What’s the Matter with Trump?
It’s hard to classify Donald Trump according to standards most of us would easily recognize. As a trust fund baby, he’s a work-a-holic. As a builder, he has mostly stopped building. He was a bust as a casino owner (the “house” lost!). The Republican candidate for the Presidency eschews Republican orthodoxy. He flouts more GOP leaders, pundits and lawmakers than he does Democrats.
Some people might see these as the signs of an iconoclast. Some might see them as the characteristics of an incipient strong man. Some might see them as the standard foibles of a poor little rich kid. Some might see them as marks of genius. Some might see them as symptoms of a deeper, darker pathology. Some might see them as GOP SOP to the Nth degree.
All of those are true.
Whatever set of circumstances led him there, Donald Trump has such a fragile ego, he is so beset by his own shortcomings, that he has spent a lifetime trying to convince himself and others that there ARE no shortcomings. Rather than being sub-average, or just average, or even slightly-above-average in anything, Donald Trump must be SUPERLATIVE in everything. His every pronouncement reads like a 4th-grader’s MadLib of self-congratulation: “I [am/have] the [superlative adjective] [personal characteristic] ever. My [noun] is the [superlative adjective][noun] of all time. You will be so tired of [superlative adjective][verb+”ing”] you will ask me to stop. Believe me!”
My whatever is [superlative adj] your whatever.
You’re either a part of me, or you’re against me.
The only compliments he reserves are for people, places or things (nouns) that he sees as complimentary to him, or as extensions of himself. This is the deepest reach of his pathology, his narcissism: the value he attaches to anything is only as an extension of his ego, as a part of himself. It’s why he slaps his name on anything that sits still long enough. It’s not possession; it’s assimilation.
With this as a foundation, all the rest of it follows. Any institution or sacred cow that is not the Donald must be torn down: iconoclast. Anybody not me must be weaker than me or beaten down: strong man. I deserved to be born to privilege, and I deserve even more, and I will pound my spoon on my highchair until I get it: poor little rich kid. I may be an idiot in most things, but I can fake my way past most Americans and bullshit, bluster and browbeat smarter people into making me look good, to the point where they give me a TV show and pay me for the use of my name and even nominate me for President: savant syndrome.
But none of this would have been possible if the GOP had not laid the groundwork for just such an empty suit. If you begin with the premise that everything that is “us” is good and everything that is “them” is not just bad, but an existential threat to “us” and then design a political strategy around it, you end up with the Republican Party of the past 30 years. It doesn’t matter what policy we promote, so long as it is the opposite of “them.” It has grown over the years to proportions that would be laughable if they weren’t so sad. The well-known meeting on the night of Obama’s first inauguration to plan the obstruction that would limit him to one term merely formalized a strategy that had been in place for years.
Each aspect of this strategy – the anti-minority legislation, the anti-immigration stance, the anti-gay hatred, the anti-science rhetoric, the anti-education antipathy, the anti-democracy suppression – is designed to empower and cajole a certain segment of the electorate to provide an unreasoning, unreasonable “base” that will vote for them without looking too closely at what’s going on, certainly without dispassionately reviewing two sides of a policy issue.
But now it’s become not “liberals stand for everything I hate” but rather “I hate everything liberals stand for.” And that is the end of discussion and compromise. It’s why you have the cognitive dissonance of Obamacare and Cap and Trade – both born of Republican ideas – being anathema to the very party that bore them. It’s why Donald Trump can know nothing about an issue and take both sides of it in the same conversation, and not leave his base voters scratching their heads and wondering if this guy has a screw loose or something.
Spoiler Alert: YES!!!
Donald embodies all of that and takes it far beyond the pale. “Not us” is bad, not from the tribal sense that they are “not us” but from the Trumpian narcissism of “us” just being an extension of “me.” These things are not an existential threat to the hegemony of “us” but an actual existential threat to Donald’s rickety glass house of a soul. It explains why his policies do not settle somewhere to the right of center or to the left of center. Because a policy becomes good as soon as Donald likes it, and bad as soon as he doesn’t. The Democratic Party is not “them;” they’re “not me.” The Republicans who refuse to play ball are not erring members of “us;” they’re just “not me.” It’s why his children are so extolled and trusted by him: literally half their DNA is his; they are actual physical manifestations of Trump’s “ME.” Of course he’d date his daughter: it’s the closest he can come to actually dating himself!
If the man got breast implants, I doubt he’d ever leave his room.
Can we take up a collection?
Seen through this lens, then, the Republican half of the Trump phenomenon makes so much sense. But this construct was lost on virtually everyone, most especially the media. They treated him like a rational actor in the political game. But he’s not playing by the same rules, he’s not searching for the same outcome. Trump wants to be President not so that he can rule the world.
He wants to be President so that, once and for all, he can say he is the greatest winner of all time. Once and for all, everyone will have to give him respect and take him seriously. Once and for all, his fragile ego will have Secret Service protection.
Donald Trump wants to be President so that, once and for all, his false sense of superlativity will feel true.
Spotted him as a malignant narcissist right off the bat. Thanks, grad school psych degree! He will take his own self down. Trouble is, he might take a lot of other innocent people with him.
1Primo. Not knowing anything about you other than what I’ve read here, I have no idea if you’ve ever been published. I DO know that this should be published. Somehow. Some way. Please. And thanks.
2And even if he gets to be president he STILL win’t be happy because nothing will ever be enough. Ever.
3Krauthammer does a great job on Trump in todays Washington Post. Remember Krauthammer is a fully qualified psychiatrist.
4Primo, thanks for a great post. Developmentally, somewhere around the age of two, humans go through a phase where they can’t distinguish where they end and the actual world begins. Everything, in other words, is “me.” Most of us are out of it before kindergarten …
5Excellent post, Primo, Sharing!
6Primo. You are consistent! Normally I would have an Ad-lib at the ready when I read other folks comments. An A+ column with no addendum.
7Indeed, tRump is the e-pit-ome of the Republic’s devolution; PE nails it again…
.
The following is just the tip of the R’berg:
“The well-known meeting on the night of Obama’s first inauguration to plan the obstruction that would limit him to one term…”
To give just ONE example of their perfidy– the developing mosquito-borne Zika virus pandemic:
The R’s have been crippling all reasonable government efforts to minimize and mitigate this expanding plague.
Could anything they do anything more dangerous or ultimately expensive (in both human and financial) terms? Hell NO.
They have blocked expenditures to fight Zika tooth and nail in Congress.
**Just the future financial costs of caring for our (in the continental US now, don’t even think of Puerto Rico or the rest of the world…) yet-borne, ill-fated, innocent, babies, who will be born to a lifetime of the damage done by Zika, will exceed what Democrats and President Obama have attempted to timely budget to the NHS, et al., by a huge, exponential amount. The costs will be staggering to care for those innocents (but, but, “Pro-Life”…)
**These people are criminals!
(and I used to/still live in the only US continental area that had, and still has, a significant incidence of ‘exotic’ diseases unseen in other US locations; it is probably where the next Zika outbreak will occur beyond S. FL.)
.
“I hate everything liberals stand for.”
Fixed, this reads: “I hate liberals.”. Because that is where it’s at now, boys and girls.
.
And my own view: If a certain colorful T’branded 757 heavy crashed down the road one day soon, I wouldn’t piss on the flames…
8Nailed it, Primo. It’s easy to sum him up as a narcissist and insecure bully, but you’ve added the details and the frame and explained the whole picture.
And yes, Gindy51, I agree that nothing will ever be enough for that sad little man.
9Oh, and a special thumbs up for “If he got breast implants, he’d never leave his room.”
10Great summary of what the RKlan has become…”anti-gay, anti-minority, anti-science, anti-education, anti-immigration, anti women’s equality and anti-democratic voting”. In short, the party of NO! to anything that smacks of enlightenment.
11They have tried to usher in a new Dark Age and Drumpf is just the ignorant lord to lead that crusade. As always, Primo, good reading.
He’s like an old comic’s character Major Hoople who was a bazzare braggart prone to outrageous boasting.
12And the people who desperately need to read this either won’t, or won’t believe it. But we’ll keep trying!
13@Old Quaker-Today’s Washington post column by David Ignatius is an excellent complement to Krauthammer. Ignatius dissects the irrational obstinacy of Trump’s hard-core fanatical following.
14And he has a 40% chance of wining. If you put 1 Cartage in a 6 shooter and put it to your head and pull the trigger you have a 20% chance of killing your self. Most of us won’t play that game. If there was ever a time to get out the vote, this is it. I can’t believe the rethugs. would do this to the country they say they love. The smarter ones are bailing out, the others are going down with the ship. [I hope,] Or are they taking the rest of us down?
15In Tiffany Thayers’ 1931 version of “The Three Musketeers” (banned in Chicago!) the character of Porthos was limned as a “blustering, blundering braggart who never backed down, but only added more lies and threats…”
16Thank you, Primo. Once again.
(But, if you want to influence the snacilbupeR base you just got to find a way to use smaller words.)
17“Remember Krauthammer is a fully qualified psychiatrist.”
yes, yes he is. unfortunately, he himself went batshit crazy a couple of decades ago.
18“(But, if you want to influence the snacilbupeR base you just got to find a way to use smaller words.)”
sadly, it isn’t possible to construct whole sentences, with single letter words.
19And now … the Trumpster is trying to turn the revolving door so it looks like … according to dear Dumbo Donald … that, no, it’s not him who has come unraveled, unhinged, gone totally off the rails … oh, no … his spiel today is that this now identifies Hillary … not him!!
I wonder what he sees when he looks in a mirror!! Because he sure as hell doesn’t see nor recognize himself!!
20At least 20 – 25 years ago Trump did a commercial for, I think Visa Cards in which he actually dumpster dived to rescue his card (accidentally blown off the balcony of his tower, I guess). At the time, sort of aware that this was a rich and powerful businessman my only thought was “WTH? Why is he doing this”. I never respected him after that, and never watched any of his ego-demolishing TV shows either. I would rather read pork belly futures.
21cpinva: Well, one can hope. I know… cock-eyed optimist. Maybe crayon drawings would help. No?
22This is an excellent analysis. Thank you, but it leaves me very much wanting to share it with my sisters. I suspect others feel the same way. To that end, would it be possible to update this
23site to allow emailing of articles or comments to others?? I often use this feature provided when I write into the NYT website. I have no idea how this magic is performed but the quality of the writing here is often very good and it seems a shame to not be able to share it. Or, am I all wet??
Olympics. Opening Ceremonies. Beautiful. Lots of people. Who scheduled that during a U.S. election year? Something fishy about that! Amiright? We need to look into who did that. Something’s rigged.
— Donald Trump on the Olympics
(Yeah. Just me being snarky.)
24I knew it! He really does have small hands. (And surely a teeny weeny as well.)
https://goo.gl/A59VSM
25Mark Schlemmer, I often share posts or comments. Copy and Paste to an email form isn’t difficult.
26What’s the matter with Trump? Everything. Simple.
27Exactly!
28Rubymay… YOU WIN TODAY!! It’s Saturday now and Trump has fallen off the wagon… AGAIN! Just go Google up the news. It’s Japan now. Boy, is he gonna get alot of Ginzu knives thrown his way.
29The thesis of this article is borne out by the evidence, but there is something much more troubling: Trump may be quite literally out of his mind.
30http://www.salon.com/2016/04/25/maybe_donald_trump_has_really_lost_his_mind_what_if_the_gop_frontrunner_isnt_crazy_but_simply_not_well/
Somebody up thread was talking about toddlers and “me” – as I recall the other favorite word was “NO” so we had “ME”, “MINE”, and “NO” and I remember whole bellicose dialogues between my two kiddos made up of only those three words! Tedious. Just like our Congress! Tedious! I mean, when Lindsay Graham would be preferable and W Bush sounds like a sane man, you know you are living in those “interesting times” the ancient curse threatened, good grief!
31Do the Scotties or the Irish hate him worse? Well, they’ve joined forces!
http://www.irishcentral.com/culture/craic/Crowd-loves-this-Kilarney-buskers-song-for-Donald-Trump-VIDEO.html?utm_source=Mailjet&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=Best%20of%20IrishCentral%20-%202016-Aug-6
32Hey, Donald, if Coleman Sweeney ended up doing something right, maybe there’s hope for you yet!
https://youtu.be/TeVLxcekEsw
33Scott, I read the Salon article. Today in Wapo Katherine Gerston said something similar. She described having a concussion and the symptoms and personality changes that resulted. She said the symptoms are gone, but it took a year. Gerston said that experience has led her to wonder if Scumpf has a brain injury or the early stages of some type of dementia.
34His bloated sense of superiority is exactly why trump must never be president. His response of ” we have nukes, why can’t I use them?” This is the response of a narcicistic sociopath who will probably end quite badly and take any and everyone near him down too.
35Tilphousia: And the serial rapist says “I have a penis, why can’t I use it”. And the ammosexual says “I have a gun, why can’t I use it”. Birds of a feather…
36And I don’t want to be pissy, but can we all avoid this rush to a logical and compassionate explanation for Trump’s outrageousness? I used to be that way when I was young. “Oh, they can’t really be that bad… there must be another reason.” Well, I finally stopped that silliness when a psychotherapist friend said “Sometimes a chair is just a chair. Don’t look for the hidden cause because there may not be one. A jerk can just be a jerk. Deal with it.”
I see things alot clearer now.
37Mark @ 23: https://juanitajean.com/whats-the-matter-with-trump
38President Hillary keeps telling me she is awesome at making deals with this club of terrorist bigots.
Nothing tastes better than half a loaf of nazism.
BUT, BUT… she-is-Not-Trump.
We need to worry about the general philosophy of Republicanism more than we need to worry about it’s failing leader, Herr Trump.
The DNC still thinks it can convert Republicans rather than rally its base.
After 8 years of obstruction against Obama this is beyond stupid, its insulting.
Bipartisanship is for suckers. Smash the GOP.
39Donnie Drumpf obviously is not prepared to pivot presidential. The real question is what previously unknown gas keeps his ego inflated. We all know that ego has to land, whether it be in one or all 3 debates he is already attempting to avoid, or he can take the high altitude crash from a landslide electoral defeat.
As with most everything in our lives, Jane was calm and most reasonable at being unable to attend the DNC convention due to the imminent arrival of Jack Paul. I think I took that harder than she did. So to thank first and foremost, Jane, I had booked rooms for us and both sets of our ‘rents to attend the Las Vegas debate. Jane and the ‘rents are the political animals in our family. If only KJ and Jack were older, I was looking forward to attending with our sons to share with them all the sports metaphors expressing Hilz’ complete rout of Donnie Drumpf.
40https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-x0rhZYahe34/V6bxzhfevSI/AAAAAAAAQ6Q/lFjt-MsPKMcNWtoJDN-O3rFlaXO_ARBwwCLcB/s400/cartoon10-BenneC20160804_low.jpg
41PKM –
The Ego Has Landed?
I think you just uncovered Trump’s real campaign slogan!
42Lunargent, I gave Donnie too much credit. He does not deserve “landed.” His over inflated ego is sputtering around the room like a balloon that was never properly tied, losing gas, and looking for a place to flop. So for a campaign slogan, maybe “the ego has flopped”?
When political geniuses and historians like JuanitaJeanHerownself, daChipster and Primo do the postmortem on all that was the Donnie Drumpf campaign, predictions are that we’ll be looking at “the ego with no clothes.”
Napoleon met his Waterloo. Donnie will meet his Cinco de Mayo. That would be Hilz batting him around like a piñata, if he makes any of the debates or doesn’t deflate before he’s stomped in the general election.
😀 I’ll leave to all the commentators who have studied psychology to predict Donnie’s ego out moment. Prior to labor Day would benefit the snacilbupeR, so I’m betting this ego challenged petulant brat will hang on until after that date and sometime prior to the first debate, Bloody Monday, Sept 26th.
If the pool is still open, place my chips all in for 9/15 as Donnie’s ego flop date.
43PKM, re Trump as piñata– I don’t regard him as a cheerful and colorful dispenser of treats to children. I regard him as something which should be hit with a stick until it breaks open.
44Rhea, just like the live Donnie Drumpf, empty; the toys and candy are sold separately.
https://www.amazon.com/Extra-Large-Donald-Trump-Pinata/dp/B0112VY6JG
In a debate with Hilz, he will feel like he’s being beaten with a stick.
45Scumpf is crying about how mean the media is. About the NY Times he said, “They don’t write good. Nobody there knows how to write good.”
The scummy Scumpf is a gold mine of idiocy.
46PKM!!! A Trump pinata! That is soooo perfect. Just think of the uses? Of course, the mouth looks like the mouth on a blow-up sex doll (so I’m told) but I’m sure it would make a nice fire. Better yet, I’ll get two, one on either side of the door for Halloween! That should frighten the neighbors. Excellent!
47JAKvirginia, I don’t even want any candy for Halloween this year. I’ve been a good boy and all I want is reassurance that I won’t wake up in November with the Chuckie/Donnie Dork as our next president. When I was a young boy on the edge of manhood, I couldn’t vote which left me serving Dubya/Darth Dickhead a few years later. That was so wrong in so many ways that I won’t list them now.
Instead, for the sake of my sons, I am prepared to swallow the bitter Hilz pill, hope the GOPigs go all Hannibal Lector on themselves, but and forgive me for this. The 2016 cycle has seemed endless, beginning in 2008 with the traitors who met to make President Obama a one term President and for 8 years have obstructed him every inch of the way. Abetted by Tommie Cotton who committed treason with his ‘better’ Senate elders as his cheering squad. I am looking ahead to 2020 with no Tea Bag influence in Congress, a Congress that actually works AND no more corporate Blue Dog Dems like Debbie STFU Schultz.
2020. Yes, let’s be free of the snacilbupeR. But let’s move forward and be free of the triangulating corporate Dems, too.
Hug the Hilz? Meh. But she is at least a step in the correct direction, while Donnie is beginning to make Kim Jong Jiggly appear to be a statesman.
48PKM: Don’t look too far down that road or you’ll miss 2018. The Congress needs Dems, too. Just sayin’.
49“If the man got breast implants, I doubt he’d ever leave his room.”
So stealing that one. Sorry.
50