Could Guffanti be a Psychopath?

As I think about Guffanti and his complete lack of awareness or acknowledgement of the damage he has done to our VUSD schools and children, I cannot help but wonder if he has some kind of mental condition. Psychopath may sound very harsh. Even as I type the word it feels over the top, but I read a sentence in the New York Times today in an article analyzing Bernie Madoff (of the 50 billion dollar Wall Street Ponzi scheme) that seemed to not only describe Madoff but also Guffanti as well. The sentence made me consider the possibility that Guffanti's mental problems might actually fit into the category of psychopath. Here is the sentence:

“Some of the characteristics you see in psychopaths are lying, manipulation, the ability to deceive, feelings of grandiosity and callousness toward their victims,” says Gregg O. McCrary, a former special agent with the F.B.I. who spent years constructing criminal behavioral profiles.

Guffanti lies. He manipulates the truth. (for instance claiming the built more schools than any other trustee in VUSD history when what he did was to reflexively oppose and impede the construction of schools at every turn).

Guffanti deceives. Jill Parvin, Dan Piro and a small band of credulous believers repeat every lie Guffanti comes up with as though it were Gospel. They are still deceived by his lies.

Guffanti definitely has feelings of grandiosity. He once told me that his unique treatments of his mother in law saved her life when no other physician in the country could have. He constantly says he built a record number of schools in VUSD (that number keeps going up--last time I believe he claimed to have built 12). He believes that only his views of schools are correct. He has special knowledge that public schools are failures and all unions are made of evil thugs. Any school board member endorsed by school teachers is owned by the union. He knows this because he has some special mind reading power that allows him to discern the motives of others. He believes he is more special than any one else.

He is also completely callous to his victims the students of the district. Our students were kept in two very over crowded high school campuses at least a decade longer than necessary largely because of his unceasing opposition to a local bond issue not to mention his opposition to all state school construction bonds that might have helped. In his last term on our school board, he and Gibson refused to be the NECESSARY fourth vote to acquire land to build the third high school. Their refusal cost the district between 17 and 25 million dollars which dried up our school bond funds. Yet Guffanti does not care. He never apologizes. He is completely callous to his victims.

Could Guffanti be a psychopath?

Addendum at 12:50pm 1/23/09, I just spoke with my youngest son who has a BS in psychology and Cognitive Science from UCSD. He told me that psychopath is not a clinical term. It is a broad and general term. It is so general that some people who can be described as psychopaths might actually feel remorse after the fact. Guffanti never expresses remorse or guilt or accepts responsibility for his actions, therefore, the general term psychopath does not fit him. However there is clinical term for those who cannot feel remorse or guilt, that term is sociopath. So let me end with the more appropriate psychology question, could Dr. Stephen Guffanti be a sociopath?