"Going Rogue": Sarah Palin is "thankful for the opportunity to write the truth" / Plus: A little lesson in psychology - UPDATE: Andrew Sullivan

Sarah Palin has gone on the great roguish trainwreck tour across the USA, and despite of the fact that she has become a laughing stock, her supporters are enthusiastic. Having just written the greatest book of lies in living history, Sarah Palin apparently misses the irony when she says that she is "thankful for the opportunity to write the truth." MSNBC reports:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Then I saw that Stephen Colbert had this moment of brilliance and I would like to share it with you:

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
The Word - Grand Old Pity Party
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor U.S. Speedskating

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But that's not all. In order to properly understand Sarah Palin, we have to look a bit deeper into the science of psychology.

There's a definition:

Narcissistic Personality Disorder > 5 of following criteria

1. Requires excessive admiration
2. Grandiose sense of self-importance; believes self to be superior
3. Preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance
4. Believes that he/she is special and should have only the best
5. Has sense of entitlement, ie deserves special favors or treatment
6. Exploits interpersonal relations, ie takes advantage of others
7. Lacks empathy and concern for others
8. Is envious of others or believes them to be envious of him/her
9. Displays arrogance

Modified from *Diagnostic & Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4th ed, Am Psychiatric Asso, 1994

I have to admit that I had never looked closely into this before. But now I understand what's going on here. It's crystal clear, and I wonder why this hasn't been discussed in more detail in the media regarding Sarah Palin.

"Psychology Today" explains:

"Deep desire to be at the center of things is served by extreme self-confidence, a combination that makes narcissists attractive and even charming. Buoyed by a coterie of admiring friends and associates—protected by the armor of positive self-regard—someone with a mild-to-moderate case of narcissism can float through life feeling pretty good about himself. Since they feel entitled to special treatment, they are easily offended, and readily harbor grudges. Yet narcissists are often very popular—at least in the short term.

The beauty of being a narcissist is that even when disaster stares you in the face, you feel neither doubt nor remorse. In a study, researchers asked a pair of participants to undertake a task that was rigged to fail. Most people tend to protect their partner, sharing either the credit or the blame. "But the narcissists would say, 'It's totally the other person's fault.' They're completely willing to step on someone," says narcissism researcher Keith Campbell, associate professor of social psychology at the University of Georgia.

(...)

Don't cross him. Entirely dependent on others' opinions, a narcissist can act like a cornered animal if he or she feels threatened. Research shows that narcissists become aggressive when they feel an ego threat—confronted with proof that they aren't special—or feel they aren't getting enough respect. In the lab, they are willing to punish other experimental subjects with a noise blast when they think they've been put down. If you have to tell a narcissist he isn't doing a good job, do it gently—and be prepared.

(...)

Unfortunately, anyone can be seduced by a narcissist. One misconception is that only those with low self-esteem date someone who's so self-centered, but people with normal self-respect can also end up involved with a narcissist. They have decisive, take-charge personalities in a society that shuns wishy-washiness."

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At least Andrew Sullivan get's it:

"Watching someone this delusional and this uninformed and this narcissistic strut around the world stage telling empirical untruth after untruth is a car wreck worth rubber-necking. The book is so weird, and its fiction so bad, and its facts so non-checked, you'd have to have every single journalistic bone in your body removed to be indifferent to it."

Please don't miss Andrew Sullivan's current extensive coverage about Sarah Palin on the "Daily Dish".

He just reported how Sarah Palin uses Trig on the tour shamelessly as a prop.

UPDATE on Andrew Sullivan:

Andrew Sullivan has written a long article about his attempt to make sense of Palin's book. He tries to take her book seriously and struggles. I can understand him and I think that he gives a very sharp analysis.

Excerpt:

In this, the book is emblematic of late degenerate Republicanism, which is based not on actual policies, but on slogans now so exhausted by over-use they retain no real meaning: free enterprise is great, God loves us all, America is fabulous, foreigners are suspect, we need to be tough, we can't dither, we must always cut taxes, government is bad, liberals are socialists, the media hates you, etc etc.

I tried to write a fair account of Palin's various stories of her incredible fifth pregnancy, labor and delivery and to reconcile all the various facts we know and the various versions of the story she has told. Just for the record and because we have aired the public record on this before. I honestly however cannot make total sense of them in a way that I'm completely convinced by and so simply do not feel comfortable making any judgment on them in any way at this point. That's fair to her, my readers, my colleagues, and the innocent private people caught up in this circus.

I thought there might be some new facts in here that would illuminate my confusion and dispel the whole thing.

There is, rather, more barely-credible myth-making and descriptions of actions taken that really make no sense even on their own terms. But since we now know that Palin tells odd lies all the time even when she doesn't have to, we cannot hold her to common sense readings. The story she tells is largely incredible if you assume a rational actor at the center of it. But we do not have a rational actor in the center of it; we have an unbalanced, delusional, ambitious fanatic whose relationship to reality is entirely instrumental and can change from minute to minute. And so we cannot even say: that doesn't make sense so it probably isn't true. With Palin, anything is possible her world is so imaginary and magical. Much that makes sense with others may not make sense with her. And without external evidence, how can we tell which is which?

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UPDATE:

Can somebody PLEASE show this clip of John Oliver from the Daily Show to Sarah Palin?

I sooo hope that she gets to see that.

"I would rather jump into a vulcano than read this book." (little unknown kid from New York, 10x cleverer already than Sarah Palin)

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Excitement Over Sarah Palin's Book Release
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Crisis

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On Hannity, Sarah Palin mixes up Iran and Iraq, and Sean Hannity (who recently wrote the foreword to the book of the lying pornographer Carrie Prejean) doesn't even correct her!

I just hope that there is no parallel universe in which Sarah Palin became Vice-President, because their nuclear bombs might hit us, you never know. She might feel threatened by planet earth.





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