"For all these reasons Trump is the most un-American president in our history"

The Onion with Balls Thomas L. Friedman NYTIMES Opinion Columnist - "For all these reasons Trump is the most un-American president in our history" "The American people elected a man who, no matter what he tells us, is taking us to a future not of “America first,” but of “America alone” and “Me first.” I have always believed that Trump has an utterly warped value set that is not grounded in any of our founding documents, but simply favors any leader who is strong, no matter what he does with that strength; any leader who is rich and can thus enrich Trump, no matter what the leader does with that money or how he got it; and any leader who will flatter him, no matter how obviously phony that flattery is. As long as Putin the dictator checked all those boxes more than the democratic leader of Ukraine, Trump treated him as a friend — American interests and values be damned. Putin never even had to break a sweat to make Trump his chump. For all those reasons Trump is the most un-American president in our history. It was obvious from the day Trump trashed Senator John McCain, an authentic American war hero and patriot, for having been shot down in combat and taken prisoner. What kind of American would denounce McCain, who was held captive for over five years in a North Vietnamese prison camp after spurning early release, knowing it would be used as propaganda? No American that I know. Trump’s worst un-American impulses and intellectual laziness were contained in his first term in the White House by a group of serious advisers. This time around, there is no one to contain them. He has surrounded himself with sycophants. So, Trump is now basically running our country the way he ran his companies — as a one-man show free to make terrible deals That management style led to six bankruptcy filings by his companies. Unfortunately, today we’re all his shareholders, and I fear he is going to bankrupt us as a nation — morally for sure, if not one day financially and politically. Trump’s behavior has become so reckless, so self-absorbed, so obviously contrary to American interests — as even Republicans have long defined them, let alone Democrats — that the question must be asked: Is America now being ruled by a mad king? What American president would ever write the text that Trump wrote to Norway’s prime minister, Jonas Gahr Store, on Sunday, claiming that one reason he is pushing to acquire Greenland is that he was not awarded the Nobel Peace Prize? He wrote, “Considering your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 Wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace, although it will always be predominant, but can now think about what is good and proper for the United States of America.”< Read those words over slowly. They don’t scream “America first.” They scream “Me first.” They scream “I, Donald Trump, am ready to seize Greenland, at the price of breaking up the nearly 77-year-old NATO alliance, because the Nobel Committee did not give ME its peace prize last year” — ignoring the fact that the Norwegian government doesn’t control the awarding of the prize.

Trump's Malignant Narcissism “Malignant narcissism is a combination of narcissism and psychopathology. Because there is little internal capacity for self-soothing or self-valuation, Trump requires continuous external affirmation dave nelson Jan 14, 2026 “Malignant narcissism is a combination of narcissism and psychopathology. Because there is little internal capacity for self-soothing or self-valuation, Trump requires continuous external affirmation to feel real and intact. Power supplies that affirmation. Visibility, dominance and constant stimulation temporarily fill the void.” Donald Trump is an extreme illustration of this dynamic. From a psychoanalytic perspective, his narcissism is malignant in the sense that it is organized around a profound inner emptiness. Thanks for reading The Onion with Balls! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work. Malignant narcissism is a combination of narcissism and psychopathology. Because there is little internal capacity for self-soothing or self-valuation, he requires continuous external affirmation to feel real and intact. Power supplies that affirmation. Visibility, dominance and constant stimulation temporarily fill the void. This activity, Robertson continued, fuels an aggressive, feel-good state of mind, particularly in dominant, amoral personalities such as Trump’s. It also creates a restless, hyperactive state of mind, which, when combined with a feeling of omnipotence, fosters the delusions that you can snap your fingers and sort every problem. At the same time, when Trump’s grandiose plans are frustrated, it poses high risks: “When that doesn’t happen — when Gaza or Greenland can’t be bought or U.S. birthright abolished — this ramps up a hyperactive rage at being thwarted and escalates a flurry of even more frenetic and unmeasured responses.” Virtually all politicians have a strong attraction to power. What distinguishes Trump? When does the appeal of power lead to its abuse? Addiction to power, Galinsky continued, “is partially the result of trying to fill the hole of insecurity left by feeling one is not respected by others. I believe this fits Donald Trump. He has always felt disrespected, and in many ways his entire persona resonates with his base as they feel their hold on society slipping away.” Trump, Galinsky argued, represents what researchers call the dark triad of three interconnected, malevolent personality traits: narcissism (grandiosity, self-centeredness), Machiavellianism (manipulation, cynicism) and psychopathy (impulsivity, lack of empathy/remorse). Trump wants to be seen as the greatest president of all time and makes everything about himself (narcissism), he views the world as only functioning through manipulation and exertion of power (Machiavellianism), and he is impulsive and shows no empathy (psychopathy). mentally deranged Trump may think his own morality and his own mind are the only constraints on his otherwise limitless power, but if we are dependent on either — not to mention Trump’s lack of empathy, compassion or sympathy for the underdog — we are in deep trouble. The nation, the Western Hemisphere and the world at large need to figure out how to place restraints on this ethically vacuous president, or we will all suffer continued and ever-worsening damage. Thanks for reading The Onion with Balls! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.