RE: Alert: Bush Ally (Next AG?) Defends Forced AA

[Guest guest]

stuart323@... wrote:

>

> Hot off the presses. The latest National Review features an

> article by Oklahoma Governor Keating defending forced AA.

> Keating is high on the list of possible Bush administration nominees

> to serve as Attorney General.

>

> Keating shows himself to be a total hard-core stepper.

>

> By the way, I cannot imagine anyone who Gore might have

> considered as AG writting such nonsense.

> **********************************************************************

> Repealing Alcoholics Anonymous

> The courts go too far — again.

>

> By Gov. Keating of Oklahoma

>

>

Stuart,

Where did this come from? Important information -- I'd like to post it

on some of the political discussion groups.

Regards,

Ken

[Guest guest]

Thanks Stuart. One down, many more to go.. ;-) This got me thinking

about what could be done. I can't imagine a 12sf letter writing

campaign having any effect on Bush's decision (lol). But we do have

some accomplished people here-- published authors and attorneys. iirc

Ken mentioned how the mainstream media has in the past blacklisted

him from writing anything critical about the step cult. I wonder if

the National Review would consider printing a rebutal, or a letter to

the editor at least. Does W. F. Buckley still run this magazine? He

always impressed me as being exceptionally open minded for a

conservative, however, I must confess that it's been years since I've

read the National Review.

This may not be as far fetched as it sounds. Take Reason magazine.

This small but very influential magazine is read by many people in

high places. Reason has published articles by Stanton Peele and other

writers that are critical of the recovery movement and AA. Reason's

politics are definetly on the libertarian to conservative end of the

political spectrum. Just a thought.

Jim

> Hot off the presses. The latest National Review features an

> article by Oklahoma Governor Keating defending forced AA.

> Keating is high on the list of possible Bush administration

nominees

> to serve as Attorney General.

>

> Keating shows himself to be a total hard-core stepper.

>

> By the way, I cannot imagine anyone who Gore might have

> considered as AG writting such nonsense.

>

**********************************************************************

> Repealing Alcoholics Anonymous

> The courts go too far — again.

>

> By Gov. Keating of Oklahoma

>

[Guest guest]

> Stuart,

>

> Where did this come from? Important information -- I'd like to

post it

> on some of the political discussion groups.

>

> Regards,

>

> Ken

Found it:

http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/comment121300a.shtml

Jim

[Guest guest]

Someone tell me where to write.

> > Hot off the presses. The latest National Review features an

> > article by Oklahoma Governor Keating defending forced AA.

> > Keating is high on the list of possible Bush administration

> nominees

> > to serve as Attorney General.

> >

> > Keating shows himself to be a total hard-core stepper.

> >

> > By the way, I cannot imagine anyone who Gore might have

> > considered as AG writting such nonsense.

> >

>

**********************************************************************

> > Repealing Alcoholics Anonymous

> > The courts go too far — again.

> >

> > By Gov. Keating of Oklahoma

> >

[Guest guest]

> Someone tell me where to write.

>

>

>

,

You might try:

http://www.nationalreview.com/contact/contact.shtml

articles:

submissions@...

Letters to the editor:

letters@...

Good luck.

Jim

[Guest guest]

Someone should turn Szaz loose on him.

Every time I read something like this I can't escape the feeling that we

should be focusing attention on the voluntary nature of the abuser's abuse.

It's the studies that indicate the abuser has complete control and displays

it which really interest me. If those studies were trumpeted everywhere the

disease nonsense would be shown to be just what it is.

Bjorn and Ken have discussed this and I'm curious if anyone else has any

additional sources of information on addictive behavior self control?

> Alert: Bush Ally (Next AG?) Defends Forced AA

>

>Repealing Alcoholics Anonymous

>The courts go too far — again.

>

>By Gov. Keating of Oklahoma

> With drunkies and junkies, you usually need a hammer.

>

>Why? One of the symptoms of chemical addiction is a steadfast denial

>that anything is wrong. An alcoholic's life may be coming apart like

>a cheap watch, he may be facing jail or prison time, he might even

>have been told, like , that his body is about to shut down from

>repeated abuses — but an alcoholic or drug addict is very likely to

>respond with a foggy, " Who, me? " The chemicals that do the damage

>also cloud awareness and judgment. Like the mentally ill — who are

>subject, under specific circumstances, to involuntary

>hospitalization — many alcoholics and drug addicts are simply not

>capable of making rational choices.

>

[Guest guest]

Someone should turn Fingarette loose on him :-) Herbert Fingarette was cited

by the Supreme Court in a decision (Traynor vs. Turnage, 1988) relating to

whether alcoholism could reasonably be classified as the result of " willful

misconduct " rather than disability.

Chapter 2 of Fingarette's " Heavy Drinking: The Myth of Alcoholism as a

Disease " is entitled " Can alcoholics control their drinking? " The chapter

discusses the arguments and the experiments, and the chapter's 25 footnotes

are mostly references (sometimes multiple references within each footnote)

to studies showing control.

--wally

Alert: Bush Ally (Next AG?) Defends Forced AA

> >

>

> >Repealing Alcoholics Anonymous

>

> >The courts go too far - again.

> >

> >By Gov. Keating of Oklahoma

>

> > With drunkies and junkies, you usually need a hammer.

> >

> >Why? One of the symptoms of chemical addiction is a steadfast denial

> >that anything is wrong. An alcoholic's life may be coming apart like

> >a cheap watch, he may be facing jail or prison time, he might even

> >have been told, like , that his body is about to shut down from

> >repeated abuses - but an alcoholic or drug addict is very likely to

> >respond with a foggy, " Who, me? " The chemicals that do the damage

> >also cloud awareness and judgment. Like the mentally ill - who are

> >subject, under specific circumstances, to involuntary

> >hospitalization - many alcoholics and drug addicts are simply not

> >capable of making rational choices.

> >

[Guest guest]

'The " not AA " recovery programs currently being manufactured to meet

the requirements of the court rulings are bound to be like

sugar-filled placebos in a double-blind drug trial. They will

inevitably lack the central ingredient that works — spirituality, a

personal connection to a higher power. '

What an ironic reversal of the probable reality. Since trees, etc.,

anything will do, they are the placebo.

" God and all, it's still the only game in town, and it is highly

unlikely that an army of government factotums, beavering away under

court auspices, will come up with a workable alternative. "

In fact, AA dominance is entirely a US phenomonon; other countries

do it different and better. Reid and HEster showed that the most

effective treatments for alcoholism are almost never used in the US.

" How, for example, will they find a substitute for AA's elegant third

step: " Came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could

restore us to sanity. " "

Just how nmuch this bozo knows is illustrated by the fact that this is

the SECOND step, not the third. The misyake is illustative, because

the second step is the outsider doctrine step that this guy wants to

promote, but the bugbear is the insider doctrine THIRD STEP which is

of course the one most internally inportant to XA's (hence the

mistake) but includes the " G " word unsuitable for this guy's purposes.

The ignorance that this guy shows, even of what he wishes to promote,

is just amazing. I dont think ppl want bureaucarats' programs, they

want scientifically credible secular programs. If ANYTHING can be

your Higher Power, why not your own conscience and maturity, or belief

in the effectiveness of a scientific program?

Gore promoted steppism but only imo because he was ignorant of the

facts of alcohol/drug treatment and he might have been persuaded. Any

claim that the Bushie administration wont be as bad at XA coercion

looks a little implausible after this,. We shall see.

[Guest guest]

Jim,

They actually go back a lot further than that. This is listed in the

1973 list of Szasz's writings:

" Drugs and Freedom. Transcript of the " Firing Line " program taped at

WKPC in Louisville, Kentucky,, on May 16, 1973, and

originally telecast on PBS on July 15, 1973. Host: F. Buckley,

Jr., Guest: Dr. S. Szasz. Columbia, South

Carolina: Southern Educational Communications Association, 1973. "

Entering szasz buckley in the Google search engine gets dozens of

results. I'm gonna look for some more.

Tommy

> > Fear not, folks. The National Review may be the platform our

> battle

> > flag has been looking for. BTW Jim and , Buckley is a fan

of

> > Szasz, believe it or not. I have lots of computer time the next

> two

> > nights and will dedicate myself, but will write no letters before

I

> > consult with you people. Good work Stuart. If we work together on

> > this I KNOW we can come up with a devastating slam dunk of this

> > constitutional outlaw.

[Guest guest]

Hello .(and Tommy)

You wrote:

" Every time I read something like this I can't escape the feeling that we

should be focusing attention on the voluntary nature of the abuser's abuse.

It's the studies that indicate the abuser has complete control and displays

it which really interest me. If those studies were trumpeted everywhere the

disease nonsense would be shown to be just what it is. "

I'm sure Fingarette will provide you with enough references, but I'll try to dig

some up more than 20 years old, if you're interested.

But what I wanted to address you about is the reliability of an anecdote I heard

many years ago concerning the rise in research questening the disease concept.

In 1982 I had the privilege to lunch with the psychologist from

Albaquerque, New Mexico.It was in Copenhagen, and he's by now been in the

alcoholism field for decades.

I had noticed that a lot of the critical research had been conducted on V.A.

Hospitals, and wondered how this could be, as I thought these hospitals were

rather conservative in their approach. That they didn't want to challenge the

medical authorities.

Well, here is in essence what he told.

During the Korean war every american soldier had a health insurence covering all

diseases that could be traced back to participation in the war.

( It could be interesting to note, that both AMA and WHO recognized alcoholism

as a disease after these contracts had been agreed on.)

As it was accepted, that a lot of the veterans could blame the war for their

'alcoholism', and 'alcoholism' was considered a disease, the insurence companies

were interested in reaearch that could question the basic concepts of the

disease theory.

One of the dogmas attached to the disease theory was that an 'alcoholic' could

not moderate his alcohol intake as a result of outer pressure or motivation to

reduce. Alcohol would, according to the theory, always be their first choice.

A lot of the research on V.A. Hospitals actually proved, that it was easy to

disconfirm the 'out of control' assumption, and thence it could not be a

disease.

Well, this sounds very reasonable to me. Could it be confirmed?

Anyway I've the names of some of the persons engaged in the research part. As I

said, I'll dig them up on request.

Bjørn

[Guest guest]

Bjorn,

Here is a link I posted about a year ago in response to one of

's posts. This is one of my all-time favorites by Peele. He

mentions the doublespeak of the VA.

http://www.peele.net/lib/fingers.html

I mentioned in a previous post that Fingarette's response to Peele's

essay is excellent but not available on the web. I ordered the book

on inter-library loan yesterday and when it comes I'll quote from it.

Some of it is very relevent to recent discussions here about the power

players in U.S. government.

Tommy

> " Every time I read something like this I can't escape the feeling

that we

> should be focusing attention on the voluntary nature of the abuser's

abuse.

> It's the studies that indicate the abuser has complete control and

displays

> it which really interest me. If those studies were trumpeted

everywhere the

> disease nonsense would be shown to be just what it is. "

>

> I'm sure Fingarette will provide you with enough references, but

I'll try to dig some up more than 20 years old, if you're interested.

>

> But what I wanted to address you about is the reliability of an

anecdote I heard many years ago concerning the rise in research

questening the disease concept.

>

> In 1982 I had the privilege to lunch with the psychologist

from Albaquerque, New Mexico.It was in Copenhagen, and he's by now

been in the alcoholism field for decades.

>

> I had noticed that a lot of the critical research had been conducted

on V.A. Hospitals, and wondered how this could be, as I thought these

hospitals were rather conservative in their approach. That they didn't

want to challenge the medical authorities.

>

> Well, here is in essence what he told.

>

> During the Korean war every american soldier had a health insurence

covering all diseases that could be traced back to participation in

the war.

>

> ( It could be interesting to note, that both AMA and WHO recognized

alcoholism as a disease after these contracts had been agreed on.)

>

> As it was accepted, that a lot of the veterans could blame the war

for their 'alcoholism', and 'alcoholism' was considered a disease, the

insurence companies were interested in reaearch that could question

the basic concepts of the disease theory.

>

> One of the dogmas attached to the disease theory was that an

'alcoholic' could not moderate his alcohol intake as a result of outer

pressure or motivation to reduce. Alcohol would, according to the

theory, always be their first choice.

>

> A lot of the research on V.A. Hospitals actually proved, that it was

easy to disconfirm the 'out of control' assumption, and thence it

could not be a disease.

>

> Well, this sounds very reasonable to me. Could it be confirmed?

>

> Anyway I've the names of some of the persons engaged in the research

part. As I said, I'll dig them up on request.

>

> Bjørn