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Feb 26, 2023Liked by Jack Cluth

Jabba the Trump needs a golf cart to wag his lard a$$ from bed to the potty. Joe enjoys the occasional gaffe, but crying out loud the man has spent his lifetime overcoming an extreme speech impediment. I'd like to see how many feet Donnie would get prior to collapsing just walking next to Biden (never mind trying to find a bicycle strong enough to carry all that mass while he tried to keep up with Joe pedaling.)

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When people talk about intelligence types, being canny about stoking audience fears and base instincts is not usually part of the conversation. Don the Con excels in those abilities. He also is good at finding and leveraging weakness (values or insecurities) in an opponent.

Whatever his intellect may be measured at, his defining characteristics seem to be mental illness(narcissism, just ask around) rather than intellectual deficiencies. He exploits the deficiencies in his followers, aiming to appear "just like them" but with the promise of riches if you buy his book (It's his version of a bible which he touts as a road map to the appearance of a successful life.)

He exploits the "prosperity gospel" mythology that is a modern-day recasting of the feudal system: god rewards the virtuous with material wealth. If you are wealthy, it is because you were born virtuous. If you are poor, it is because you were born sinful. It's a fine line of rhetoric to keep his followers at the trough of promise while serving up a menu of disappointment. Blaming someone else for fouling the promised feast has worked for him so far.

His cleverness is in getting ahead of someone else pointing out his deficiencies, and pasting memorable labels of those deficiencies on someone else. He's a narcissistic (read: irretrievably abused child with a focus on self-defense) school-yard bully with a talent for labeling, and seeing points of leverage; Kind of a social/psychological geometry.

Nobody comes out better after being around a person like that.

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I think you last sentence is brilliant, and probably the best summation of Trump that I've read anywhere:

"He's a narcissistic (read: irretrievably abused child with a focus on self-defense) school-yard bully with a talent for labeling, and seeing points of leverage; Kind of a social/psychological geometry. Nobody comes out better after being around a person like that."

America certainly came out worse for the experience.

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