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An angry man

Confession of an angry man, continued - Part 3

The diagnosis

The psychiatrist said he knew I could take the truth and that he would not sugar-coat his diagnosis of my problem.

He said that I was indeed an angry man and that my situation was terminal.

The doctor couldn’t or wouldn’t say how long I had to live, but he did say that I would never be rid of my anger as long as I continued to pay attention to what was going on in Louisiana state government.  My only relief would come a few hours after my death.

The doctor then went on to explain how he came to the diagnosis and the cause of my anger. He said that my anger was caused by both genetic pre-disposition to anger and environment.

The genetic part came from my upbringing in a family that had suffered bullets, bombs, gas, etc. from fighting in World Wars I and II.

The environmental part was partially a result of my father, who was a politician. He instilled in me an old outdated form of morality that is more Biblically-based than statutory or constitutionally-based ethics as is the case today.

My father told me things like:  He didn’t care if the law said it was okay to do, if it was “wrong to do, it was wrong to do.”  He also said: “Just because others are doing it doesn’t mean you can.” He even hit me with: “That’s the way it has always been done is not an excuse for wrong-doing. ”

The mental scars from my father’s sense of morality were even visible on my brain scan.

Additionally, the doctor said that another cause of my condition was because I used to work for the Louisiana Legislature, had been in many of the “smoke-filled rooms” (literally smoked filled back in that day) and had seen the inner workings of the leges.

Even worse, I had continued to follow the activities of the leges and state government for over 40 years.

As you can imagine when the diagnosis was first revealed to me a sense of helplessness came over me. I thanked the doctor for getting to the bottom of my problem and asked him to forward his findings to my Primary physician.

Not to be morbid, but after months of flying around the country and world, being poked, prodded and undergoing every imaginable test, it was with a sense of relief that I packed my bags and headed home.

To be continued

Tomorrow, Part 4 of my confession and a message for the concerned leges….

C.B.

1 CB 8:00 am

An angry man

Things that make me angry

Note: Despite their attitude, all elected officials are legally considered “public servants.”

Here’s the list of things that make me angry that the psychiatrist made while I laid on his couch:

1. Public servants who tell their constituents one thing and when they are at the Capitol do the opposite.
2. Public servants who don’t care about their constituents and patronize them to their faces and talk about them behind their backs.
3. Public servants who rudely treat citizens when they come to public hearings on matters of importance to them.
4. Public servants who hold secret meetings and makes deals in Chinese Restaurants, in Washington, D.C. and other no longer smoked-filled rooms.
5. Public servants who don’t read the legislation on which they vote or even those which they sponsor.
6. Public servants who ignore the state constitution because they believe the ends justify the means.
7. Public servants who believe the law and rules don’t apply to them.
8. Public servants who sit in committees and on the floor of the bodies and ignore what is being said.
9. Public servants who consider friendships and acceptance by the colleagues more important than their constituents best interests.
10. Public servants who are arrogant and don’t believe that they are public servants.
11. Public servants who are self-serving rather servants of the people.
12. Louisiana last in everything that is good and first in everything that is bad in comparison to the other states.
13. Public servants that knowingly tell lies about others in order to discredit them such as saying that I was fired by the leges.
14. Public servants who take every general comment personally.
15. Public servants who refuse to take responsibility for their mistakes and take credit for the work done by others.
16. Public servants who are condescending, who bully, berate, threaten and intimidate those they know cannot fight back.
17. Public servants who strut around the Capitol Complex like it belongs to them rather than the people of Louisiana.
18. Public servants who whine about being overworked and underpaid while over 15% of those eligible to work in Louisiana don’t have a job.
19. Public servants who run around the state giving out taxpayer funds without giving due credit to the taxpayers.
20. Public servants, who put their names on plaques on public buildings, name buildings after politicians all without acknowledging the taxpayers who made the buildings possible.

I was just getting warmed up when the doctor suddenly held up his hand and told me to quit talking because he said it was making him angry about what was going on in Louisiana.

He had enough to diagnose me.

To be continued

Tomorrow, Part 3 of my confession and the diagnosis.

C.B.

1 CB 8:00 am

During this Lenten season it is appropriate that I make a public confession.

Recently, I received an email from a lege reminding me that I was considered by the leges, and I’m sure by others, as an angry man.

I immediately knew this fellow was a first-termer.  He left out the word old. Old is a term when applied to me by the leges is to indicate that I’m senile.

It is true; I am older (chronologically) than all but a couple of the incumbent leges.

But, I digress; old age you know.

My immediate reaction was: What’s your point?

Background

What the rookie didn’t know is that I was first diagnosed by leges as an angry man a couple of decades ago.  I don’t recall the date (old age, again), but it was sometime around the period that I began appearing regularly in the commercial electronic and print media around the state and world.

The diagnosis by the leges was elevated to life-threatening around the time I began posting their voting records, writing commentary and distributing them to those who asked.  My own state senator, at the time, brought the bad news to me.

When first diagnosed by the leges, I did what anyone would do, after all some of the leges were physicians.   I sought professional help. Because I was well-insured (thanks to my monthly premium payments paid entirely by me) I sought out the best of the best to get help with my anger.

Initially, I went to my primary care physician to ask if there was a pill he could give me.  He said there was no pill that could cure what ailed me. I asked about surgery, but again other than a frontal lobotomy, he offered little hope.

That didn’t sit well with me so I asked for referrals to specialists for second opinions.   My doctor immediately set me up with a battery of everything from anger management specialists to brain surgeons. None could diagnose my problem.

The “shrink”

Finally I ended up with a world-renowned psychiatrist.

The doctor told me to lie down on his couch and then asked me to tell him what most angered me.  I told him that would take a while, but he assured me it was therapeutic and that I was well-insured.

To be continued

Tomorrow, Part 2 of my confession,  the list…

C.B.

1 CB 8:00 am