It's always a great pleasure to read "The Ledger," my nomination for Central Florida‚s best newspaper. Unlike at home, I often find myself reading columns like "Dear Abby," and "Ask Amy," which tend to strengthen my strong belief that the general American public is a great psycho-social zoo. We read "self-help" books by the thousands and share our innermost secrets on Oprah. We watch, fascinated, as Dr. Phil further screws up the minds of those poor miserable wretches who go whining before the nation on his "show," and we watch Jerry Springer, with the kindred fascination that one has with the contents of the toilet bowl, just before flushing. Yet, most appealing of all are the "advice" columnists and the people who write to them.

Self-help books are apparently the most unread books sold today. If self-help books were read, and/or if their "solutions" worked, the sales of those "sugar tits" to the weak- willed would be declining by now, but their sales continue to rise. Those sales are aided by Oprah, whose personal charity one greatly admires, but whose growing role as some sort of spiritual diviner is bad for us, especially when she parades "new age" poets and soothsayers on her show with their unoriginal, and weakly "lifted," re-packaging of observations of human behavior as old as the ancient Greeks and the Old Testament. These feel-good books are also unhealthy, because they invariably use terms and phrases that are meaningless when it comes to human behavior. Here are a couple of samples: "get in touch with your inner-self," or "find the authentic you?" Those terms are basically nonsensical, and are on par with the ever popular, "finding closure." When a child is brutally murdered, the parents of that child will NEVER GET OVER IT, but most parents who are victims of such horrible life events do survive, and have done so since man first walked the earth. It is true that a parent normally finds relief from recovering and burying (memorializing) the long lost remains of a murdered loved one, but that's not "closure." Rather, a grave becomes a memorial that parents can visit, a special place to remember, and dream of what might have been, it is the mentally healthy opposite of seeking a non-existent "closure."

No amount of "psychologizing" on TV will help the parents of a murdered child feel any better. No amount of "Dr. Phil" TV programs will aid a betrayed spouse in forgetting that their mate is a liar. And no schizophrenic is likely to be aided by such modern day traveling voodoo medicine shows. However, Dr. Phil's program is ideal for reinforcing the pleasure a neurotic person feels in being "odd." Dr. Phil's "patients" are likely to get worse as the result of their publicity. But in the case of a truly mentally ill person, it's dangerous to his safety, and the safety of the community, to be on such shows as Dr. Phil's. All treatment of a mentally ill patient should be diagnosed and treated, and all counseling overseen, by a psychiatrist, who can prescribe appropriate psychotropic drugs for the alleviation of the living hell an untreated schizophrenic endures. In the space we have left, let's leave the exploitive abuse of the mentally ill and move on to the mildly neurotic letter writers to Dear Amy and Dear Abby.

Let's start with a letter to Dear Abby (Dec. 28, '05) in which a woman complains that her husband and soul mate "speaks horribly about himself several times a day." She gives several examples, "he says he's ugly," and he says he's lazy," etc. Abby replies that the writer married a man of "low self-esteem." Abby goes on to write that perhaps the husband has a childhood history of verbal abuse, which gave him his "sagging ego." Abby ends by suggesting "counseling." My take is a little different. The wife is the one with the problem. Truth be known, SHE is likely the one pointing out her mate's failures. Her entire letter suggests a passive-aggressive and controlling wife. My advice to her would be: "If you're not satisfied with your husband's "self-esteem," buy him some Viagra, since most marital problems first begin with the Sealy, I'd start there, but if that doesn't work, tell him to pack some clothes and get as far away from you and your nagging as he possibly can, pronto."

One can't leave Dear Abby without commenting on her column (Dec. 30,"05) concerning a mother's complaint that her 5-year-old daughter is a "bully." The mother writes, " a schoolmate asked my daughter for a piece of candy, and she replied, 'you don't need it, you're too fat already.'" The mother wonders where her daughter learns such things, since she had taught her child "never to call others names because they are different." The mother also appears to be worried that her five-year-old daughter boasts about being "beautiful and skinny."

Abby replies that, "I am concerned because your daughter seems unwilling to learn when you correct her, a child psychologist might help you understand what's going on." Abby and I disagree, once again. Clearly the mother is actually pleased (because she protests too much) that her child is "beautiful and skinny." Her letter is just a way to boast about her perfect little child. Here's what I advise the mother to do. When the teacher reports, as she did in several instances, that her child was "bullying" a classmate, I urge the doting dolt of a mama to take the child to her bedroom, tell her, each time she gets such a verified report of bullying, the following: "I'm going to bust your butt, exactly as I'm about to do now." A child is born into this world a little "beastie" that must be trained to live among us, and expecting a child to come to us already "socialized" (civilized) is just as silly as expecting that child to come into the world "potty trained."

We'll end today's column with "Ask Amy," and her column (Dec. 29, '05) dealing with "confused." The woman writes to Amy, "We've been married 3 years … last year he became suddenly filled with doubts … was I the one? did he ever love me? did he choose me not knowing that he had options?" The woman finally asked the husband to leave, but now he calls "countless times" wanting to come back. Seems the grass was not greener. Amy suggests: "if you truly want to be with him you two should continue counseling but--he sounds especially miserable--you should insist that he get therapeutic help." Amy, Amy, Amy, the man's not worth the effort! They apparently have no children. I say to the wife, "Leave him, permanently, before you all have babies and screw up the lives of innocent children. To take him back, after his "doubts" about your marriage, rewards his childishness. Rewarded behavior, good and bad, tends to be repeated, and nearly always when it is reinforced. At some time in his life, someone needs to show him that there are consequences for bad behavior. Apparently, he came from a home where excuses were made for "baby boy's" mistakes, even big ones. He had to learn that irresponsibility has it rewards somewhere? Show the lout the door, and go shopping, and not just for clothes!"

Finally, anyone who takes my advice, about anything, should seek immediate help.

Good Luck to Yawl in 2006!

Kenneth Kinchen is an independent writer with a background in international business and foreign service contracting.