Category: Trump and Trump-hatred

How was Trump’s State of the Union speech?

by philg

I had to attend an aviation event this evening and then proceed to the gym for my annual workout. So I missed the Trumpenfuhrer’s speech at the Reichstag. How was it?

Are people who didn’t vote for Trump shocked and horrified by his continuing failure to do the stuff that they want him to do? I found that in Manhattan last week. My elite (either through wealth or education) friends there continued to express their shock that Trump was doing X, Y, or Z. I would point out that they hadn’t voted for him and therefore wouldn’t it make more sense for Trump to instead do the stuff that he promised to the people who did vote for him? Answer: NO! The elite point of view is so obviously correct that they expect Trump by now to have come around to adopting it!

Update: Boston Sports Club was showing professional wrestling and State of the Union on adjacent TVs (a friend pointed out that Trump has a history with WWE).

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Trump was “paranoid” about a deep-state conspiracy…

by philg

New York Times on Donald Trump’s mental health:

  • March 4, 2017: he is frustrated by his rocky debut and increasingly paranoid about what he sees as the Vast Deep-State Conspiracy.
  • March 18, 2017: Consumed by his paranoia about the deep state, Donald Trump has disappeared into the fog of his own conspiracy theories.
  • June 17, 2017: His paranoia about the Deep State…
  • August 20, 2018: (headline: “The G.O.P.’s Climate of Paranoia“) the assertion of Trump and company that all of the tweeter in chief’s woes are the product of a vast deep-state conspiracy

Definition of paranoia:

a mental condition characterized by delusions of persecution, unwarranted jealousy, or exaggerated self-importance, typically elaborated into an organized system. It may be an aspect of chronic personality disorder, of drug abuse, or of a serious condition such as schizophrenia in which the person loses touch with reality.

What is the reality? Today the same paper that called Donald Trump “paranoid” for thinking that some of the people ostensibly working for him were actually working against him published “I Am Part of the Resistance Inside the Trump Administration,” subtitled “I work for the president but like-minded colleagues and I have vowed to thwart parts of his agenda and his worst inclinations.” The article is from “a[n anonymous] senior official in the Trump administration.”

Is it now fair to say that Donald Trump’s shortcomings do not meet the clinical definition of paranoia? Or is it instead an example of “Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t after you.”? (Catch-22)

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