Helping The Trump People

ABOUT TWENTY YEARS AGO, in a magazine article, a much younger looking and more perceptive Donald Trump said, roughly paraphrased; "If I ever run, I'll do it as a Republican, because Republicans are the dumbest people in the world. They believe everything they hear on FOX news. I could lie all the time, and they would believe me." Anyone who doubts that he actually said this is cordially invited to do the necessary research. Trump, it turns out, is quite the self fulfilling prophet. One wonders whether his opinion of Republicans is as pejorative now as it was at the time of the interview. Why wouldn't it be? Republicans have responded to him, and continue to respond to him, in precisely the manner he long ago predicted, accepting or believing all his lies. Numerous sociologists, psychologists, and Barbara Bush have tried to understand why those who support Trump do so, considering his truly deplorable behavior and lie mongering. The lies are blatant, undeniable, and constant. So far research has focused on actual differences between the progressive and the conservative mind, involving different reactions to external stimuli, such as fear and anger. Conservatives, it seems, are more responsive to perceived threats with stronger fear responses, and Trump expertly exploits that. Anyone who suspects that this generalization is a fabrication to insult conservatives or Trump supporters, again, is invited to do the necessary research. One fact emerges unscathed. Trump supporters support him not in spite of his lies, and his vicious slanderous remarks about other people, but because of them. Throughout his long life Trump has alternately been an independent, a Democrat, and several other political affiliations. He has been pro choice, pro life, an interventionist, and isolationist, this, that, and the other, a veritable chameleon, changing his color with the vicissitudes of momentary expediency. This is the characteristic of a survivor; flexibility, a willingness to travel through life unanchored to any set of core principles, other than his own advancement. Personal advancement for Trump, as revealed by his behavior, has always meant fame and fortune. Sexual conquests have been a priority, almost as if each one serves as more validation of his worth, which, perhaps, is one reason why men, even those with beautiful adoring wives, often stray. I have been aware of Donald Trump much longer than I should have been, considering that for most of his life he was merely another very wealthy very ambitious high rolling New York investment and money monger. This is because he has gone to great lengths to insinuate himself into the public eye, onto the front pages of scandal sheets, always chasing cameras and tabloids, offering himself as fodder for gossip, in exchange for the attention he so desperately craves. His behavior is that of the consummate narcissist. Nobody in the mental health profession disputes this. Not long after his election as president tens of thousands of mental health professionals signed a letter warning us about his excessive narcissism and other mental instabilities. Trump's political enemies, who consist of nearly sixty percent of the American people, took heed. His supporters, predictably, did not. Trump's supporters are masterful at ignoring and dodging any evidence of malignancy in Trump's behavior or mental state, of which there is a prodigious amount. They have to be. Conversations with Trump supporters invariably frighten me, so twisted does their reasoning seem. The evangelicals emphasize forgiveness of sin. When reminded that forgiveness requires repentance and atonement, they shrug their shoulders. When reminded that one can forgive anyone anything, without electing as president someone unfit for the job, they fall silent. Trump supporters are magicians at avoidance of addressing Trump's lies and erratic behavior, partly because they do not see it, nor wish to, partly because they do not mind it, party because they approve of it. And, this, above all else, is the frightening part, the part which is so eerily remindful of Hitler and his mind numbed minions. People who support Trump as president are themselves afflicted with a complex array of mental and emotional disturbances, ranging from alienation, anger, and fear, to resentment at the direction of their rapidly changing world, which they see as spinning out of their control. Rather than excoriate and despise them for their folly, the best approach for the rest of us, the majority, might well be to reach out in friendship and compassion, and offer, sincerely, to do everything we possibly can to help.