Category Archives: Trump

The Definition of a Narcissist

Authoritarianism, Populism, Trump, Trumpism

 

Here is a short definition of “narcissistic personality disorder” based on the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 5th edition (DSM-5), the official psychological diagnosis manual:

 

Has a pervasive pattern of grandiosity. Needs and requires excessive admiration. Has a grandiose sense of self-importance. Exaggerates achievement and talents. Expects to be recognized as superior without commensurate achievements. Is preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success. Has a sense of entitlement. Lacks empathy. Takes advantage of others to achieve his or her ends.

 

Does this not describe Donald Trump perfectly? What does it say about America that millions and millions of people think he should be the president of their country?

Donald Trump: The President they Want

Trump, Trumpism

 

A couple of days ago, just past year 1 of Trump’s second term in office as President, a recent poll came out.  It showed his approval rating had dropped to  41%, the lowest since the election of 2024. My first reaction was that this was good news.  My second reaction was this is terrible news. How can that be?

 

First of all, we must remember that Donald Trump is the most famous and most well-known person in the history of the world. He is the news world-wide every single day.  Every word he utters is recorded for all to hear.  He tells us openly, and proudly, everyday who he is and what he stands for.  Everyone knows Donald Trump.  No one can be unaware of who he is or what he wants to do with his immense power.

Yet after all the scandalous, mean, corrupt, disgraceful, racist, near fascist, stupid, ignorant, narcistic, vain, actions he has shown us all, 41% of Americans still love Donald Trump!  Nothing Trump has done changes their devotion. Nothing can be done to eliminate that support of the base. Yes, he has lost some significant support, but millions of Americans still support him despite all that.

I can’t be happy about that.

Ignorance can be funny. Or not.

The Sleep of Reason, The War on Smart, Trump

 

Recently, I learned that comedians are smart. At least they are smart enough to gather together a diverse collection of funny people. And when they smell ignorance, they smell funny. Recently this was proved by the actions of Donald Trump. Actually, this has happened many times, but it certainly happened when Donald Trump declared war on brains. One of those actions—there are actually many—was the dismissal of basically all of the Department of Education. After all who needs education. Trump’s sons didn’t need no education!

 

As Jimmy Kimmel said, “Trump famously said he loves the poorly educated, and now he will have so many more people to love.” Supposedly that is what it means to say ignorance is bliss.

 

Kimmel also said this: “Trump signed the order [gutting the Department of Education] during an event at the White House. They invited  like ‘Hey kids, who hates school?’  And they’re like ‘Well we all do!’  And they said, ‘Well, good news, it’s over.’

 

One more comment from Kimmel:  “The idea behind this is to let the states come up with their own educational standards. For instance, from here one, in order to receive a high school diploma in Florida, all you have to do is complete the maze on the back of the kids’ menu at Fuddruckers.”

 

Jimmy Fallon said this, “Today, President Trump signed an executive order to shut down the Department of Education. It’s a historic move that years from now kids will not read about in history books.”

 

Greg Gutfeld said, “President Trump signed an order today to dismantle the Department of Education. Yep. Soon employees will be reading their pink slips at a third-grade level.”

 

Yes, in the good ole USA, famous the world over for the strength of its universities is turning to dumb. Dumb on steroids.  And this is no accident. This is what Trump and the Trumpsters want—ignorance.  They want dumb! They want it. And they’ll get it. Kimmel was right when he called it “a confederacy of dunces.”

 

Why does Trump want dumb?  I think Hannah Arendt had the answer::

 

“Totalitarianism in power invariably replaces all first-rate talents, regardless of their sympathies, with crackpots and fools whose lack of intelligence and creativity is still the best guarantee of their loyalty.”

 

Trump, like most totalitarians likes dumb! Look at his cabinet of sycophants and this is abundantly clear.

 

 

If it’s not famine, what is it?

Trump, War Between Israel and Hamas

 

A lot of people have been talking about “famine” in Gaza.  The Israelis and their champions, the United States vigorously deny this. Though it is worth noting that Donald Trump talked about people there starving.

The BBC described what Trump said this way:

“There is “real starvation” in Gaza, Donald Trump has said, after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insisted there was no such thing.

 

Asked if he agreed with Netanyahu that it was a “bold-faced lie” to say Israel was fuelling hunger in Gaza, the US president replied: “I don’t know… those children look very hungry… that’s real starvation stuff.”

Speaking during a meeting with UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer in Scotland, Trump said: “Nobody’s done anything great over there. The whole place is a mess… I told Israel maybe they have to do it a different way.”

I agree with Trump. No one has done anything great there, but Israel controls it. Isreal is therefore responsible for what happens there. And starvation is happening there.

 

The group of experts called the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, or IPC, had said half a million people in Gaza were known to be experiencing famine and the numbers could be higher because they did not have enough information from some parts of Gaza where Israel was not allowing information out and was not allowing international press in.

David Miliband, President, International Rescue Committee did not share the view of the US and Israel that it was outrageous to say famine was occurring in Gaza. He was asked if the IPC who came up with the clear statement was a trustworthy organization to comment on the issues. Miliband said,

“Well, today is a horrible milestone marking a true moral and political scandal, because the IPC are a technical, technocratic, small-C conservative body that are very careful in determining the question of famine.

They have only declared three other famines in the whole of the 21st century, and they have to pass three very tough tests just to pick up the third test. Two deaths per 10,000 people per day in Gaza means that 400 people a day are dying of starvation in Gaza.

And they do this work on the ground with reputable sources, with their own people, making sure that they are not taken away by rhetoric, but focus on the facts on the ground. The fact that they should have declared this famine, this is what they call a manmade disaster of the famine in Gaza, carries extra significance because of the credibility and seriousness of which they do their work.”

 And conditions in Gaza continue to get worse. Miliband said the deterioration in Gaza was the direct result of

“the tourniquet that has been applied to aid flows. The blockage on aid flows that was announced by Prime Minister Netanyahu in the middle of March has had its effect. And in the previous reports of the IPC, they pointed to “some of the dangers. Of course, the war is ongoing, so that adds to the problem.”

 

That tourniquet was of course the blockade of all aid established by the Israel Defense Forces.  That blockade was actually worse than most people realized. As he explained, even those families that had received aid of beans often could not cook those beans because they did not have cooking oil. Displacement of people from their homes also made things worse. In fact, the vast majority of people in Gaza are displaced from their homes. He also said IPC reports are usually a “lagging indicator, not a leading indicator,” so things were likely far worse than we realized.

 

Israel has claimed that its policies are to stop famine.  Miliband did not accept this interpretation. He said when Israel stopped interfering the policies of preventing famine by his organization and others worked. Israel was the problem he made clear. As he said, “And so the policy of the Israeli government is very clear. It’s to restrict aid. And that has its consequence that you’re seeing today.”

 

Miliband said five tons of food were “stuck on the wrong side of the border.”  And that border is controlled by Israel not Hamas. And, of course, Israel is the only authority in the region that is capable of allowing aid in or stopping it from coming in. No one else could be stopping it.

 

We must also not forget that around 1,200 people from Gaza have been killed in the vicinity of the food distribution points controlled again, by Israel. In other words, they have been killed trying to get food. Often shot by Israeli forces. The humanitarian groups are not allowed by Israel to do their job and the result is the people of Gaza are starving while food rots at the Israel controlled border. Whether  you call it “famine” or not, this is a moral catastrophe. And it is fully supported by the United States!

 

A friend of mine told me today he was actively joining protests in the US because, if his grandchildren asked him someday what he did to stop the famine, he did not want to say “nothing.”  Some might say that is doing nothing, but at least we must denounce what is going on.

 

 

Champion of the Overdog

Death of Truth, Right-wing Extremism, Trump

 

Rush Limbaugh had an important role in the brain washing of Jen Senko’s dad.

 Jeff Cohen said that Limbaugh became “the champion of the overdog. Any powerful group that was challenged by scientists or medical people was the victim. For example, the tobacco company was the victim.” Likewise environmentalists and Ralph Nader, consumer advocate, are victims. The world is topsy-turvy in other words in the land of the extreme right.

 According to a commentator in the film here are the top 10 Limbaugh lies, that his followers were prepared to believe:

 There are more Native Americans alive today than when Columbus arrived.

  1. The government is going to be able to get into your bank account with the health care bill and make transfers without you knowing it.
  2. Egyptian men are soon going to be able to have sex with their dead wives for up to 6 hours after their death.
  3. President Obama shut down NASA space flights and turned the agency into a “Muslim outreach department.”
  4. The US has more forestland than it did in 1787.
  5. President Obama wants to mandate circumcision.
  6. There is no conclusive proof that nicotine is addictive and the same thing with cigarettes causing emphysema, lung cancer and heart disease.
  7. If the ice caps melted the ocean levels wouldn’t rise.
  8. Styrofoam is biodegradable.
  9. I’m not making this stuff up folks!

 

President Donald Trump gave him a Medal of Freedom.  US Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas officiated at Limbaugh’s 3rd wedding. According to Jeff Cohen, Thomas does not listen to mainstream media, but he records Rush Limbaugh’s show! That 3-hour show was Thomas’ “window into the world,” according to Cohen.  A pretty dim window I would say. Similarly, Justice Antonin Scalia, the darling of the right, also said, “I get most of my news, probably driving back and forth, to work on the radio…talk show guys mostly.”

In America little is revered more than ignorance.

Rush Limbaugh was Trump’s kinda guy. Some Americans love bullies, and the more ignorant the better.

 

Dying of Stubbornness and Ignorance

Epidemics/Pandemics, Health, Trump, Trust and Distrust

 

North Americans are repeating what they did during the Covid-19 pandemic. They are not heeding good science in favour of more attractive positions self-learned on the Internet.  Charles Blow wrote in the New York Times this during the Covid pandemic and it sounds ominously familiar:

“So, we have a situation in America where people are dying and will continue to die of ignorance and stubbornness. They are determined to prove that they are right even if it puts them on the wrong side of a eulogy. This is like watching millions of people playing in traffic.”

 

We must remember how during the Covid pandemic people in hospitals diagnosed with Covid-19 refused to believe their physicians even as they lay dying.  We see something similar now with regard to measles. Physicians have made it clear how important the measles vaccine has been in safely reducing the consequences of measles and saving thousands of lives and yet many continue to disbelieve the scientific evidence or the advice of medical advisors in favor of Internet quacks. As Blow said this about those times:

“All the while, the patients on ventilators gasped for breath, and refrigerated trailers filled with bodies. Death is one of the ultimate truths of life, and yet not even it could dissuade the headstrong from casting doubt on the science.”

 

 

Blow called this “anti-vax insanity.” That is what it was during Covid. And that is what it is again in the case of Measles. The Covid-19 vaccines were incredibly safe and so are the measles vaccines, yet too many people refuse to take them.

 

Blow said this about the reaction of conservatives to scientific evidence relating to Covid-19:

“Why were Americans turning away a vaccine that many people in other parts of the world were literally dying for? Many did so because of their fidelity to the lie and their fidelity to the liar. They did it because they were — and still are — slavishly devoted to Trump, and because many politicians and conservative commentators helped Trump propagate his lies.”

 

Once again conservative leaders are leading their faithful adherents to their doom. Blow also said during the Covid-19 pandemic  “They are too dug in, too committed to the lies and conspiracies, too devoted to rebellion.” Again, the vaccine deniers are showing their over commitment to “lies and conspiracies” about the measles vaccines.

 

Note as well the words, “too devoted to rebellion.” I will come back to that in a future post.

 

Are tariffs beautiful?

Economics, Trump

 

Donald Trump calls tariffs beautiful. He also  called  April 2, 2025, the day on which many tariffs were imposed,  “Liberation Day”. I am not sure he understands tariffs. I am not sure I understand tariffs either. Many commentators  thought Liberation Day meant people—ordinary people—would be liberated from their hard-earned money. At least much of it.

Historically, countries like the United States, while they were developing, imposed tariffs on foreign goods in order to protect local working men and women and businesses. That was a laudable goal. And often it worked.

The problem is tariffs are very inefficient. They are blunt instruments.

We are told they levy a heavy cost on the country that imposes them. The ordinary people in that country must pay more for the goods they want to buy from foreign companies so locals will buy their goods instead.  That’s why Canadians think Americans are foolish, for tariffs will inevitably drive up the costs of out of country goods allowing local producers to compete. But it results in inefficient producers getting more money than they otherwise would. That is certainly not free enterprise. It is the opposite of free enterprise. I think that is why economists think free trade—trade without tariffs or artificial trade barriers—such as farm production quotas or protectionist policies are not favoured by most economists because they are inefficient.

Added to that, tariffs are extremely subject to arbitrary benefits. That is why Trump loves them so much and thinks they are so beautiful. He is allowed to exercise executive power and grant exceptions to people or businesses he favors whether they deserve them or not. That is corruption, but it is exactly the type of corruption Trump wants, because it gives him so much power.  Anything that gives him power is beautiful.

But that does not make tariffs beautiful. It makes them ugly!

 

Immigrants: the traditional scapegoat of the Fascist

American Fascism, Extremism, Hate, Populism, Right-wing Extremism, Trump, Tyranny and Fascism

 

 

Just like Hitler, Orban, and so many other fascists, Donald Trump has been scapegoating immigrants, both legal and illegal. I was shocked to see how popular such language was in the 2024 Republican Convention where Trump was endorsed as their candidate. I shuddered when I saw posters held high and proud which specifically demanded “Mass Deportation Now.” This reminded me of the fervour of ordinary Germans in the 1930 calling for abuse of Jews.

 

Very similar words were heard demonizing immigrants in Madison Square Gardens in the 1930s at a rally that could only be called a Nazi rally. That’s what it looked and sounded like.  The rally in Madison Square Garden again in 2024 was eerily similar.

As Anne Applebaum the author and journalist for The Atlantic said this about Trump (near the end of the campaign):

 “His talk of mass deportation is equally calculating. When he suggests that he would target both legal and illegal immigrants, or use the military arbitrarily against U.S. citizens, he does so knowing that past dictatorships have used public displays of violence to build popular support. By calling for mass violence, he hints at his admiration for these dictatorships but also demonstrates disdain for the rule of law and prepares his followers to accept the idea that his regime could, like its predecessors, break the law with impunity.

 

These are not jokes, and Trump is not laughing. Nor are the people around him. Delegates at the Republican National Convention held prefabricated sign: Mass Deportation Now. Just this week, when Trump was swaying to music at a surreal rally, he did so in front of a huge slogan: Trump Was Right About Everything. This is language borrowed directly from Benito Mussolini, the Italian fascist. Soon after the rally, the scholar Ruth Ben-Ghiat posted a photograph of a building in Mussolini’s Italy displaying his slogan: Mussolini Is Always Right.”

 

These similarities are deeply disturbing. The support of ordinary Americans for such words and policies is shocking. It is so much like the support of ordinary Germans for Hitler, or ordinary Italians for Mussolini. In both highly advanced countries there was stunning support for the fascist policies. It seems to me this is exactly what is now happening in the United States.  I hope I am wrong; I fear I am right.

It is really shocking to me that Americans continue to support Trump’s fascist policies. This is the really scary part.  Trump is Trump. We all know that. He does not hide his fascist tendencies. Why then do so many Americans support him?  I think the answer is also deeply disturbing.

This is what Anne Applebaum had to say:

“These phrases have not been put on posters and banners at random in the final weeks of an American election season. With less than three weeks left to go, most candidates would be fighting for the middle ground, for the swing voters. Trump is doing the exact opposite. Why? There can be only one answer: because he and his campaign team believe that by using the tactics of the 1930s, they can win. The deliberate dehumanization of whole groups of people; the references to police, to violence, to the “bloodbath” that Trump has said will unfold if he doesn’t win; the cultivation of hatred not only against immigrants but also against political opponents—none of this has been used successfully in modern American politics.

 

But neither has this rhetoric been tried in modern American politics. Several generations of American politicians have assumed that American voters, most of whom learned to pledge allegiance to the flag in school, grew up with the rule of law, and have never experienced occupation or invasion, would be resistant to this kind of language and imagery. Trump is gambling—knowingly and cynically—that we are not.”

 

Trump was clearly betting that he knows the American people will support him.  He hears a lot of applause at his rallies. It turns out he was right. More than half the Americans who voted in the recent election of president voted for him.   Were they voting for fascism?