"So I called Allen Frances, the former chairman of the department of psychiatry at Duke University’s School of Medicine. Frances, who lives in Coronado, Calif., chaired the task force that produced the fourth edition of the “Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders,” or D.S.M. IV. The guy literally wrote the book on narcissistic personality disorder.
“In a historical context,” Frances told me Thursday, “I think Donald Trump may be the most narcissistic human being since Nero. His handling — or mishandling — of the pandemic and climate change is equivalent to Nero fiddling while Rome burned. He doesn’t care what happens to anyone but himself, and would be willing to have the whole country go down in flames if he feels himself stumbling.”
However, Frances does not believe Trump is sick. “It’s a mistake to call Trump crazy,” Frances said. “He’s an evil genius. There is a method to his madness. It’s directed toward self-aggrandizement, but it could not have worked if our society wasn’t crazy in the first place. He is appealing to our darkest angels.”
And some wear masks to stay alive and to (unlike Donnie) prevent deaths.
And some TikTok kids order tickets to rallies to ensure empty seats because they love Donnie so. (I know; so many MAGAts deprived of the opportunity of attending. So sad!
Can imagine, though, how it’s possible to disapprove of the most despicable and hated POTUS since the vile Tricky Dick Nixon.
Even Nixon is looked on more fondly as time passes, something I doubt will happen to Trump.
Trump can’t even manage to be seen as more capable than William Henry Harrison, who died within a month of taking office. Even George W Bush managed this during his presidency.
I wouldn’t be at all surprised if he did. He and his crowd want to repeal the 1st amendment. No wait he’s already called the Constitution “FAKE” so maybe he wants to hire a ghost writer to put out a new version without those pesky amendments thingies. You don’t see Vlad or Xi or Fatty Boy Rocket Man hampered by anything like them.
Of course as memories die or recede on one hand, and we have Trump as POTUS, it’s easy for Tricky Dick to look good in the comparo. And in fact, Nixon does look legitimately good: A har less vile a human being than Donnie and fairly competent as POTUS. I’, sure he wouldn’t want tens of thousands of Americans dying because of his incompetence.
Despite all the evil Nixon did, he also did some good too, as this group of socialists* point out. Thats something I will never be able to say about Trump.
* I’m not kidding about that, they were the first British rock band to perform in Cuba with Fidel Castro’s blessing.
That comparatively liberal track record of Nixon’s is due less to any decency on his part than understanding that not every battle has to be fought. IIRC, both houses of Congress were Democrat. BUt he got what he wanted on the big things — foreign policy, for the most part, extending the Vietnam war for four years for electoral reasons and opening up to the PRC primarily.
