It can be argued that Donald Trump’s current “insanity” is not caused by any one thing but grows organically out of his malignant narcissism. But, rather than get into the weeds — beautifully and chillingly spelled out by Dr. John Gartner in the book, “The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump: 27 Psychiatrists and Mental Health Experts Assess a President,” edited by Bandy Lee — I want to concentrate on one thing, perhaps the most chilling of all: Trump’s inability to admit a mistake and his tendency to “double down” instead. This tendency is also known as the “escalation trap,” in which a person who has already invested much blood and treasure into a disaster continues digging his hole deeper because doing otherwise would mean admitting a bigger and bigger mistake. On a smaller scale, we can see this tendency among Trump’s most ardent followers. Admitting that one is wrong is not easy, but not doing so could be fatal, not only to the person involved but also to the country and, perhaps, to the world.
Let’s take Iran as an example. Trump has made it clear that he cannot admit that bombing Iran on a whim was a mistake. Iran has called his bluff. So, what is a bully to do when the smallest kid in the schoolyard has shown him to be an empty blowhard? He has to punch down and keep punching until either the little kid cries uncle or the bully is laughed out of the playground. But what if being laughed at is intolerable? What if the bully has a gun or, worse, a nuclear weapon? Where will he stop in the pathetic attempt to save his ego?
This is the question that is now before us.
Frederick Longacre
Hockessin
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