Article archive / January 1, 2012
Originally published: . Volume 3, No. 5. Source pages: 2.
A few weeks ago I saw polling expert Pat Caddell on Fox who reported some disturbing findings. He surveyed voters and asked if they had “much of a say” in how government operated. To this, 64 percent said no, they did not. He asked if government operated with their consent and 71 percent said no, it did not.
“I’ve never seen anything like this,” Caddell told the reporter. He said it’s never been this bad, and his firm has been collecting data on these items since the 50s.
To the item, “The system is rigged and the treasury is being looted,” 86 percent of the voters agreed, a majority across both political spectrums. People are angry, Caddell said, at what they see going on in politics, corporations, and government.
This week ballots go out for a position on the LSBEP. Currently, the state psychology board is 60 percent medical psychologist (including the one in training). However, medical psychologists represent only 6 percent (39 people) of all those (648) licensed under our board.
What happens every election is that we go through the expense and illusion of holding a democratic effort, where licensed psychologists vote on who they believe will serve best on the board. Then LAMP goes to the governor and gets their person appointed. If that doesn’t work, they have the non-MP candidate black-balled at the Senate confirmation. This is how LAMP managed to control the LSBEP when Act 251 was passed. It was already rigged. What is being looted bit by bit is the independence of our profession, to the detriment of the consumer, for which independent psychology offers an alternative model and approach.
So this time LAMP has placed Dr. Darla Burnett on the ballot. I doubt very much that this is Dr. Burnett’s idea. But LAMP leaders seem to have a knack for getting some psychologists to go along with their plans despite the personal risk to that individual.
In fact it was Dr. Burnett, as LPA President during the passage of Act 251, who was in charge of representing LPA members and the protection of psychology. It was under Dr. Burnett’s presidency that she “monitored” Act 251 but “took no stand,” while keeping it a secret from members who would object. All evidence suggests that it was under her watch that LPA funds were used to pay Courson&Nickel to get 251 passed, since LAMP paid C&N nothing during that time period. It was under Burnett’s watch that Dr. Jim Quillin, who was the LPA Legislative Chair and her responsibility, designed 251 and cut the deal with the medical board, hacking off a chunk of psychology and subordinating it to medicine, a different profession.
Rigged and looted? Real psychologists point the way out of society’s ills, we don’t add to them. Let’s reset our bar to wisdom and integrity for all our community leaders, and then as Coach Miles would say, “play to it.”
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