When world leaders turn out to be psychopaths or sociopaths.

For your consideration, I offer Netanyahu.

Sometimes the best place to start an essay is with the relevant definitions.

• Psychopath: A person suffering from a chronic mental disorder with abnormal or violent social behavior, reduced empathy, and reduced inhibition.
• Sociopath: A person with a personality disorder manifesting itself in extreme antisocial attitudes and behaviors.
• Borderline personality disorder: A serious mental illness marked by unstable moods, behaviors and relationships.
• Narcissism: Excessive interest in or admiration of oneself and one’s appearance, extreme selfishness, with a grandiose view of one’s own talent and a craving for admiration.

World leaders are no more immune from these conditions than anyone else. It can be argued that the nature of politics attracts those with at least mild manifestations of one or more of these personality disorders. Therefore, it should not come as a surprise that if one is afflicted with one or more of these personality disorders, but to a moderate or severe degree, politics offers the perfect hiding place, assuming one has the wherewithal to fit it. Some have this ability, for example George Bush and Dick Cheney; while others do not, Muammar Gaddafi. 

Variation of these personality disorders have turned up repeatedly throughout history. We’ve seen them in world, regional, national and local leaders and policy makers. In most cases, the resulting mixture of authority, power and misguided mind produce devastating social effects. Charles Taylor, Ho Chi Minh, Benito Mussolini, Ante Pavelic, Yahya Khan, Idi Amin, Josip Tito, Saddam Hussein, Kim Il Sung, Adolf Hitler, Josef Stalin, Augusto Pinochet, and Mao Ze Dong; these names are deeply etched into history and are powerful examples of the human cost of dysfunctional minds completely out of control.

Consider the example of Saddam Hussein. For a period of time he had mastered his disguise to the point that he could blend in among other national leaders. He was a US alley for many years, and his unstable side was able to hide in plain sight. He was able to hide to the point that the US supplied him with considerable support and weapons. Later, these same weapons would be turned on the citizens of Iraq in one of his many psychotic outburst that lead directly to the deaths of 10s of thousands of people.

Netanyahu’s speech to the US congress on the 3^rd of March, 2015, as well as his earlier speeches at the UN in 2012 and to the US congress in 2003, as well as an amazing assortment of TV interviews make it very clear that, while not currently suitable for the list of names above, Netanyahu is nonetheless afflicted with a potent mixture of the personality disorders previously described. A mixture, which if unchecked, as with Saddam Hussein, could lead to a catastrophe. For the moment, it appears that he is functional enough to hide within the heard of those only mildly affected. His function side was revealed as he received 50 ovations in his recent speech to the US Congress. Although his ability to hide depends in large measure, on a willingness to look the other way and ignore his glaring personality defects. 

It is also worth noting that while Hussein did not have access to weapons of mass destruction, Netanyahu does.

While you might think the Netanyahu is the subject of this essay, it turns out he is not. The subject of the essay is the US Congress; and the question I seek to answer is, “why were the stewards of Capital Hill jumping up and down, like puppets on strings, applauding everything Netanyahu?” Please excuse my vulgar side note, but Netanyahu could have tipped himself slightly to the right and farted and gotten a rousing standing ovation, which would have made 51 ovations in all.

One possible explanation is that the collective political elite of Washington do not believe as I do when it comes to the shaky ground of Netanyahu’s mental status. I am willing to concede that this is probably true for at least a few. There are those who buy into Netanyahu’s narrative of the Middle East, however, I don’t think it represents more than a small fraction of those that attended his speech. Of the 500 plus that filled the chamber, I am convinced the vast majority did not, for one second, fail to recognize that the venom and hate they were applauding was coming from the mind of a borderline psychotic. So why did they applaud – again, and again and again?

They were encouraging and empowering Netanyahu because they too are afflicted. They were there offering their support because their careers, their prestige, their power, and their futures were tied to the money that Netanyahu represented. They were there because they are narcissists. Instead of turning their back on this increasingly dysfunctional world leader, they stood and applauded as he spelled out his plan to keep the Middle East and America in a state of war for the foreseeable future. The number of potential deaths and the degree of human suffering never came up, because, as a psychotic and sociopath those things are not important and therefore, are rarely mentioned, unless it is politically expedient.

I contend, that what we saw, which include democrats and republicans, was little different than the German parliament listening to their psychotic leader as he outlined his plans to cleanse the Europe of the Roma, Slavs and homosexuals. The Jews were an afterthought.

Were those parliamentarians complicit in the horrors that followed, of course they were. If Netanyahu interprets his rousing speech as congressional permission to lose the tenuous bonds that tether him to reality, and launches a preemptive strike, nuclear or otherwise, against Iran, will the members of Congress that danced and applauded like puppets be complicit? Of course! 

Will they care? Of course not! 

The line between madness and sanity is very fine, and historically it is crossed easily and it is often crossed before anyone realizes what has happened. Do not lose sight of the fact that many, many American cheered and applauded as Hitler started his conquest of Europe. By the time people realized that the line between a charismatic, strong leader and a madman had been crossed, the damage was already done.