Analyzing George Conway's Anti-Psycho PAC Campaign against Trump....
Triggering Trump's pathologies.....
George Conway created the "Anti-Pscyho Pac" to educate voters about the presence and danger of Donald Trump's Cluster B Personality disorders.
The PAC's first ad....
.....created quite a reaction. Most notably, from Donald Trump:
Perhaps the most important effect of this ad:
It caused Trump to feel betrayed by FOXNews.
When Trump feels betrayed, his pathologically fragile ego causes him to compulsively sabotage his long-term interests/goals in order to vindictively pursue his short term "wins" (revenge).
Remember when Trump was pissed off because @GaSecofState Raffensperger didn’t corruptly hand the 2020 election to Trump?
It resulted in Georgia sending a Democrat to the U.S. Senate for the first time since 2000 (two actually: Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnick):
Relevant to this point....
.....at the 52:30 minute mark of this "Shrinking Trump" podcast....
....George Conway, and psychologists John Gartner and Harry Segal...
....discuss the difference between Trump and Hitler....
....and observe the tension that exists between Trump’s impulsivity, and his Machiavellianism.
This tension, along with Trump’s lack of emotional discipline/restraint/maturity cause him sabotage his (and his advisors’) long term goals. This tension was analyzed in 2019:
This article, like so many before it, continues to try to view/understand Trump through a lens of reason, logic, and strategy rather than pathology.
There is no method to Trump's madness, there are only consequences of his disorders.
Trump is far more compulsive and reflexive than he is strategic. To oversimplify, think about it in terms of his disorders existing on a continuum with narcissism on one pole, and sociopathy on the other, with both disorders locked in an ongoing battle for disorder dominance/expression.
Without question his narcissism appears to be ever present. But he also appears to be a sociopath. But whereas sociopaths can be cunning, strategic, and able to execute a plan to bring about desired consequences of a cunning strategy....
....Trump’s reflexive, impulsive, compulsive narcissistic need to defend his ego results in self-sabotaging short-term gains or near-sighted “wins” that often have detrimental long term consequences on his sociopathic strategies/agenda/desires (His narcissism > sociopathy)
As a result, he not only constantly gets in his own way, and undermines his administration and his political agenda, but he repeatedly makes statements against interests that carry legal consequences (or at least did back when the law still mattered)
Trump's propensity to self-sabotage is due to his grandiosity-induced distorted conception of “fairness”....
From 2019:
If you look at “unfairness” through the lens of his narcissism, particularly through the lens of grandiosity/superiority/perfection….there’s an inability/unwillingness to see things objectively.
There’s also a zero-sum dynamic: If something doesn’t go 100% in Trump’s favor, it’s unfair, b/c he’s pathologically subjective (only see the world through his own limited perspective), and thinks he “deserves” 100% of the pie (zero-sum). Anything less than 100% is “unfair”.
As far as “treatment”, if he doesn’t receive 100% adulation (narcissistic supply), it’s perceived as “unfair” treatment. This is why there’s no acceptance of accountability, why he bristles at criticism, and will go to war & hold grudges with people who criticize him (press).
He’s also oblivious, in denial, and/or dishonest about when the interaction timeline begins (which usually begins with an egregious action/statement by Trump)….. Instead pointing to other peoples' reactions to his words/actions as the initial action rather than as a reaction.
…..which allows him to always (attempt to) claim victimhood because he characterizes the situation as being one where everyone else (press/Democrats/law enforcement) is “attacking” Trump (or someone who sycophantically furthers Trump’s interests) without provocation.
This due in part to Trump symptomatically living in an "immortal, eternal now", without any concept of historical significance.....other than to keep score of others who have "wronged" him.
…..which triggers Trump’s “punitive orientation"…..:
In my experience/observation, narcissists have a strong punitive orientation. Since they're pathologically subjective (incapable of objectively seeing/engaging the world), they often interpret every experience through the lens of subjective “unfairness”,
...because, due to their “zero-sum” orientation, that is how they interpret experiences/interactions (transactions) that don’t go their way.
When even seemingly minor incidents go against them, they will often interpret the event as someone punishing them, or at least attempting to do so (victimhood), especially if it is occurring from a person or entity that has leverage or power over them.
There often appears to be a multi-layered projection: 1) it exposes/projects their punitive orientation where, since they view every interaction (transaction) as one where imminent punishment can/should be dispensed if they don’t get 100% of the pie (zero-sum),..
This creates an opportunity to drive a wedge between Trump and FOXNews….
....who Trump will perceive as "disloyal" for televising Harris’ rallies…
....and for selling Trump out for Anti-Psycho Pac ad money:
At the 44:00 minute mark, George Conway points out that:
“You can’t control Trump, but you can manipulate him”. Conway was referring to the ease with which opponents can trigger Trump.
But, this also makes Trump a dangerous liability as a president:
Another important point discussed in the podcast (13:20 minute mark) was Psychologist John Gartner explaining that malignant narcissists only get worse over time. I recently wrote about this when analyzing Trump's reaction the assassination attempt:
….and pointing out the insincerity of Trump’s speech when he spoke about “healing” division, and promising to be “president for all of America, not half of America”.
Trump's flatness is a by-product of Trump’s limited range of emotional experience:
At the 1:13:00 minute mark George Conway talks about society being overloaded with too much information.
There is research that shows when people are overloaded with information (even if it’s true), it can push them into even more extreme positions.
Relevant study (Lord, et al., 1979), and analysis of why contradicting information does not moderate, but can actually lead to an even more extreme position on issues:
At the 5:00 minute mark, psychologists John Gartner and Harry Segal talk about the emotional authenticity of Harris and Biden...
.....something that is non-existent with Narcissistic Personality Disorder.
The contrast is stark, and a potential issue for Trump/the Right:
At 1:24:45, psychologist Harry Segal, when discussing Harris' infusion of energy, observes, “What happens when suddenly you go from feeling powerless to feeling hopeful…the shift in the psychological experience.”
The Right/Trump is experiencing the inverse, as explained in this article about the Right's reaction to Kamala Harris:
There's fear in her voice. The Right isn't handling the abruptness of not just the change in reality....but the change in momentum of what felt like an inevitable election.
When people warn that the other side has to "be very careful", it's often because they're scared. The fact that she calls Kamala, "the luckiest son of gun".....is especially telling.
We don't resentfully say someone is lucky unless we believe they are "unfairly" in a better position than us......or unless we believe they are "unfairly"......"winning".
At the 1:26:45 minute mark, @duty2warn celebrates Harris’ aggressiveness…and encourages her to prosecute the case.
Yes, exactly:
Well, right now Harris is in a position where she has 3 ½ months to prosecute the case against Trump.
Don’t worry about saying or doing the wrong thing.
Don’t worry about triggering the Left wing snowflakes.
Don’t worry about what the Right Wing/MAGA voters think/say.
Just prosecute the case against Trump.
There is no shortage of evidence, and Trump’s pathology will continue to produce new evidence.
____________________________________________________________________________
A relevant article psychoanalyzing Jordan Peterson's projective analysis of "Trump Derangement Syndrome"...... .
....by dissecting Trump's close to be personality-disordered behavior:
Jordan Peterson:
“The degree of animosity that people have for Trump is.…a mystery to me.…it’s very mysterious.” Also Peterson: “[When] trust collapses, [societies] become impoverished & imperiled. The wealth of the West [is] its high levels of trust & honesty. [Trust & honesty is] the fundamental natural resource [of Western society].”
This monologue is rife with projection. Peterson is using Trump as a proxy for his own experience.
Let’s unpack….
___________________________________________________________________________
I don't have enough information to know what Trump was like as a child....but I have a pretty good grasp of Trump's childhood experience:
Yes, it would appear that Trump’s disorders, like many people who were exposed to pathological parenting (as experienced by children of narcissistic parents), are are partly grounded in his childhood experience.
In my observation/experience, it appears there may be a predisposition & a triggering experience (pathological parenting as experienced by children of Narcissists) which would explain why two kids w/similar experiences do not both grow up to possess the parent’s disorders.
Fred’s cold, pathological parenting resulted in severely unmet emotional needs. This can create a “steal it forward” dynamic where adult children (Trump) use subsequent generations (children) to backfill a void created by previous generation (Fred).
With Trump, a perfect storm of severe childhood traumatization, hyper-presentation of disorder symptoms, & a unique position of power essentially relegates millions of people to the role of “subsequent generation” from which he can attempt to backfill (exploit) his unmet needs.
Fred apparently defined life in binary terms of winners and "losers", which incoincidentally is one of Trump's go-to phrases…..most likely because Trump heard Fred spew it with such contempt throughout the early part of his life.
In this binary-framed context you either win or you are a “loser”. There is no nuanced position, which is a consistent with Trump’s behavior, disorder presentation, and authoritarian instincts…
When life is framed in such a way that you either “win”, or you are a “loser”, it has the effect of removing the emphasis from the process of winning (an affirmative, merit-based action), and instead puts the emphasis solely on the avoidance of loss/losing.
Essentially, you don't win by actually winning….you win by avoiding losing. This not only justifies any tactic/behavior necessary to avoid losing, but it expands the definition of "winning" to include everything/anything that avoids “losing” (deceit/criminality/betrayal).
Therefore in Trump’s mind, you only "lose" if you fail to avoid losing: Basically, the pathological belief that the only limits to “winning” are those you place on your willingness to lie, cheat, and steal.....to whatever extreme extent that will allow you to avoid “losing”.
In this pathological context, “winning” is synonymous with “lying”, “cheating”, & “stealing”. When seen through this lens, Trump’s statements of “so much winning” and “you’re going to be tired of the winning” are revealed as not only being cryptic, projective confessions,…