openpolitics.com

John Nurse

Keen observer of American culture and politics for 40 years.March 6

“Is it possible that Trump has convinced himself …”

This actually mischaracterizes the way that Trump has always worked. He has a narcissistic personality disorder.

One of the thinks that a narcissist like Trump cannot possibly do is to be a loser. To have to acknowledge that he had lost, even worse lost to a senile, barely competent old man hiding in the basement, would have been something Trump simply could not contemplate

But narcissists often have a particular symptom (or perhaps ability):

Since reality doesn’t support their grandiose view of themselves, narcissists live in a fantasy world propped up by distortion, self-deception, and magical thinking.

So, in contemplating what could happen in the 2020 election, Trump is aware enough that he could lose – even though he will tell his people to only show him the “good polls”. He knows that he can never accept being a loser so he creates his alternative world “fantasy” of massive fraud and stolen election. Whatever the initial motivation. this serves not only to deceive his supporters (on whom he will later rely on to defend the “big lie”) but achieves a “self-deception”.

For “normal” people, it would be, and is, very difficult to hold in your mind a factual knowledge and a non-factual belief of this type. But not for Trump. I would suggest, for instance, that he absolutely believes that his inauguration crowd was bigger than Obama’s (and it is important to him that it be so). I imagine, when he first looked out across the crowd in the Mall, that was the reality that he decided was true, and there was absolutely no way that facts would get in the way of that.

It is similar with the “If I lose, the election was rigged” fantasy. That is so deeply embedded, he probably believes it. Or at least, it is the only truth of relevance to him. And his acolytes and court followers gather round to feed him fatuous, imaginary and disproven “evidence” that fits his fantasy. And this same “evidence” is sufficient to “maintain the faith” for his supporters. Not such a demanding task, of course, as faith is belief not requiring evidence. All the supporters need is a few dot points to wave around like fig leaves, such as “but the suitcase full of ballots under the table”, ”but the statistical anomalies, the counting pauses, the sudden jumps”. They can roll out their top ten greatest hits and, even when you clearly show them the fallacy of the claim, they refuse to change their belief, going back to “well you haven’t disproved that there was fraud” and “but Trump was so much more popular”.

So it has been a fantasist populist leader, inspiring absolute faith from his supporters in a “big lie” fantasy.