Psyche, Science, and Society

Self-deception at the top: Sex predator Bush choice for heading Operation Predator to expose sex predators

April 5th, 2006

Word comes that the top Department of Homeland Security official, Brian Doyle, who was arrested recently for molesting a 16-year old girl in a mall was himself former head of DHS Operation Predator, allegedly aimed at catching sexual molesters. Aside from the fact that the Bush administration always picks the best for its administrative positions, this revelation makes one wonder why Doyle would take the assignment. Is it a flirting with danger, a desire to see if he can get away with it? As a psychoanalyst, one might speculate that such flirting is unconsciously also a desire to be caught and punished. Or is it an attempt at self-control involving a disowning of that part of him that molests? By catching and punishing the “perverts” he’s attempting to prove that he’s really not one of them.

Whatever the explanation, the Bush administration should be a boon to psychoanalysis. It is hard to believe that many of their actions do not involve unconscious motivations. A few examples:

• A draft dodger starting war and then showing his manliness by shooting disoriented cage-bred birds and a fellow hunter.
• Someone who stole two elections declaiming the promotion of “democracy” as the center-piece of his foreign policy.
• A Secretary of State of a country which occupies another country with approximately 150,000 troops telling the occupied country’s neighbor that foreign interference will not be allowed in the occupied county’s affairs.
• A senior White House official being repeatedly caught stealing from the local Target.

Psychoanalysis is about the endless capacity for human self-deception. The Bush administration cannot be comprehended without understanding that capacity.

Entry Filed under: Politics, Psychoanalysis