It’s Miller Time!

Panicked VRWC pulls out the stops

by Bryan Zepp Jamieson
06/08/04
http://www.zeppscommentaries.com/VRWC/miller.htm

“It looks as if Al Gore has gone off his lithium again.”

Charles Krauthammer, a former psychiatrist who apparently abandoned his professional ethics when he abandoned his practice, said that about Al Gore in the wake of Al Gore’s sensational speech at Moveon.org in which he called for the resignation of Rumsfeld and Rice.

Dennis Miller, a former comedian turned partisan failure, said, “At one point I respected Al Gore, but I think he's lost his mind. ... I think he's gone daft because he's a sad little man now.” If you believe Miller had respect for Gore – or any of his betters – I have some Florida voting rolls I want to sell you.

These days, Krauthammer is a journalist for the Washington Post and a frequent contributor to Faux news, which is a polite way of saying he never replaced those professional ethics he dropped when he switched careers.

He’s a part of the trash right, and right now, the trash right is very unhappy with Al Gore. 

Mark R. Levin, who is one of the inhabitants of Richard Scaife’s stable of right wing whore lawyers, said, “And half the country thinks he's [Al Gore is] a mental patient. ... They think he should go back to the dayroom he came out of.”

John Podhoretz wrote, “It is now clear that Al Gore is insane.” 

I didn’t have to do much research for this selection of quotes. These, and dozens of others from the trash right, can be found at David Brock’s Media Matters, a website devoted to real-time debunking of right wing bullshit. 

Brock, of course, is no stranger to the concerted smear campaigns of the far right. He’s been both perpetrator of such smears (he wrote the book which called Anita Hill “a little bit nutty and a little bit slutty”) and the recipient (his first taste came when he wrote a novel about Hillary Clinton that was actually fair and reasonable, which caused outraged howls from the loony right, and then when he abandoned them outright. He decried the right’s hypocrisy, dishonesty, and viciousness, and they reacted with hypocrisy, dishonesty, and viciousness). He knows that they are Stalinesque in their drive to destroy anyone who dissents, let alone who publicly disagrees with their most basic tenets. Regnery Press, whore publisher to the trash right, doesn’t list Brock’s two best sellers (and Regnery’s biggest two best sellers at that!) although they can’t claim lack of topicality (granted, nobody cares who Paula Jones was now). Regnery authors take the phrase “circle jerk” and give it a pseudo-scholastic meaning since all their footnotes refer to books written by other Regnery authors, including, of course, Brock. Brock’s books are no less topical than all the other books listed that are nothing more than no-talent rehashes of his own work.

So he knows what to watch for on the right, and where to look to see where the slime is oozing out. I predict that Media Matters is going to be an enormous thorn in the side of the right.

His article named the following other members of the right who all questioned Gore’s sanity: Joe Scarborough (he of the mysteriously dead secretary found in his office), Michael Savage (still trying to live down the fact that his real name is Michael Weiner), David Frum, Barbara Comstock, James Taranto (part of the Wall Street Journal’s editorial staff of rich white trash), Oliver North (still out of jail on a technicality), Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh (who admittedly knows quite a bit about losing one’s mind), and last but not least, Henry Miller.

Doctor Henry Miller wrote: “John [Podhoretz] is not a physician, but he's half right. Al Gore appears to suffer from Narcissistic Personality Disorder, which is not treatable with medications. Consider the diagnostic criteria for this malady: ‘A pervasive pattern of grandiosity (in fantasy or behavior), need for admiration, and lack of empathy, beginning by early adulthood and present in a variety of contexts,’ as indicated by the following: ‘a grandiose sense of self-importance (e.g., exaggerates achievements and talents, expects to be recognized as superior without commensurate achievements).’ Gore demonstrated his grandiosity repeatedly. Who can forget his notorious claim that he had been responsible for creating the Internet?”

Who, you ask, the hell is Henry Miller? Besides a liar and a fool, that is?

Turns out he’s part of the Hoover Institute. Back in the day, it used to be a fairly prestigious think-tank for libertarian thought, advocating small and unobtrusive government. Now, of course, under the weight of funding from right wing whack jobs like Scaife and Moon, it is a swamp of right wing neo-cons, corporate hacks pretending to be environmental specialists, reactionaries pretending to be revolutionaries, and the usual collection of hacks and stiffs who couldn’t get work in honest jobs. One of the leading lights of the Insitution is Newt Gingrich. Need I say more?

According to the Cee Vee on him at the Hoover website, Miller specializes in biotechnology, genetic engineering, bioterrorism, government regulation of science and technology, especially pharmaceutical development and biotechnology; and regulatory reform.

In other words, he’s a corporate hack who wants to mazimize profits for the pharmaceutical companies at the expense of both government and the people it represents.

If you are wondering where it mentions psychiatry or psychology, it doesn’t. Miller is a physician, but not in the field of sociopathic disorders. 

Narcissistic Personality Disorder is quite real, of course. 

You might ask yourself if the syndrome described could possibly fit with a man who served in Vietnam, and then served eight years in the House, eight in the Senate, and eight as Vice President. Gore is widely regarded as one of the most effective vice presidents in US history. Narcissists rarely make good Number Two men. 

You can also find in the APA literature mention of doctors who psychoanalyze people they haven’t even met, or who do so publically and for obvious political and partisan reasons.

The APA is polite about it, and simply says they are outside the guidelines set for professional standards. But we don’t need to be polite. Doctors who pull that type of crap are whore doctors, and Miller is a fool to have done what he did.

Liar? Take Miller’s statement, “Who can forget his [Gore’s] notorious claim that he had been responsible for creating the Internet?” Gore never claimed to have created the internet, so Miller is either lying when he claims Gore said so, or he is lying when he says it is notorious.

But Doctor Henry I. Miller, M.S., M.D. is a fairly typical example of the sort who infest the right these days. Dishonest, ethically bankrupt, and willing to say or do anything, no matter how shabby, for the cause. 

And right now, the far right, in its quivering, cowardly outrage, has decided that rather than fight a losing battle over what Gore actually said in his speech, they must try to destroy the man with these pitiful, vicious tactics.

Still, there is room for hope. People like this are essentially weak and stupid, and given time, will eventually self-destruct and lose.

The trick is to make sure they don’t take America, and the rest of us, with them.