How Psychedelic Drugs Can Help Patients Face Death ~ New York Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/22/magazine/how-psychedelic-drugs-can-help-patients-face-death.html?src=me&ref=general

Photo illustration by Clang

By LAUREN SLATER

Published: April 20, 2012

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Pam Sakuda was 55 when she found out she was dying. Shortly after having a tumor removed from her colon, she heard the doctor’s dreaded words: Stage 4; metastatic. Sakuda was given 6 to 14 months to live. Determined to slow her disease’s insidious course, she ran several miles every day, even during her grueling treatment regimens. By nature upbeat, articulate and dignified, Sakuda — who died in November 2006, outlasting everyone’s expectations by living for four years — was alarmed when anxiety and depression came to claim her after she passed the 14-month mark, her days darkening as she grew closer to her biological demise. Norbert Litzinger, Sakuda’s husband, explained it this way: “When you pass your own death sentence by, you start to wonder: When? When? It got to the point where we couldn’t make even the most mundane plans, because we didn’t know if Pam would still be alive at that time — a concert, dinner with friends; would she still be here for that?” When came to claim the couple’s life completely, their anxiety building as they waited for the final day.

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As her fears intensified, Sakuda learned of a study being conducted by Charles Grob, a psychiatrist and researcher at Harbor-U.C.L.A. Medical Center who was administering psilocybin — an active component of magic mushrooms — to end-stage cancer patients to see if it could reduce their fear of death. Twenty-two months before she died, Sakuda became one of Grob’s 12 subjects. When the research was completed in 2008 — (and published in the Archives of General Psychiatry last year) — the results showed that administering psilocybin to terminally ill subjects could be done safely while reducing the subjects’ anxiety and depression about their impending deaths.

Grob’s interest in the power of psychedelics to mitigate mortality’s sting is not just the obsession of one lone researcher. Dr. John Halpern, head of the Laboratory for Integrative Psychiatry at McLean Hospital in Belmont Mass., a psychiatric training hospital for Harvard Medical School, used MDMA — also known as ecstasy — in an effort to ease end-of-life anxieties in two patients with Stage 4 cancer. And there are two ongoing studies using psilocybin with terminal patients, one at New York University’s medical school, led by Stephen Ross, and another at Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center, where Roland Griffiths has administered psilocybin to 22 cancer patients and is aiming for a sample size of 44. “This research is in its very early stages,” Grob told me earlier this month, “but we’re getting consistently good results.”

Grob and his colleagues are part of a resurgence of scientific interest in the healing power of psychedelics. Michael Mithoefer, for instance, has shown that MDMA is an effective treatment for severe P.T.S.D. Halpern has examined case studies of people with cluster headaches who took LSD and reported their symptoms greatly diminished. And psychedelics have been recently examined as treatment for alcoholism and other addictions.

Despite the promise of these investigations, Grob and other end-of-life researchers are careful about the image they cultivate, distancing themselves as much as possible from the 1960s, when psychedelics were embraced by many and used in a host of controversial studies, most famously the psilocybin project run by Timothy Leary. Grob described the rampant drug use that characterized the ’60s as “out of control” and said of his and others’ current research, “We are trying to stay under the radar. We want to be anti-Leary.” Halpern agreed. “We are serious sober scientists,” he told me.

Sakuda’s terminal diagnosis, combined with her otherwise perfect health, made her an ideal subject for Grob’s study. Beginning in January 2005, Grob and his research team gave Sakuda various psychological tests, including the Beck Depression Inventory and the Stai-Y anxiety scale to establish baseline measures of Sakuda’s psychological state and to rule out any severe psychiatric illness. “We wanted psychologically healthy people,” Grob says, “people whose depressions and anxieties are not the result of mental illness” but rather, he explained, a response to a devastating disease.

Sakuda would take part in two sessions, one with psilocybin, one with niacin, an active placebo that can cause some flushing in the face. The study was double blind, which meant that neither the researchers nor the subjects knew what was in the capsules being administered. On the day of her first session, Sakuda was led into a room that researchers had transformed with flowing fabrics and fresh flowers to help create a soothing environment in an otherwise cold hospital setting. Sakuda swallowed a capsule and lay back on the bed to wait. Grob had invited her — as researchers do with all their subjects — to bring objects from home that had special significance. “These objects often personalize the session room for the volunteer and often prompt the patient to think about loved ones or important life events,” Roland Griffiths, of Johns Hopkins, says.

“I think it’s kind of goofy,” Halpern says, “but the thinking is that with the aid of the psychedelic, you may come to see the object in a different light. It may help bring back memories; it promotes introspection, it can be a touchstone, it can be grounding.”

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Lauren Slater is the author of ‘‘Opening Skinner’s Box: Great Psychological Experiments of the Twentieth Century.’’

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: April 22, 2012

An article on Page 56 this weekend about the use of psychedelic drugs as part of the treatment for patients with terminal diseases misspells, in two instances, the surname of a cancer patient who was given one of them, psilocybin. As the article correctly notes elsewhere, she was Pam Sakuda, not Saduka. And an earlier version of this correction misspelled psilocybin as psylocybin.

Not so Secret Service: A column about responsibility and morality..by Cal Thomas

Boys will be boys, but men should be men; real men, not "Mad Men," or the promiscuous men lauded in "men's" magazine that are always on the prowl for new conquests. I'm speaking about men of honor and integrity who are the same in the dark as they are in the light........


CONTINUE READING: Not so Secret Service

Conservative Politics, 'Low-Effort' Thinking Linked in New Study / Huffington Post / David Freeman

The Huffington Post  |  By David Freeman 

Posted: 04/ 9/2012 10:44 am Updated: 04/ 9/2012 2:16 pm

Conservatives and liberals don't seem to agree about much, and they might not agree about recent studies linking conservatism to low intelligence and "low-effort" thinking.

As The Huffington Post reported in February, a study published in the journal "Psychological Science" showed that children who score low on intelligence tests gravitate toward socially conservative political views in adulthood--perhaps because conservative ideologies stress "structure and order" that make it easier to understand a complicated world.

Ouch.

And now there's the new study linking conservative ideologies to "low-effort" thinking.

"People endorse conservative ideology more when they have to give a first or fast response," the study's lead author, University of Arkansas psychologist Dr. Scott Eidelman, said in a written statement released by the university.

Does the finding suggest that conservatives are lazy thinkers?

"Not quite," Dr. Eidelman told The Huffington Post in an email. "Our research shows that low-effort thought promotes political conservatism, not that political conservatives use low-effort thinking."

For the study, a team of psychologists led by Dr. Eidelman asked people about their political viewpoints in a bar and in a laboratory setting.

Bar patrons were asked about social issues before blowing into a Breathalyzer. As it turned out, the political viewpoints of patrons with high blood alcohol levels were more likely to be conservative than were those of patrons whose blood alcohol levels were low.

But it wasn't just the alcohol talking, according to the statement. When the researchers conducted similar interviews in the lab, they found that people who were asked to evaluate political ideas quickly or while distracted were more likely to express conservative viewpoints.

"Keeping people from thinking too much...or just asking them to deliberate or consider information in a cursory manner can impact people's political attitudes, and in a way that consistently promotes political conservatism," Dr. Eidelman said in the email.

The study was published online in the journal "Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin."

What do you think? Are conservatives less intelligent than liberals--or more intelligent? And is conservatism a matter of lazy thinking?

The Science of Fox News: Why Its Viewers are the Most Misinformed | Media | AlterNet

Authoritarian people have a stronger emotional need for an outlet like Fox, where they can find affirmation and escape factual challenges to their beliefs.

April 8, 2012  |  

Photo Credit: ShutterStock.com
In June of last year, Jon Stewart went on air with Fox News’ Chris Wallace and started a major media controversy over the channel’s misinforming of its viewers. “Who are the most consistently misinformed media viewers?” Stewart asked Wallace. “The most consistently misinformed? Fox, Fox viewers, consistently, every poll.”Editor's note: This is an excerpt from Chris Mooney’s new bookThe Republican Brain: The Science of Why They Deny Science and Reality.

Stewart’s statement .....

READ MORE: The Science of Fox News: Why Its Viewers are the Most Misinformed | Media | AlterNet

Krugman: Pink Slime Economics from the GOP -New York Times

By PAUL KRUGMAN

Published: April 1, 2012

The big bad event of last week was, of course, the Supreme Court hearing on health reform. In the course of that hearing it became clear that several of the justices, and possibly a majority, are political creatures pure and simple, willing to embrace any argument, no matter how absurd, that serves the interests of Team Republican.

Fred R. Conrad/The New York Times

But we should not allow events in the court to completely overshadow another, almost equally disturbing spectacle. For on Thursday Republicans in the House of Representatives passed what was surely the most fraudulent budget in American history.

And when I say fraudulent, I mean just that. The trouble with the budget devised by Paul Ryan, the chairman of the House Budget Committee, isn’t just its almost inconceivably cruel priorities, the way it slashes taxes for corporations and the rich while drastically cutting food and medical aid to the needy. Even aside from all that, the Ryan budget purports to reduce the deficit — but the alleged deficit reduction depends on the completely unsupported assertion that trillions of dollars in revenue can be found by closing tax loopholes.

And we’re talking about a lot of loophole-closing. As Howard Gleckman of the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center points out, to make his numbers work Mr. Ryan would, by 2022, have to close enough loopholes to yield an extra $700 billion in revenue every year. That’s a lot of money, even in an economy as big as ours. So which specific loopholes has Mr. Ryan, who issued a 98-page manifesto on behalf of his budget, said he would close?

None. Not one. He has, however, categorically ruled out any move to close the major loophole that benefits the rich, namely the ultra-low tax rates on income from capital. (That’s the loophole that lets Mitt Romney pay only 14 percent of his income in taxes, a lower tax rate than that faced by many middle-class families.)

So what are we to make of this proposal? Mr. Gleckman calls it a “mystery meat budget,” but he’s being unfair to mystery meat. The truth is that the filler modern food manufacturers add to their products may be disgusting — think pink slime — but it nonetheless has nutritional value. Mr. Ryan’s empty promises don’t. You should think of those promises, instead, as a kind of throwback to the 19th century, when unregulatedcorporations bulked out their bread with plaster of paris and flavored their beer with sulfuric acid.

Come to think of it, that’s precisely the policy era Mr. Ryan and his colleagues are trying to bring back.

So the Ryan budget is a fraud; Mr. Ryan talks loudly about the evils of debt and deficits, but his plan would actually make the deficit bigger even as it inflicted huge pain in the name of deficit reduction. But is his budget really the most fraudulent in American history? Yes, it is.

To be sure, we’ve had irresponsible and/or deceptive budgets in the past. Ronald Reagan’s budgets relied on voodoo, on the claim that cutting taxes on the rich would somehow lead to an explosion of economic growth. George W. Bush’s budget officials liked to play bait and switch, low-balling the cost of tax cuts by pretending that they were only temporary, then demanding that they be made permanent. But has any major political figure ever premised his entire fiscal platform not just on totally implausible spending projections but on claims that he has a secret plan to raise trillions of dollars in revenue, a plan that he refuses to share with the public?

What’s going on here? The answer, presumably, is that this is what happens when extremists gain complete control of a party’s discourse: all the rules get thrown out the window. Indeed, the hard right’s grip on the G.O.P. is now so strong that the party is sticking with Mr. Ryan even though it’s paying a significant political price for his assault on Medicare.

Now, the House Republican budget isn’t about to become law as long as President Obamais sitting in the White House. But it has been endorsed by Mr. Romney. And even if Mr. Obama is reelected, the fraudulence of this budget has important implications for future political negotiations.

Bear in mind that the Obama administration spent much of 2011 trying to negotiate a so-called Grand Bargain with Republicans, a bipartisan plan for deficit reduction over the long term. Those negotiations ended up breaking down, and a minor journalistic industry has emerged as reporters try to figure out how the breakdown occurred and who was responsible.

But what we learn from the latest Republican budget is that the whole pursuit of a Grand Bargain was a waste of time and political capital. For a lasting budget deal can only work if both parties can be counted on to be both responsible and honest — and House Republicans have just demonstrated, as clearly as anyone could wish, that they are neither.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/02/opinion/krugman-pink-slime-economics.html

"Death of the Ego" ~ David Loy

The Fear of Death is not an instinct: it is a reaction of the animal who is conscious enough to become aware of himself and his inevitable fate; so it is something we have learned. But exactly what is it we have learned? Is the dilemma of life-confronting-death an objective fact we just see, or is this, too, something constructed and projected, more like an unconscious game that each of us is playing with himself? According to Buddhism, life-against-death is a delusive way of thinking it is dualistic: the denial of being dead is how the Ego affirms itself as being alive; so it is the act by which the Ego constitutes itself. To be self-conscious is to be conscious of oneself, to grasp oneself, as being alive. (Despite all their struggles to keep from dying, other animals do not dread death, because they are not aware of themselves as alive.) Then death terror is not something the Ego has, it is what the Ego IS. This fits well with the Buddhist claim that the Ego-self is not a thing, not what I really am, but a mental construction. Anxiety is generated by identifying with this fiction for the simple reason that I do not know and cannot know what this thing that I supposedly am is. This is why the "shadow" of the sense-of-self will inevitable be a sense-of-lack.
Now we see what the Ego is composed of: death terror. The irony here is that the death terror which is the Ego defends only itself. Everything outside is what the ego IS terrified of, but what is inside? Fear is the inside, and that makes everything else the outside. The tragicomedy is that the self-protection this generates is self-defeating, for the barriers we erect to defend the Ego also reinforce our suspicion that there is indeed something lacking in our innermost sanctum which needs protection. And if it turns out that what is innermost is so weak because it is...nothing, then no amount of protection will ever be felt to be enough and we shall end up trying to extend our control to the very bounds of the universe.

If, however, the Ego is constituted by such a dualistic way of thinking, it means that an Ego can die without physical death and without consciousness coming to an end.

What makes this more than idle speculation is that there is ample testimony to the possibility of such Ego death:

• No one gets so much of God as the man who is completely dead. (St. Gregory)
• The Kingdom of God is for none but the thoroughly dead. (Eckhart)
• We are in a world of generation and death, and this world we must cast off. (William Blake)
  
• Your glory lies where you cease to exist. (Ramana Maharshi):
  

  "All of a sudden, he was seized by a chill of Fear. He felt he was almost dying by an all encompassing Fear of Death. Trying to prevent this feeling from weakening him, he began to think of what he should do. He said to himself:
  
  "'Now death is approaching. I am dying. What is death? This body gets lost.'
  
  "Then he held his breath completely, closed his lips and eyes, lay down as one dead, and began to ponder:
  
  "'Now my body is dead. They will carry this body, motionless, to the cremation ground and burn it. But do I really die with this body? Am I merely this body? My body is now motionless. But still I know my name. I remember my parents, uncles, brothers, friends and all others. It means that I have a knowledge of my individuality. If so, the "I" in me is not merely my body; it is a deathless spirit.'
  
  "Thus, as in a flash, a new realization came to Venkataramana. His thoughts may seem boyish fancy. But one thing must be remembered. Usually a man wins God realization by performing tapas for years and years, without food and sleep; he subjects the body to great suffering. But Venkataramana won the highest knowledge without all these. The fear of death left him. Venkataramana became the Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi."

NOTE: It should be brought to the attention of the reader that in 1912, at age 32, fifteen years after Sri Ramana's initial death experience, he was once again confronted by death, in his little known Second Death Experience.


A moving example of death and resurrection is of course one of the sources of Western culture; but examples are found in many religious traditions. The problem is demythologizing these myths, extracting the core of psychological and spiritual truth from the accretions of dogma and superstition that all too often obscure their meaning, in order for that truth to spring to life again within our myth--the technical, objectifying language of modern science (in this instance, psychology). Blake's quotation (from The Vision of the Last Judgment) points the way because it implies that we are not seeing clearly but projecting when we perceive the world in terms of the dualistic categories of birth and death.
Precisely that claim is central to the Buddhist tradition. "Why was I born if it wasn't forever?" bemoaned Ionesco; the answer is in the anaatman "no self" doctrine, according to which we cannot die because we were never born. Anaatma is the "middle way" between the extremes of eternalism (the self survives death) and annihilationism (the self is destroyed at death). Buddhism resolves the problem of life-and-death by deconstructing it. The evaporation of this dualistic way of thinking reveals what is prior to it. There are many names for this "prior," but it is surely significant that one of the most common is "the unborn."
In the Pali Canon, what are perhaps the two most famous descriptions of Nirvna both refer to "the unborn," where "neither this world nor the other, nor coming, going, or standing, neither death nor birth, nor sense objects are to be found."


"There is, O monks, an unborn, an unbecome, an unmade, an unconditioned; if, O monks, there were not here this unborn, unbecome, unmade, unconditioned, there would not here be an escape from the born, the become, the made, the conditioned. But because there is an unborn,...therefore there is an escape from the born...."







Philosophy east and west
Volume 40, No.2 (April 1990)
P.151-174
(C) by University of Hawaii Press



David Loy is a tenured professor in the Faculty of International Studies at Bunkyo University in Chagasaki, Japan. Dr. Loy has also served as a Senior Tutor in the Department of Philosophy at the National University of Singapore from 1978 to 1984. Dr. Loy received his BA degree from Carleton College in Northfield , Minnesota, and his MA in Asian Philosophy from the University of Hawaii in Honolulu, Hawaii. Dr. Loy then pursued his PhD in Philosophy at the National University of Singapore. Dr. Loy undertook a Zen journey in 1971 that included attending a sesshin with Yamada Koun-Roshi in Honolulu, Hawaii. Dr. Loy then moved to Kamakura in 1985 to continue Koan study, and in 1987 he completed the formal course of Koan study and was recognized as a Zen sensei. His most recent publications include A Buddhist History of the West: Studies in Lack (2002) and The Great Awakening: A Buddhist Social Theory forthcoming in June 2003. Dr. Loy also sits on the editorial boards of Cultural Dynamics, Worldviews, Contemporary Buddhism, and the Journal of Transpersonal Psychology.

"The Horrors of an Ayn Rand World: Why We Must Fight for America's Soul" |Gary Weiss/ AlterNet

The whole damned history of the world is a story of the struggle between the selfish and the unselfish! . . . All the bad around us is bred by selfishness. Sometimes selfishness even gets to be a cause, an organized force, even a government. Then it’s called Fascism.

—Garson Kanin, Born Yesterday

 READ THIS INSIGHTFUL ARTICLE! : The Horrors of an Ayn Rand World: Why We Must Fight for America's Soul | News & Politics | AlterNet

How Do Obsessive Compulsive People Think? | Psychology Today

In a previous post Those Damn Unwanted Thoughts I indicated how your anxiety often is a result of your fear of your thoughts and sensations. Let's say that you are obsessive and you have the recurring thought, "Maybe I have cancer". But you don't. You've seen the doctor, she tells you that you are fine, you go home and begin thinking again, "Maybe she's wrong. Maybe I have cancer". Then you think, "The fact that I'm thinking that must mean that there is something to worry about. I need to know for sure. I need to do something." So you Google endlessly every possible cancer and expect to see your pretty face appear on the screen......

CONTINUE READING: How Do Obsessive Compulsive People Think? | Psychology Today

Walking While Black | Psychology Today

People tend to not be openly racist (at least when filling out a survey) which is not a claim that could be made so confidently in decades past. However, declaring that one is not racist and not behaving in a racially biased manner are two different achievements. In other words, just because someone says, and maybe even believes, that he or she is not racist, does not mean that he or she would not engage in behavior that could be described as racially biased. To illustrate this point let's consider just a few behavioral studies of racism.....

READ ARTICLE: Walking While Black | Psychology Today

Rev. Dr. C. Welton Gaddy: "The War On Religion Does Not Exist"

 Apparently, attempts are underway to open a new front in the supposed "war on religion" in my home state of Louisiana as it takes center stage in the presidential primary season. Truth be told, from what I have seen lately, those claiming there is a war on religion are the ones most guilty of waging that assault.......


CONTINUE READING: Rev. Dr. C. Welton Gaddy: The War On Religion Does Not Exist

Paranoia Strikes Deeper By PAUL KRUGMAN

Published: March 22, 2012

Gas prices are bringing out the crazy during this campaign season.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/23/opinion/krugman-paranoia-strikes-deeper.html

The Narcissist's Dilemma: They Can Dish It Out, But . . . | Psychology Today

It's precisely this need to be viewed as perfect, superlative, or infallible that makes them so hypersensitive to criticism. And their typical reaction to criticism, disagreement, challenges-or sometimes even the mere suggestion that they consider doing something differently-can lead to the "narcissistic rage" that is another of their trademarks. To.......

CONTINUE READING: The Narcissist's Dilemma: They Can Dish It Out, But . . . | Psychology Today

"Do Therapists Live Vicariously Through Their Clients?" | Psychology Today

.....In sum, I can think of nothing more important for a therapist than becoming ever more attuned to what their clients have gone through . . . and then communicating to them how such oppressive experiences may likely have affected them. As a direct result of so .....

CONTINUE READING: Do Therapists Live Vicariously Through Their Clients? | Psychology Today

Afghan Rampage: Who's to Blame? | Psychology Today

Out of context, such a question might sound strange—or possibly stupid. After all, if we're not responsible for our brain and what it tells us to do, who would be? But on the other hand, what if we have a diseased brain—say, a schizophrenic's? Or what if—perhaps because of some combination of traumatic brain injury (TBI), post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and protracted situational stress—we suffer a psychotic break? .............

READ MORE: Afghan Rampage: Who's to Blame? | Psychology Today

Wounds That Stay Forever | Psychology Today

The PTSD coach was designed with veterans in mind, but can be used by anyone experiencing the symptoms of PTSD. The app allows users to check in with themselves to determine levels of distress; has features, like the option to upload personal photos or music, that can help manage symptoms; and serves as a complement to ongoing therapy with a mental health professional.......

READ MORE: Wounds That Stay Forever | Psychology Today

"The Real Impact of Food Stamp Cuts" | The Washington Independent

Congress is poised to cut food stamps again, taking more away from an extended benefit created by the 2009 stimulus, before its original expiry date, and setting up an unprecedented “cliff” in food stamps......

READ MORE: The Real Impact of Food Stamp Cuts | The Washington Independent

"Why I Use Sex Toys to Satisfy My Wife" | AlterNet / Salon

I place the vibrating sex toy, which is packed in a plastic container with the words “Diving Dolphin” written in a wavy blue script, on the counter along with my American Express card. It’s been about one week since Deb and I argued at the Wig and Pen. That’s one week without sex.....

READ MORE: Why I Use Sex Toys to Satisfy My Wife | | AlterNet

Arizona out-crazies other contraception bills. Use birth control, get fired.

The GOP is all for small government—one that's small enough to drown in a bathtub, but big enough to fill up a uterus......

READ MORE: Arizona out-crazies other contraception bills. Use birth control, get fired.

"This week in the War on Women: Who's ready to go on offense?" ~ DAILY KOS

Raise your hand if you're sick and tired of Republicans waging war on women........

READ MORE: This week in the War on Women: Who's ready to go on offense?

The Truth About The Minimum Wage That Will Make You Gasp

The Truth About The Minimum Wage That Will Make You Gasp

Blame the GOP for $4 gas - Gas Prices - Salon.com

 "......the rise in gas prices has almost nothing to do with energy policy. It has everything to do with America’s continuing failure to adequately regulate Wall Street. But don’t hold your breath waiting for Republicans to tell the truth......"

READ MORE:Blame the GOP for $4 gas - Gas Prices - Salon.com

"Shame" ~ Brene' Brown..A Rich experience!

Natural Born Drillers - Krugsman - NYTimes.com

To be a modern Republican in good standing, you have to believe — or pretend to believe — in two miracle cures for whatever ails the economy: more tax cuts for the rich and more drilling for oil. And with prices at the pump on the rise.........

READ MORE: Natural Born Drillers - NYTimes.com

"In Memory of Our Fallen Soldiers"

A TRIBUTE OF PROFOUND GRATITUDE

New York Times: 9/11 Truth Movement

READ! Becoming current again......New York Times: 9/11 Truth Movement

Ex-Senators Graham and Kerrey See Possible Saudi 9/11 - LINK -NYTimes.com

For more than a decade, questions have lingered about the possible role of the Saudi government in the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, even as the royal kingdom has made itself a crucial counterterrorism partner in the eyes of American diplomats........

READ MORE.....Ex-Senators Graham and Kerrey See Possible Saudi 9/11 Link - NYTimes.com

How We're All Paying for Rush Limbaugh to Take Viagra (And Why it Costs a Lot More Than Contraception) | News & Politics | AlterNet

 

Photo Credit: Shutterstock

When conservative blowhards rant, you know they have something on their minds and it’s almost always themselves. So the people who yell loudest about class warfare have waged it successfully on behalf of the 1 percent. And the conservatives complaining about death panels did not object to the real ones in states............

READ MORE: How We're All Paying for Rush Limbaugh to Take Viagra (And Why it Costs a Lot More Than Contraception) | News & Politics | AlterNet

Science Daily: Narcissism impairs ethical judgment even among the highly religious, study finds

 "Devout people who are narcissistic and exercise poor ethical judgment would be committing acts that are, according to their own internalized value system, blatantly hypocritical," said Marjorie J. Cooper, Ph.D., study author and professor of marketing at Baylor's Hankamer School of Business. "Narcissism is sufficiently intrusive and powerful that it entices people into behaving in ways inimical to their most deeply-held beliefs"........

READ ARTICLE FROM THE SCIENCE DAILY: Narcissism impairs ethical judgment even among the highly religious, study finds

The Sun Magazine / Ralph Earle: "At The Heart Of Healing"

 RALPH EARLE lives in the woods near Chapel Hill, North Carolina. He designs Web-based documentation for IBM and occasionally teaches poetry classes at Central Carolina Community College. His poems have recently appeared in Sufi, Wild Goose Poetry Review, and Redheaded Stepchild.

READ INTERVIEW: The Sun Magazine | At The Heart Of Healing

The Sun Magazine / Ralph Earle--- "After the e-mail saying you forgave me"

 From a North Carolina poet, Ralph Earle:

READ POEM: The Sun Magazine | After the e-mail saying you forgave me