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I've come across an article on The Atlantic that analyses Trump's personality:
Many questions have arisen about Trump during this campaign season—about his platform, his knowledge of issues, his inflammatory language, his level of comfort with political violence. This article touches on some of that. But its central aim is to create a psychological portrait of the man. Who is he, really? How does his mind work? How might he go about making decisions in office, were he to become president? And what does all that suggest about the sort of president he'd be?
It's a long, but very interesting read.
Here's a list of sentences the article itself highlights:
Combined with a gift for humor, anger lies at the heart of Trump's charisma.
Trump appeals to an ancient fear of contagion, which analogizes out-groups to parasites and poisons.
Narcissism in presidents is a double-edged sword. It is associated with historians' ratings of "greatness"—but also with impeachment resolutions.
Andrew Jackson displayed many of the same psychological qualities that we see in Trump.
Trump has never forgotten the lesson from his father: The world is a dangerous place. You have to be ready to fight.
And the final paragraph summarizes:
Who, really, is Donald Trump? What's behind the actor's mask? I can discern little more than narcissistic motivations and a complementary personal narrative about winning at any cost. It is as if Trump has invested so much of himself in developing and refining his socially dominant role that he has nothing left over to create a meaningful story for his life, or for the nation. It is always Donald Trump playing Donald Trump, fighting to win, but never knowing why.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday November 15 2016, @01:13AM
Who really knows what it means, or what will ensue? But as long as we're reading tea leaves, I'd say that what you're asserting would have been better supported by Trump making him Chief of Staff. He didn't. He chose Priebus. That right there pretty much guarantees the people who supported Trump as anti-Establishment are going to be entirely disappointed.
Then again, Trump does like to say, "You're fired!" So if Priebus steps wrong I don't think Trump will have any problem cutting him loose.
I wonder if Trump has any intention of following through on anything, or if he's thinking he wants to run everything like one big reality show. I have thought from the beginning it would be the latter, but it would be excellent to be surprised and have the former happen.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by Zz9zZ on Tuesday November 15 2016, @02:24AM
I hope some of this type of discussion filters through to him so he sees that even some of his biggest detractors hope he'll pull off his more honorable schemes.
~Tilting at windmills~
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 15 2016, @04:53AM
> if he's thinking he wants to run everything like one big reality show.
Look at who he surrounds himself with.
Priebus may be establishment, but he's got no relevant experience for the job. He's never held office, he's never worked in the whitehouse. Chief of staff is the gatekeeper to the president. Its requires a depth of knowledge and experience to triage events on the fly and determine which ones to bump up to the pres, which ones to delegate within the administration and which ones to kick over to other agencies. There has never been a successful chief of staff without either previous whitehouse or congressional experience. Priebus would be great at managing relations with congress because of the RNC. But that's the limit of his credentials.
Bannon may have been given a made-up position in order to throw a bone to the alt-white. Or maybe it is legit. Whatever it is we have no idea what the job actually requires so who knows if he's qualified for it or not. But even before breitbart the guy was in entertainment out in hollywood, so he's no policy guy.
Beyond that, the transition team has got 3 of his kids on it. They absolutely have zero experience, didn't two of them fail to register in time for the primaries? But all the lobbyists in the other slots ought to make up for that. I took a look at Obama's 2008 transition team, its on wikipedia, they were all deeply experienced and most were not lobbyists, the first guy on the list (chu? I think) was even sort of anti-lobbyist with a previous job doing accountability stuff.
Even with the lobbyists, the WSJ is reporting [wsj.com] that Trump and his transition team had no idea they would have to fully staff the west wing by inauguration day. How could they be so uninformed? That's one of those stories that almost can't be believed, except its Trump...
He also burned some major bridges by dicking over his in-house policy think-tank [washingtonpost.com] during the campaign. He refused to pay them after stringing them along for months so they walked out. Obviously he didn't really need them then, but what happened is no secret, the wonks all know each other. That's going to make recruitment difficult.
Also, he seems to think he's going to be able to fly home for the weekends, to NYC or Miami. [nytimes.com] Which is exactly in line with an absurdist reality show perspective.
I don't think he's making a conscious choice to run it like a reality show. It just sounds like he doesn't know any other way and so far none of the people around him seem to be of the calibre required to rise to the task. Its a big handicap.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday November 15 2016, @06:16PM
Priebus may be establishment, but he's got no relevant experience for the job. He's never held office, he's never worked in the whitehouse. Chief of staff is the gatekeeper to the president. Its requires a depth of knowledge and experience to triage events on the fly and determine which ones to bump up to the pres, which ones to delegate within the administration and which ones to kick over to other agencies. There has never been a successful chief of staff without either previous whitehouse or congressional experience. Priebus would be great at managing relations with congress because of the RNC. But that's the limit of his credentials.
There's his earlier work with the Wisconsin state legislature and his work in a law firm. Not seeing it.
Bannon may have been given a made-up position in order to throw a bone to the alt-white. Or maybe it is legit. Whatever it is we have no idea what the job actually requires so who knows if he's qualified for it or not. But even before breitbart the guy was in entertainment out in hollywood, so he's no policy guy.
Remarkably weak rationalization. Bannon did similar work for Trump prior to the election and that apparently worked out.
Even with the lobbyists, the WSJ is reporting that Trump and his transition team had no idea they would have to fully staff the west wing by inauguration day. How could they be so uninformed? That's one of those stories that almost can't be believed, except its Trump...
And you knew that how? They have two months to go, it's not the end of the world that they're slightly behind.
Also, he seems to think he's going to be able to fly home for the weekends, to NYC or Miami. Which is exactly in line with an absurdist reality show perspective.
So? The point of this transition is in large part to learn these things. Why shouldn't he have that expectation, especially prior to having any need to consider it for real? One doesn't expect people who have lived their entire lives in a city to understand how to approach (answer: you don't) a wild American bison, for example. It's when they have appropriate learning opportunities (such as seeing numerous warning signs to not approach wildlife and bison in particular), that expectations are appropriate.
Sure, there's going to be exciting times for the relatively inexperienced crew that Trump will have access to. But your arguments are ridiculous even given that legitimate concern.