Diagnosing Sarah Barracuda; Borderline? Bipolar?

[DogPoundPup]

by Rob Kall

I'd like to see the complete medical and psychiatric history of Sarah Palin, including medications taken. Could be interesting.I'm particularly interested in her psychiatric background. You have to ask, what diagnosis would you give to a student nicknamed, "Sarah Barracuda."

There are at least four or five possiblities. Or, she could be normal, vendettas, aerial hunting, book banning and all-- just another right wingnut. But let's look at some of these and se if they fit. At the end, please vote in the poll I've created to express your opinion of where she fits in.

Borderline personality;
Many psychologists refuse to work with Borderlines. These folks will be sweet and nice to get you to like them and then, they bite yhour head off and stab you in the back.
Wikipedia offers this profile:

is a psychiatric diagnosis, a diagnostic category in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (published by the American Psychiatric Association) that describes a long-term disturbance of personality function characterized by depth and variability of moods.<2> It is one of four related diagnoses classified as cluster B ("dramatic-erratic") personality disorders typified by disturbances in impulse control and emotional dysregulation, the others being narcissistic, histrionic, and antisocial personality disorders.

Excerpt...
something's going on with Sarah. I lean toward seeing her as borderline personality. She gets close to people then screws them. That's what she did with the mayor who brought her in to the Wasilla City council. That's what she did to the governor who gave her a plum job working for the state, before she ran against him.And her mean, shrill speeches show the kind of meanness that borderlines lapse into so easily.
Continue reading: http://www.opednews.com/articles/Diagnosing-Sarah-Barracuda-by-Rob-Kall-080915-106.html

[begin_within]

1. My guess would be narcisstic

[vaberella]

15. Can I get this on a shirt. It's the truth!! n/t

[begin_within]

18. which one? I can send you the full photoshop files

[vaberella]

21. The first one with *priceless*.

[begin_within]

25. OK, check your PM for a larger version.

[Bobbie Jo]

19. NPD...I concur with your diagnosis. nt

[backscatter712]

22. NPD++

[cliffordu]

23. Yep. Narcisstic

Dangerous as anything that walks.

[marshall]

27. Don't they all have Narcississitc Personality Disorder?

I thought it was a prerequisite.

[gateley]

2. Dumb Fuck. nt

[Phredicles]

30. Combine posts #1 & 2: Narcissistic Mo-ron;

that's my diagnosis.:P

[Writer]

3. Narcissistic Personality Disorder. n/t

[Barack_America]

16. If I were going to give a Frist diagnosis, that would definitely be it. nt

[madeline_con]

4. Maybe she's plain, old fashioned batshit crazy. n/t

[iiibbb]

17. Batshit crazy is my vote.

[vaberella]

5. Compulsive Liar with a healthy dose of unrestrained ID. n/t

[goodgd_yall]

6. Oh, puhleaze---this is an affront to true borderline and bipolar people

She's just your typical Republican fundie, that's all.

[Lilith Velkor]

7. Diagnosis: RW asshole.

No need to get all Frist about it and shit.

[melody]

8. Here's another vote for Narcissistic Personality Disorder n/t

[blue neen]

9. A lot of nice, reasonable, intelligent, talented people take psychiatric medications.

You are going down the wrong road, bud.

[jesus_of_suburbia]

13. I'd also say that many of the most intelligent people NEED meds. n/t

[jesus_of_suburbia]

10. She is just disturbing in my opinion. I can't understand the way she thinks. It's sad.

[saltpoint]

11. If the account with the Wasilla librarian is true, then at the very least

she's a bully.

When you shoot wolves from an airplane it really does seem to me that you are incapable of empathy.

Also she strikes me as not knowing what she does not know. Maybe part of it is willful ignorance but I think a lot of it is run-of-the-mill cluelessness.

Her adherence to her church and its extreme beliefs suggests a bias toward a delusional construct. She was raised in a Catholic household then later abandoned that tradition and grafted herself onto a pack of fire-belching apocalypse types.

She's a bully. She's unschooled and/or willfully ignorant. She does not exhibit empathy. And she's drawn to a delusional system where only some are rewarded with an afterlife and screw everybody else.

I don't know what that adds up to in the DSM-IV. But it sure sucks, whatever clinical label it goes to.

[chicagoexpat]

12. She's ALASKAN, that should have it's own section in the DSM-IV

John McCain Lie Counter Web Page

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=7075041&mesg_id=7075041

[Cleita]

14. I think she's just a garden variety sociopath. Nothing exotic.

She can gain popularity because she knows how to smooze people, but she has no interest in them or their feelings. When she needs to get something she wants she has no problem stabbing them in the back because she really has no concern or empathy for anyone. Angelina Jolie played a sociopath in the movie "Girl Interrupted".

[thewall77]

20. she's bicrazy

biliar, biwingnut, and all the bad bi's.

[ladjf]

24. She is neither bipolar or borderline.

But, neither is any where near being qualified for V.P. or President.

[EmeraldCityGrl]

26. Anyone see the movie "Burn After Reading?" Palin is so like the

Francis McDermand character. She's read the book "The Secret" one too many times.

[jberryhill]

28. Everyone is "great" until they are "disloyal"

I'll bet each of those colleges was wonderful, until they weren't.

I know this person.

[D23MIURG23]

29. Imbecile with a side of authoritarian personality.

Thats what you call someone who thinks the Earth is 6000 years old 'cause the bible says so.

[CampDem]

31. Oh, this is fun, personally I don't think she is borderline and here is why

An outstanding characteristic of borderlines are numerous and manipulative suicide attempts and gestures. They are not organically depressed, but at their core is a gaping hole emotionally and profound fear of abandonment. To be a real borderline her behavior would likely be so dramatic/erratic that there would have been police involvement during her meltdowns and multiple ER trips after suicide gestures. I would guess that many, many people would have observed her temper tantrums. These folks many times cannot hold a job at all unless they get treatment.

I do think that you are right about her having a personality disorder of the cluster B type. My guess is that she has Narcissistic Personality Disorder. These folks are usually higher functioning than borderlines.She smacks of someone with a huge sense of entitlement. She appears to be an experienced pathological liar and somewhat empathy impaired. She may possess an inability to stay truthful and admit shortcomings. Her longing for attention and fame and her strident ambition also would fit. Palin's ability to embrace so completely the exaggeration of her qualifications and accomplishments is remarkable to me. NPD folks can be very successful in politics and business because of their superficial charm. The way she has taken out all her rivals here in Alaska and her disregard for playing by the rules screams bully to me.

[Triana]

32. PSYCHOPATH. n/t

[FKA MNChimpH8R]

33. Narcissistic sociopath

Even easier to diagnose than the Chimp. And I have 30-plus years of therapists behind me. Add Dominionist/minnenialist religious psychopath to the mix. The most seriously deranged (and bone stupid) person proposed for major office in this country ever. Barking mad on any real psychologist's diagnostic chart. Should be permanently shipped to the place where the nuts hunt the squirrels and given enough Thorazine to never be able to move a muscle voluntarily again.

And I am as serious as a procto exam or a cancer biopsy.

[GoesTo11]

34. Nothing like bipolar. More like unethical, narcissistic and vindictive,

Although of these three, only narcissistic is classified as a disorder.

[H2O Man]

35. Borderline w/ histrionic features

[AllentownJake]

36. Diagnosing people from afar isn't good and just because we don't like someone's

political views doesn't mean they have a mental illness.

Mental illness doesn't cause bad political and religous views. Being a prick and stupid does. That can't be treated with medication.

[moriah]

37. Agreed, stupidity can't be treated with meds.

It's very interesting what happens when laymen (like me) get a bit too much psychiatric knowledge. I may have been studying to be a psychiatrist, but I'm not one. I may have set the curve in my undergrad Abnormal Psychology course, but I never spent the years I wanted to in a clinical position. I may have done psychiatric transcription, but that just means I'm good with the lingo.

A friend of mine did psych transcription with me, and he started trying to diagnose our friends as having personality disorders, etc.

Hint: Everyone has a few traits that are similar to personality disorders. It's when those traits overcome a person's ability to function in the real world, or as the DSM-IV puts it, "The enduring pattern leads to clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning."

Some people question whether personality disorders are truly even "mental illnesses". They are diagnosed on a different axis, so even psychiatry recognizes that they aren't the same as major depression, bipolar I or II, or schizophrenia.

Perhaps another truism like "stupidity can't be treated with meds" is "crazy doesn't mean ill". I think someone's crazy when they think that rape victims should be forced to bear the child of their rapist. But it doesn't mean she's ill.

She's just a right-winger. We may wish that we could give them meds and make them see the light, but unfortunately they haven't come up with the meds to fix right-wingerism.

[LeftishBrit]

38. None of the above I suspect - just a far-right extremist

Studies of suicide bombers and would-be suicide bombers have shown that most of these are quite sane by the usual psychiatric criteria. So I suspect is Palin. Being a religious and political extremist does not necessarily mean psychiatric illness - and there is no medicine to treat the former.