Is Alaska’s newest Senator OK?

By Rebecca Logan
Alaska Standard Contributor

“First Year Focused on Honoring Promises” appears in the Anchorage Daily News, with Senator Mark Begich listed as the author. My first reaction was to skip over it, knowing that reading it would probably upset me. I couldn’t resist the temptation to look at something that I knew would upset me, and now I’m not only upset, I’m concerned.

It would appear that our Senator has many characteristics of a serious mental illness.

Delusional disorder, previously called paranoid disorder, is a type of serious mental illness called a "psychosis" in which a person cannot tell what is real from what is imagined. From the article:

“My focus has been on delivering what I promised. . . jobs and keeping Alaska’s economy healthy. . . and protecting Alaskan’s freedoms and interests”

Senator Begich imagines that he helped to “create and protect about 8,000 Alaska jobs” by voting for the stimulus bill. What’s real? The highest unemployment rate in Alaska since 1992. What’s really real? His mismanagement of the city’s finances has forced the municipality of Anchorage to lose more than one hundred jobs already – more job loss is on the way.

Senator Begich imagines that he is the defender of our individual freedoms and interests. What’s real? Senator Begich voted for a health care bill that would drastically limit access for all Medicare patients in Alaska (like we don’t already have a problem with this issue), would add a huge tax to working families who have decent health care plans and would establish more than 200 commissions that would tell individuals and businesses what they had to do.

There’s more. The main feature of this disorder is the presence of delusions, which are unshakable beliefs in something untrue.

“When it comes to protecting Alaska freedoms and interests, I haven’t been bashful to stand up to my own political party.”

This is becoming the mantra of Senator Begich- perhaps because he believes that if he keeps saying it – it will become true. Senator Begich had the perfect opportunity to stand up to his party and help all Alaskans by voting against the healthcare legislation – the local studies that had been done by groups like ISER gave great detail about the harm that would be caused in Alaska by the pending legislation. Senator Begich chose to ignore his constituents and the studies and toe the party line.

It gets better. People with delusional disorder experience non-bizarre delusions, which involve situations that could occur in real life, These delusions usually involve the misinterpretation of perceptions or experiences. In reality, however, the situations are either not true at all or highly exaggerated:

“Even though earmarking rules have been reformed. . . .” (perhaps he meant replaced by bribery, back door deals and extortion) and finally,

“As the Senate reconvenes this month, my highest priorities are keeping Americans safe, kicking our economic recovery into high gear, ensuring our children have essential skills they need to compete and elimininating the red ink that threatens future generations.”

You can always count on Will Rogers to put things in perspective “If we ever pass out as a great nation we ought to put on our tombstone ‘America died from a delusion that she had moral leadership’.”

Let’s not kid ourselves!!