According to the National Institutes of Mental Health, psychosis is defined as:
The word psychosis is used to describe conditions that affect the mind, where there has been some loss of contact with reality. When someone becomes ill in this way it is called a psychotic episode. During a period of psychosis, a person’s thoughts and perceptions are disturbed and the individual may have difficulty understanding what is real and what is not.
Having worked in the mental health field for a number of years before re-careering to politics (and If you want to classify politics as mental illness I'd be fine with that just the same), I am very familiar with those who experience impaired and distorted thinking as evidenced by an inability to relate to and understand what's true and real for the norm versus the incoherent and otherworldly reality they experience firsthand. Simply put, theirs is a world of profound confusion, conflict, inner-turmoil and inexplicable terror that is hard to share and make understandable to others.
This brings me to President Joe Biden and the Democrats, who seemingly are caught between two polarizing Americas: one is the racist America they remind us about all too often with claims that racists are lurking around every corner and behind every policy that's authored by anyone White, conservative, and Republican. The other "reality" liberals and Democrats promote is an America steeped in egalitarianism, utopian ideals, openness, acceptance, and government largess. When it comes to the latter, they frequently reference the words enshrined at the Statue of Liberty, which read as follows:
"...A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
The poem is by Emma Lazarus, and it was written before the Statue of Liberty was built. It was eventually inscribed at the base in 1903, seventeen after its completion and opening in1886. And while it continues to be used to assert a false immigration narrative that's not supported by the poem's meaning or intent, it echoes the "immigration dream" espoused by the majority of Democrats(1). Thus, we have two competing Americas promoted by one party, the Democrats, who together with their newly elected President seek to expand immigration like never before; Reuters News states that Biden's goal calls for125,000 new refugee admissions who will call America home starting October 1 of this year(2). This push drastically conflicts with "America the land of the racist" imagery promoted by Democrats through-and-through. Such was the case in February 2020 at the Democratic Primary debate, where Democratic dogma was on full display for all to see. One after the other, Democratic candidates perpetuated American racial antipathy without hesitation or qualification. Here's a snapshot from a New York Post post-debate article:
About an hour into the debate, they found their message: America, Bernie Sanders said, is “a racist society from top to bottom.”
One by one, the candidates echoed the message that “systemic racism” characterizes America.
“We can’t legislate away racism,” said Andrew Yang, because racism runs so deep in the American soul.
Joe Biden, verbatim (poor Joe): “The fact is that we in fact there is systemic racism.”
Elizabeth Warren even declared that “we need race-conscious laws in education, in employment, in entrepreneurship to make this country a country for everyone.”(3)
Again, the above is just a sample of a chorus of "racist America" rants that dominated the scene that night. But here's the rub: Democrats can't have it both ways. If America is so racist, then why is the Biden Administration set to flood America with 120,000 immigrant refugees starting October 1, 2021, the very country Biden and the Democrats scorned and professed to be systemically racist? Not only is this contradiction, it is political psychosis. To speak contradiction out of both sides of your mouth destroys credibility and defies common sense politically. To speak with a distorted sense of reality is not only negligent, it is morally reckless if what you believe about America is true and will jeopardize the safety of thousands of new arrivals. On the other hand, if you also speak of the utopian America, then your "racist America" rhetoric will have recklessly and irresponsibly tainted your new arrivals' views of America over which you obviously are conflicted. This also conflicts with the immigrants understanding of America because all they've heard and believe is America, the land of opportunity, which is why they migrated over many miles and at great risk to their lives in the first place.
Rhetoric or reality, Democrats should be held accountable for their double-talk and the confusion and harm they do to America's reputation and the psyche of newly arriving immigrants, who we all want to see flourish and embrace America for all its greatness, past, present, and future. Democrats would be well served to read one of Frederick Douglass's most famous speeches for a proper perspective on America, this from a man who truly saw and experienced unfathomable horrors for an entire race of people under the systemic brutalities of chattel slavery. HIs speech, What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?, is truly remarkable and a testament to his convictions about America, her ideals, flaws, and the essence of freedom. After a scathing rebuke of American slavery, Douglass concludes the following, a conclusion truly lacking from Democrats today given the rhetoric and political psychosis recklessly repeated ad nauseum from the mouths of their so-called leaders:
Allow me to say, in conclusion, notwithstanding the dark picture I have this day presented of the state of the nation, I do not despair of this country. There are forces in operation, which must inevitably work the downfall of slavery. “The arm of the Lord is not shortened,” and the doom of slavery is certain. I, therefore, leave off where I began, with hope. While drawing encouragement from the Declaration of Independence, the great principles it contains, and the genius of American Institutions, my spirit is also cheered by the obvious tendencies of the age.
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For an excellent and concise treatment of this poem, See Stephen Miller is right: Lazarus’ immigration poem is not US Law at https://www.aei.org/articles/stephen-miller-is-right-lazarus-immigration-poem-is-not-us-law/
Biden set to accept more refugees after years of Trump Restrictions, Reuters, Ted Hesson and Steve Holland, February 4, 2021, https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-usa-biden-refugees-order/biden-set-to-accept-more-refugees-after-years-of-trump-restrictions-idUSKBN2A50C6.
Trashing America as racist won't help Democrats beat Trump, NY Post, John Podhoretz, February 7, 2020, https://nypost.com/2020/02/07/trashing-america-as-racist-wont-help-democrats-beat-trump/