrackers into frogs and exploded them; he shot and wounded his little brothers with a b-b gun; he branded fraternity pledges at Yale with red-hot coat hangers; he mocked others and was a verbal bully, irreverent about anything serious.

Bush is leaving office immensely satisfied with his presidential accomplishments: Not merely wreaking havoc worldwide – actively destroying Iraq, and passively turning his back on New Orleans – he became feared both abroad and at home, where Congress and the press have yet to muster the courage to confront him. Now, the financial devastation of his policies seems to be hurtling the globe ever faster towards an economic Judgment Day.

Evading responsibility has always been a central element of the pleasure he takes in the suffering of others, and his evasion has taken many forms, from colluding with questioners to let him off the hook, asking “Ken who?” when asked about Enron’s Ken Lay, to making light of his cruel deeds, casually dismissing the fraternity branding as nothing worse than a “cigarette burn,” or insisting that the United States does not torture when confronted by reporters about Abu Ghraib.

For Bush, the roots of his bad-boy sadism run deep. He was a ruthlessly-teased, learning-disabled little boy who was criticized by teachers for not being able to keep up in class. And he was left behind by an emotionally distant father who reinforced the message from his mother that it was pathetic for a seven-year-old to show grief about his sister’s death. All of these factors contributed to an unrelenting self-hatred that made him feel weak and ashamed, things he tried to deny by posing as superior, exploiting weakness in others and becoming a bully. This process of externalizing his damaged sense of self, which he then attacked, became so strong later in life that it could only be partly managed by daily exercise and prayer.