Always prepare to giggle when someone calls a conservative a "sociopath" and then says "I use that word very, very, very carefully."
On Thursday's edition of the Thom Hartmann show, the leftist radio host suggested Rep. Paul Ryan -- a runner-up in Time's Person of the Year considerations -- is a sociopath, just like Ted Bundy, but without the dead women. A caller was complaining that Sen. Ron Wyden stooped low enough to make Medicare plans with Ryan, and Hartman replied with his armchair diagnosis:
I am of the opinion that Paul Ryan is actually a sociopath, and I use that word very, very, very carefully. And sociopaths are people who are typically, you know – Smart sociopaths can be incredibly charming. Ted Bundy, who was a sociopath and a serial killer, his sociopathy came out as a murderer. Most sociopaths don't. Sociopaths are overrepresented, about five to one from the normal population, for example, as CEOs of corporations, and that's the kind of sociopath that I see Paul Ryan as.
Sociopaths think that everybody else in the world is just an object to be manipulated, and that they're the only people in the world who actually experience real emotions... and they can be very, very, very charming, and I think that Paul Ryan has charmed Ron Wyden into playing the role of useful idiot, and Ron Wyden is going to deeply regret that day.
On Friday's program, Hartmann's idea of an evil conservatives was "millionaire lobbyist" Grover Norquist. Hartmann said he was at a Media Matters “dinner party event thing and Grover Norquist was there,” and he shook his hand. But Grover is very opposed to the Constitution, Hartmann reported:
He’s got big money behind him....And he has succeeded in getting every Republican in the House and the Senate to sign a pledge that they will honor the millionaires in America before they will honor the Constitution.
Hartmann was upset that college students weren't getting enough federal aid, which is somehow in the Constitution he was reading, and Republicans want the poor to "die in the street" like a dog:
It’s the Herman Cain thing ‘Hey if you’re poor, blame yourself, and don’t expect the government to help.’ ‘Cause this is a society, increasingly, where the Republicans, and a few Democrats, but mostly the Republicans, are saying, 'Aaaaah, we don't give a damn about the poor! ‘Pull yourself up by your bootstraps.' 'Well, I don't have any bootstraps.' 'Well, then die in the street like a dog.' That was the message in the Republican debate.
He means the September 12 Republican debate on CNN, where Wolf Blitzer pressed Ron Paul about how much he wanted to cut government, if he wanted to cut off a comatose man who could not pay the hospital bill. He said no, but some audience member suggested yes. The audience seemed to cheer the idea that freedom means you don't always get your bills paid. But there was also applause when Paul said they never turned a victim away from the hospital.
