Who we are

"Who we are is neither encoded at birth nor gradually assembled over the years, but is inscribed into our brains during the first two years of life in direct response to how we are loved and cared for." ~Sue Gerhardt

Margaret Ainsworth, a Canadian psychologist, was first to demonstrate a significant connection between early childhood experience and development of personality. For a large part of the1960s, Ainsworth sat behind a one-way mirror in Baltimore and watched one-year-olds playing with their mothers. She noted what happened when the mother left the room for a few minutes and how the child responded when she returned. She then studied what happened when, instead of the mother, a stranger entered the room and tried to engage with the child.

Ainsworth's study, together with John Bowlby's attachment theory, showed that how a child developed was not the result of general experiences, but the direct result of the way the child's main care-giver responded to and engaged with him or her. A neglectful, stressed, or inconsistent parent gave the kind of care which led to anxious, insecure or depressed children. Further studies showed that patterns of attachment behavior in one-year-olds could accurately predict how those children would behave at aged five, ten, and fifteen which can further predict the personality of a child when fully grown.

Although the attachment theory has been very influential, underpinning psychology and psychotherapy, the kind of "proof" provided by psychologists has never quite convinced a skeptical public that thinks: Sitting in a room and watching babies – what kind of proof is that? How can anyone know what a baby is thinking and feeling? Isn't it all just liberal conjecture? Added to this, an entire generation of feminists hated the attachment theory from the get go, accusing Bowlby and Ainsworth of being against working women and wanting to shackle women to the home. The whole issue of how babies develop suddenly became highly politicized – and still is. Confusion reigns about the connection between early experience and personality.

Later, when researchers studied the brains of Romanian orphans – children who had been left to cry in their cots from birth and denied any chance of forming close bonds with any adult – they found a "virtual black hole" where the orbitofrontal cortex should have been. This is the part of the brain that enables us to manage our emotions, to relate sensitively to other people, to experience pleasure and to appreciate beauty. The earliest experiences of these children had greatly diminished their capacity ever to be fully human. This gave strong evidence for the attachment theory.

In Why Love Matters, Sue Gerhardt, a psychotherapist, takes the language of neuroscience and uses it to prove the attachment theory. Gerhardt makes an impressive case that emotional experiences in infancy and early childhood have the greatest influence on how we develop as human beings. Drawing on the most recent findings from the field of neurochemistry, she explains how daily interactions between a baby and its main caregiver have a direct impact on the way the brain develops. Picking up a crying baby or ignoring it may be a matter of parental choice, but the effects will be etched on the child’s brain throughout life.

Gerhardt is not interested in cognitive skills – how quickly a child learns to read, write, etc. She is interested in the connection between the kind of loving we receive in infancy and how it influences the kind of people we turn into. According to Gerhardt, "There is nothing automatic about the development of one’s personality. The kind of brain that each baby develops is the brain that comes out of his or her earliest experiences with people." Our earliest experiences are not simply laid down as memories or as influences; they develop into precise physiological patterns of response in the brain that set the neurological rules for how we deal with our feelings for the remainder of our lives.

In other words, how we are treated as babies and toddlers determines exactly who and what we are.

Stress during infancy damages the amygdala, an almond-shaped cluster of nuclei located in the brain's emotional control center that enables us to respond quickly to danger – such as stepping out of the way of a swerving car. Repeated abuse or violence in the home of any type causes the amygdala to signal danger even when there is no apparent threat. Dr. Bruce Perry, a neuroscientist who heads the Child Trauma Academy, a nonprofit research center in Houston, says that a maladaptive amygdala makes a child or an adult survivor of child abuse recoil in fear at the drop of a hat. This negative impact on developing brain structures is associated with changes in brain chemistry.

Overwhelming stress early in life also alters the production of both the stress-regulating hormone cortisol and key neurotransmitters such as epinephrine, dopamine, and serotonin, the chemical messengers in the brain that affect mood and behavior. These biochemical imbalances can have profound implications. For example, constant abuse typically lowers serotonin levels, leading to depression or impulsive aggression.

When a baby is upset, the hypothalamus, situated in the subcortex at the center of the brain, produces cortisol. In normal amounts, cortisol is good, but if a baby is exposed for too long or too often to stressful situations its brain becomes flooded with cortisol and it will then either over- or under-produce cortisol for the remainder of its life when exposed to stress. Too much cortisol is linked to depression, anxiety, and fearfulness; too little cortisol is linked to emotional detachment and aggression. Children of alcoholics have a raised cortisol level. Baby girls of abusive parents tend to develop high cortisol levels while boys tend to do the opposite, and produce too little, becoming aggressive and/or detached.

If abuse or stress continued into the early childhood years, triggers and cues act as reminders of the trauma and can cause further anxiety and depression. Often the person can be completely unaware of the triggers. In many cases this may lead a person suffering from a traumatic disorder, engaging in disruptive or self-destructive coping mechanisms, without being fully aware of the nature or causes of their own actions. Panic attacks are an example of a response to such emotional triggers. Consequently, intense feelings of anger may surface frequently, sometimes in very inappropriate or unexpected situations, as danger may always seem to be present. Upsetting memories such as images, thoughts, flashbacks, and/or nightmares may haunt the person. Insomnia may occur as lurking fears and insecurity keep the person vigilant and on the lookout for danger, both day and night. Chronic depression and/or Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) more likely than not plagues the person throughout their life.

The point is that babies cannot regulate their stress response on their own, but learn to do so only through repeated experiences of being shown consistent love, unconditionally, or not being shown love, by its parents. Through positive interactions, the baby learns that people can be relied upon to respond to its needs, and the baby's brain learns to produce only beneficial amounts of cortisol. Through a lack of love, or through physical or emotional abuse, babies become highly stressed causing cortisol production to run amok throughout its life, leading to a plethora of physical and psychological problems. Baseline levels of cortisol are pretty much set by six months of age. Too much cortisol, and the child is set up for a lifetime of struggle with depression and physical health problems such as fibromyalgia, IBS, asthma, weight gain, and high blood pressure.

Timely interventions – by 7 years of age – can help rewire the brain and put psychological development back on track up to a point. A loving, understanding adult can come along during the child’s early years and somewhat correct the problem; but if the child is removed from its rescuer any time before full adulthood and once again put in a situation where love and nurture is not provided (as with an unloving stepparent), then the “repair” is all but undone.

Sue Gerhardt's book, Why Love Matters: How Affection Shapes a Baby's Brain, is a much-needed corrective to those who have made too great a claim for the role of inherited genes. Instead, she shows that you can't slide a knife between the heart and the brain. Human babies, like all mammals, are born wired for survival, but uniquely, we are wired to do so through other people. By smiling cutely long before they can walk or talk, babies ensure that the adults in their lives forgive them the sleepless nights and want to keep them alive. Being smiled at in return teaches the baby the rewards of communication and primes the infant brain for more.

Good parenting during the early years leads to good development of the baby's prefrontal cortex, which in turn enables the growing child to develop self-control, empathy, and to feel connected to others. Bad parenting (neglect, abuse, violence in the home) during those early years leads to a damaged amygdala (the brain's emotional control center) setting the child up for a lifetime of sorrow.

Gerhardt is not the first person to say these things, but research findings in this area have been very slow to filter out to the general public because they are so politically sensitive. It is because of this that researchers in this field have been reticent over the years about broadcasting their results. It's hard to read this book and feel complacent about the conditions in which many children today are raised. Too many parents are not meeting their children's need for love in the vital first two years of their lives.

Who we are really goes back to those early years spent with loving or unloving parents. Those who say that the grown-up child should forget and forgive, that at some point she is completely responsible for her own emotions, is ignorant of brain development and the long-term consequences of abuse and/or neglect. Years of therapy and love from a good-hearted spouse can rewire the brain to an extent; but, even so, the personality that we developed as a young child is always there, ready to subconsciously respond to any trigger or reminder of those early years.

Who we are is neither encoded at birth nor gradually assembled over the years, but is inscribed into our brains during the first two years of life in direct response to how we are loved and cared for.


http://www.amazon.com/Why-Love-Matters-Affection-Shapes/dp/1583918175

Smarter than the average bear

When President Obama finished his speech Tuesday evening, my husband turned to me and asked, “What do you think?” My “teacher instincts” told me that the speech went over the heads of most viewers, including the media, because instead of focusing on just the oil spill, the President spoke of the big picture: our gluttonous need for oil and the nation’s long-term energy policy. My husband agreed with me when I said that the speech was too complicated for most people.

So, I was not surprised when CNN, MSNBC, as well as FOX, said that the speech left them wanting. There was not enough emotion, not enough profanity (none), and too broad a stroke. They complained that the President looked at the big picture – or as FOX put it, pushing his energy agenda, specifically cap-and-trade (although Obama did not mention cap-and-trade). They complained that the speech was dull. Almost all the pundits didn’t get it, except Ed (the Ed Show), who exactly understood the entire speech and said that this was why he likes the President – because “he is in the top 5% of the smartest people in this nation.” In other words, our President is smarter than the average bear.

But why did no one get it?

CNN talked to Paul J.J. Payack, a language analyst who said the President’s prose was too complex. He said the President’s comments on Tuesday night, written to a 9.8 grade level, went way over the head of most viewers. According to the National Assessment of Adult Literacy, the average American reads at around an 8th grade level – with average listening comprehension hovering somewhere between 8th and 9th grade.

The speech was not dumbed down enough. It needed to be on the level of my middle schoolers – most of whom did not pay attention unless I constantly moved around the room, stopped to ask questions, and used a good bit of wit. The speech needed average words and only one punch line – the same way I taught my students – one concept at a time, then reiterate many times until you see their light bulbs go on. Anything more than that and… our nation of ADD, like, you know, plugged-in scatter-brains don’t get it.

Payack revealed his results on Wednesday, the same day that BP Chairman Carl-Henric Svanberg said his company cared “about the small people” – and a day before BP CEO Tony Hayward was preparing his own written remarks to be presented to Congress. Many analysts mocked the BP chairman for talking “down” to the American public. Yet, according to Payack, Obama apparently should have dumbed down his speech a bit more.

Payack specifically criticized Obama’s 20-word average per sentence, as well as the speech’s average word length of 5 letters. The language expert said in doing so the President “added some comprehension difficulty for his target audience.” Since the speech went over the heads of most, it obscured his messages because most listeners just didn’t get it.

This particular analysis of Tuesday’s speech contrasted sharply with other Obama speeches. The “Yes, We Can” victory speech, for example, was written for grade 7.

Is it possible that Tuesday’s explanation of the Gulf oil spill may have simultaneously been Obama’s smartest as an orator – and at the same time, his poorest, because he did not dumb it down enough for the average bear?

The pundits thought it was poor. What does that say about the average pundit?

And what does that say about the average American?

Ahhh…so that’s why so many Americans loved Bush – he spoke on their level – below it, actually.

A hole in my heart

Sorry... but I feel compelled to write about this subject again. I just had another visit with my parents this past weekend. It has taken me about five days to pull out of the ensuing depression. They always find a way to throw subtle barbs at me. Others who are in the room may see it as “joking”, but it isn’t. Some people who are astutely observant will notice the undercurrent of contempt toward me.

My husband saw it from day one when he met them. It almost caused him to not marry me – because when you marry someone, you marry their family. Now he tries to protect me by deflecting the barbs – but he misses many of them. He will only realize what happened when I point it out to him later on, at home, when I am crumpled and in tears.

I cannot say anything right around them. I can't even breathe right to suit them.

You can divorce an abusive spouse. You can call it quits if your lover mistreats you. But what can you do if the source of your misery is your own parent(s)? You either cut down on the visits (I’ve cut mine down to about 4 per year) or completely cut things off. I have not had the courage to completely cut things off because if I do so, I will lose my sisters.

Granted, no parent is perfect. And whining about parental failure, real or not, is practically an American pastime that keeps the therapeutic community dutifully employed. But just as there are ordinary parents who mysteriously produce a difficult child, there are decent people who have the misfortune of having a truly toxic parent.

The assumption that all parents are programmed to love their children unconditionally and protect them from harm is not universally true. I know of a really nice person who has been treated for depression throughout her life due to difficulty dealing with her aging mother. The mother has always been extremely abusive of her. She said, “Once, on my birthday, she left me a message wishing that I would get a disease and die. Can you believe it?”

Over the years, she has tried to have a relationship with her mother, but the encounters were always painful and upsetting; her mother remained harshly critical and demeaning. Whether her mother was mentally ill, just plain mean, or both, was unclear. But there was no question that my friend had decided long ago that the only way to deal with her mother was to avoid her at all costs. Yet, when her mother was approaching death, she was torn about whether there should be another effort at reconciliation. Should she visit and perhaps forgive her mother even though her mother will probably once again be extremely abusive toward her and cause her great emotional pain? Or should she protect herself and live with a sense of guilt from “abandoning” her mother, however unjustified?

I have had to deal with the same problem with my parents. Through the years several of my therapists have had a bias to salvage the relationship, even if harmful to me. Most have not been open-minded as to whether maintaining the relationship is really healthy and desirable. And I have found that this is probably due to very little, if any, training in this area. The topic gets little attention in standard textbooks or in the psychiatric literature, perhaps reflecting the common and mistaken notion that adults, unlike children and the elderly, are not vulnerable to emotional abuse.

But we are vulnerable – because with every visit, the healing wound is once again opened until, one day, it can no longer heal at all. My wound does not scab over anymore. I have become extremely sensitive to their words.

My last counselor was stunned by my parents’ implacable hostility toward me – their constant berating – the history of physical and emotional abuse – and became convinced that they were a psychological menace to me. He suggested that for my well-being I might consider, at least for now, forgoing a relationship with them. I have tried to do so, but my conscience or my feelings of obligation (not love) has kept me from being successful at cutting things off. Maybe I have been brainwashed by them, but I felt this was a drastic measure. Yet, in not doing so, I cannot escape the truckload of negative feelings and thoughts that I have internalized due to their abuse.

Of course, relationships are rarely all good or bad; even the most abusive parents can sometimes show love, which is why severing a bond can be a tough decision. Research on early attachment, both in humans and in nonhuman primates, shows that we are hard-wired for bonding – even to those who are not very nice to us. It is similar to an abused pet still being loyal to its master. Though terribly hurt and angry, many survivors of child abuse try to get their abusive parents to change their ways and love them.

Parental abuse of their children, whether physical or mental, can cause lifetime depression at the very least, chronic PTSD at its worst, and an extremely low self esteem. It is no stretch to say that having a toxic parent is harmful to a child’s brain, let alone his feelings. Brains can mend by removing or reducing stress. Prolonged stress can kill cells in the hippocampus, a brain area critical for memory. We know that although prolonged childhood trauma can be toxic to the brain, young adults retain the ability to rewire their brains through new positive experiences, therapy, and psychotropic medication. But the only way to truly mend the brain of a survivor of child abuse is to cut the ties with the abuser(s).

Dr. Judith Lewis Herman, a trauma expert who is a clinical professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, wrote, “Sometimes we consider a paradoxical intervention and say to a patient, ‘I really admire your loyalty to your parents — even at the expense of failing to protect yourself in any way from harm.’ ” She tries to empower her patients to take action to protect themselves without giving direct advice to cut ties. The hope is that her patients will come to see the psychological cost of a harmful relationship and act to change it. As drastic as it sounds, an adult survivor of child abuse is much better off letting go of a toxic parent.

That’s just it: we survivors do see the harm. We just have trouble letting go because it means we will never be loved by Mom or Dad.

I have greatly reduced my visits with my parents, but their absence in my life is never far from my thoughts. At first I thought I missed them. Now I realize that it is the loving childhood I never had that I miss. It left a hole in my heart that can never be filled.

No magic wand

According to the pundits, Gulf Coast residents are supposedly mad at President Obama for not keeping the oil from threatening their beaches and marshes. We hear this from political opposition on the right and liberal pundits on the left bored by the president's cerebral approach to problem-solving. But when you actually talk to the people down there, many believe that Obama gave the problem his attention from the beginning and is doing all he can to help. The majority of the coastal people blame BP for the problem. (I know this because I know some people who live there.)

Obama's campaign for president cultivated a myth of godlike powers for the immature – and some still want to buy into the magic narrative, showing disdain toward Obama for not showing some emotion and fixing the problem right now – pundits Savannah Guthrie on MSNBC and James Carville on CNN come to mind. Another, columnist Maureen Dowd, wrote that "Barack Obama is a guy who is accustomed to having stuff go right for him." (Huh? Ms. Dowd is obviously bored and cannot find anything else to write about.) Sunday talk show panelists parroted her idea, followed by "and now look what's happening to him": A vast oil spill brings disaster in the Gulf; Israel complicates Mideast diplomacy by killing would-be blockade breakers; and the new job numbers are lousy.

Also on the left, Atlantic writer Joshua Green criticizes Obama for "his abiding faith in the judgment of experts." Columnist Frank Rich agrees: Whether the subject is the oil spill or the troubled campaign in Afghanistan or even predicting future unemployment rates, Obama has erred by relying on experts. Solving these problems "may be beyond the reach of marathon brainstorming by brainiacs," Rich writes, "even if the energy secretary is a Nobel laureate."

If not brainiac experts, just who should Obama be listening to? Should he check his horoscope like the Reagans did or just 'follow his gut' like Bush did or 'feel our pain' like Clinton did? The worst Obama decisions – going passive during the health care ruckus and pushing for new offshore drilling – were because he did not listen to science, economic and military experts, but from listening to his political advisers. For the oil spill, he is listening to the best science and military advisors available – just as he should.

Obama's "magic" was in campaign politics – now he has to work to solve problems with which any president would have a tough time. There has never been a time in history when a president did not have to deal with bad, scary problems. For example, the economy is a long-term and structural challenge, made tougher by the recent recession. No one is going to cheer a 9.7 percent jobless rate, even if it was a tad below April's. But it would probably have gone a lot higher without the stimulus. The stimulus did not end the scourge of high unemployment – it just kept us from going into a depression. It kept us from going over the cliff.

I do agree with Obama's critics who complain that plans to expand offshore drilling before cleaning up Minerals Management Service – which is supposed to regulate the industry – was hasty. The administration is now reversing plans on deepwater offshore drilling pending an investigation of what went wrong. But those on the right are complaining Obama has not stopped the crisis a mile underwater. Apparently, these detractors would only accept his actions if he were to put on a cape, dive to the bottom of the Gulf, and suck up every last bit of oil in one huge breath, expelling it directly into an oil refinery which BP would refine and deliver to the American population for free as penance. Then they want him is to use god-like strength to plug the hole.

Some on the left are asking why the administration put faith in BP's early reports about the blowout. Who else is supposed to stop the flow? The military does not have the technology to stop oil flows a mile or more beneath the surface of the water. BP was supposed to have the technology to do that.

What is the proper government response? Do what it can to keep as much oil as possible from shore, and to clean up the oil on the shore and in the water, as BP tries to fix the well. The administration is doing that with all resources presently available. For those who say that we need ships from the military out there – navy tankers are already out there. For those who say other nations should send vessels – not many other nations have the capability to drill or capture oil from the ocean.

What went wrong? I think we will find that BP cut corners to hurry up the drilling and start the profit-making oil flowing. I think we will find that BP pushed the envelope beyond its own expertise in drilling the world’s first deepwater oil well. I think we will find that BP lied to MMS about its capability to clean up a spill. And we will find that MMS was negligent in its oversight of the oil industry. BP’s arrogance would be similar to NASA sending a man to the moon before the technology to bring him back had been developed.

To those who want Obama to “lose it” just once: I prefer a calm leader who works with the most respectable expert opinions he can find. If you stop to think about it, this is what America really wants. In dealing with a crisis, Obama may not make the grade as a god, but as an intelligent man playing a tough hand, he is really doing as well as any human could do – better than Reagan or Bush did with their crises. Listen up, you immature whiners (yes, I am speaking to you, James Carville): stopping the waves from bringing the oil to shore is a job for Neptune, or BP, not the president. Obama cannot raise a magic wand and force the oil back into the hole. There are things he can do, but they are not exciting enough for the punditry.

The pundits are stirring the pot, as they always do, because they are bored. They are bored with the war in Afghanistan. They are bored with Iran. They are bored with the recession. They are bored with the Middle East. They must have something, anything, to hyperventilate over 24-7 to get their ratings up. So they are now hyperventilating over President Obama not cleaning the oil up ‘fast enough.’ They are hyperventilating over Obama not emoting enough – not showing enough anger to suit them.

It is easy to sit back and criticize without having to give real solutions. I would like to see these critics do a better job than Obama in cleaning up the oil and stopping the spill – which they cannot do because no one has a magic wand to make it all go away.

They speak with forked tongues

It is always interesting to watch the small-government politicians and their small-government-no-taxes constituents scream for “guvmint” to provide money and clean up whatever catastrophe has recently happened. Many are now screaming for the Obama administration, including the military, to push BP aside and put a stop to the oil spill themselves (as if government has the expertise and the equipment to do so). Just a few months ago they were protesting “guvmint’s” interference in their lives as in “cut my taxes”, or “no taxes”, or “you shouldn’t make me buy health insurance” or “get off my back.”

Now they want mother government to take care of them – and for President Obama to go down there the moment the catastrophe happened to hold their hands and soothe their pain. It is interesting how the gulf-state conservatives' suddenly found respect for the powers and money of the federal government due to a catastrophe in their own backyard.

Case in point: Senator David Vitter (R-LA), a hardened foe of big government, posted an item on his campaign Web site about the huge oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. "I strongly believe BP is spread too thin," he wrote. He thinks it would be a better arrangement if federal and state officials would do the dirty work of protecting and cleaning up the coast instead of BP.

Then came word from the Pentagon that Alabama, Florida and Mississippi – governed by conservatives who believe in low taxes and limited government even to the point of not providing for good schools, roads, bridges, etc – want the federal government to mobilize more National Guard troops to aid in the cleanup (at taxpayer expense, of course). That followed an earlier request by the Republican governor of Louisiana, Bobby Jindal, another limited government believer, who issued a statement saying he had called the Obama administration "to outline the state's needs" and to ask "for additional resources. These resources are critical."

“BP is the responsible party, but we need the federal government to make sure they are held accountable and that they are indeed responsible. Our way of life depends on it,” said Governor Jindal, a constant critic of big government. He is blasting the White House for not doing enough to stem the oil flow in the Gulf! This is the same guy who decried the government doing volcano monitoring. It seems obvious that what is really going on here is political calculation. Jindal’s ambitions have always extended beyond the bayou: He was not shy about blasting Obama’s stimulus package as “irresponsible” while accepting a large amount of the money. He also positioned himself as a responsible Republican voice on healthcare — dismissing the House plan as “radical,” but urging Republicans not to abandon the process.

Alabama, Florida, and Mississippi also have asked for more federal help. Senators Richard Shelby and Jeff Sessions of Alabama and George LeMieux of Florida, flew over the gulf with small-government Republican Rep. Jeff Miller (FL). Sessions, probably the Senate's most ardent supporter of tort reform, extolled the virtues of litigation against BP.

"They're not limited in liability on damage, so if you have suffered damages, they are the responsible party," said Sessions, sounding very much like the trial lawyers he usually maligns. "We're here to send the message that we're going to do everything we can from a federal level to mitigate this to protect the people and make sure when people are damaged that they are made whole."

"They're not too big to fail," Sessions said. "If they can't pay and they've given it everything they've got, then they should cease to exist." If you believe that the federal government will not be on the hook for a major part of the costs, perhaps you would like to buy a leaky oil well in the Gulf of Mexico.

Congressman Thad Cochran of Mississippi, a far-right leaning Republican, says he is making sure “the federal government is doing all it can.” Another limited-government conservative, Senator Roger Wicker, also of Mississippi, says he will “make sure the federal government is poised to assist in every way necessary.” All these limited-government guys expressed their belief that British Petroleum (BP) would cover all the costs of the cleanup – apparently unaware that the Congress put a limit on oil company liability years ago.

"We're going to have the oil industry folks, the BP folks, in front of us on the Commerce Committee," Florida's LeMieux vowed in the news conference. "We're going to talk about these drilling issues." Oh, but not before the taxpayer sends some more big-government money down to the small-government believers of the Gulf coast area.

These conservatives speak with forked tongues. They tell their constituents how government should only exist for defense and should not provide for the welfare of the people and then turn around and ask the federal government to spend taxpayer’s money to clean op the oil mess. Yet, their regions already get about 30% more money from Washington than they send to Washington – receiving much more than their counterparts in Democratic states.

An analysis of data from the nonpartisan Tax Foundation by Washington Post database specialist Dan Keating found that people in states that voted Republican were by far the biggest beneficiaries of federal spending. In states that voted strongly Republican, people received an average of $1.50 back from the federal government for every dollar they paid in federal taxes. In moderately Republican states, the amount was $1.19. In moderately Democratic states, people received on average of 99 cents in federal funds for each dollar they paid in taxes. In strongly Democratic states, people got back just 86 cents on the tax dollar.

Personally, I think we need big government, not just for defense, but to provide a safety net for all the people – and to be there when disasters happen. Although it is likely a temporary attitude, this ecological catastrophe has Gulf coast conservatives’ crying out for the aid and purse of the federal government – a timely reminder for all that government is necessary. As conservatives in Washington complain about excessive federal spending, the ones who would suffer the most from spending cuts are their own constituents.

Oh yes, they have forked tongues, indeed.