We may be creating an echo chamber here but what the hell....
>>Clintons followed a similar trajectory.
In her book(s), Ann Coulter mocks the Democrats’ use of the term ‘rock star’ when talking about unattractive, otherwise untalented politicians. Dems and media are the speech & debate geeks excited when one of their own gets noticed.
>>Bill was a superstar narcissist celeb similar to Obama
It’s interesting (?) that Bill, like JFK and other previous Dems including FDR despite his handicap, used his seats of power to gain ready access to women he would otherwise not have. I won’t excuse Ike’s wartime dalliance but he behaved as president, I assume.
If anything, we might say that Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Bush I and Bush II almost spent too much time appeasing their wives and let’s be fair and throw Carter in among these.
It’s also interesting that Obama did not. Is this simply down to being a good husband and father as we were repeatedly told? Or is there something to the rumors? There is a LOT about his matriculation in Hawaii and in lefty hothouses on both coasts that screams out ‘grooming’ and I don’t mean personal hygiene.
My own opinion is that Obama is the political version of gay-for-pay. He was abandoned by his father, by his stepfather, and ultimately by his mother. He was the ultimate latchkey kid across a hemisphere. I believe these emotional shocks made him a narcissist, as you say, but that morphed into sociopathology. Obama learned that he was an excellent user of other human beings. Universities, especially the elite schools, are hives of homosexuals and pedophiles, often both. At that time they were also hives of people who thought a tall, young, black student with an exotic name was beyond their wildest fantasies. They plied him with drink, drugs, easy grades, and unearned praise. Obama hadn’t had much positive reinforcement to date and learned how to manipulate these sad perverts even if Obama himself was technically heterosexual. But he also learned consciously or unconsciously their academic-ese and how to mimic their speech patterns and body language. As you say, he became a parrot. He repeated this ‘sponge’ routine at Harvard and then in lower-level politics.
>>[Bill] can no longer walk into any room and own it.
True. In the runup to 2016 the media kept a constant drumroll going, telling us that sooner or later the Hillary campaign would unleash the Big Dog to campaign for her and together they would smite all enemies.
There were several problems, obviously:
1) They hate each other. This is the worst-kept secret in the world but it’s never mentioned in the regular press except for the ‘Energizer Bunny’ stories that the NY Post ran about Secret Service men scrambling to get the Bunny out the side door in Westchester when Hillary came in the front door. But the Clintons soon gave up the cohabitating fraud. Bill moved to Arkansas for daily golf and a daily supply of young if deluded cookies. Edward Klein’s books may not be meticulously corroborated but the stories of Bill providing campaign advice to Hillary over the phone only to get screamed and cussed at are easy enough to believe. He didn’t want to go back to DC but he didn’t want a loss in his column either.
2) He had no following, as you say. Despite the buildup, he stiffed onstage. He looked and sounded like hell.
3) He undermined the Hillary campaign because she was far to the left of him. He mocked Obamacare. He was quietly pulled off the tour. Very quietly.
>>He hangs out by the rooftop pool with rent-a-bimbos playing make believe.
Yes.
>>He actually doesn’t give a rip about politics or America or anything that is not about *him*.
Yes again. A few morsels of what the Obamas were really like trickled out during his term. It was revealed that they had separate suites wherever they went. Obama snored, lay in bed eating and chain smoking (he never quit despite the PR) til noon and watched ESPN until he went to the golf course.
Let’s not forget that ‘Mother Robinson’ was the fifth wheel at the White House and on the road. By all accounts she was a holy terror. Rude, demanding, ungrateful. You’d avoid her too.
The press dutifully ignored the fact that Michelle & the daughters jetted off to Europe on two consecutive Father’s Days.
Close family? Not a bit of it.
You may recall the Congresswoman who noted the Obama daughters always had sourpuss expressions. The media were outraged. Because the woman was correct. Don’t pick on the kids etc. became the mantra. But it bothered the PR-obsessed Obamas. Later that year at the Christmas tree lighting, the four Obamas gathered and unleashed bizarre grins that would embarrass a jack o’ lantern.
The FBI/DOJ/NSA/CIA/FISA caper was catnip to Obama, who had always advanced politically through dirty tricks. Here were skeleton keys to every house in the neighborhood including Trump’s. He may not have liked Hillary but he hated Trump. Using the power of office and especially the power of secrecy was too good to pass up. Just as professors and students groomed him in college, the self-serving cabal of Brennan, Clapper, Comey, Lynch et al groomed him as president. He’s as guilty as sin but, as someone commented at the Wall Street Journal, was he fool or knave? Probably both but his decisions and actions fit in perfectly with his entirely transactional existence.
If you look at the DSM 5, sociopath and psychopath have been subsumed under Antisocial Personality Disorder, which was dumb. All of the Cluster Bs (low/no conscience PDs) share many of the same traits, the most significant being the lack of capacity for empathy. Bill could fake it, Obama was excruciatingly obvious in missing that chip. It can’t be installed as an aftermarket.
Trying to tease out narcissist vs sociopath for non- clinical purposes is a waste of energy, they’re alike enough that it doesn’t matter. People don’t actually morph into PDs. A PD is literally just that—a part of your core personality.
New research is showing that the brains of psychopaths and narcissists are different in structure than normals. This explains their legendary treatment resistance.
Now if we could only convince the women who are tangled up with these guys that they’ll never change.
To further confuse you, a person can have more than one disorder at a time (comorbidities). It can even be two Cluster Bs. Pray that you never run into a bipolar narcissist.
Bill and BO are great examples of narcissism. Politics is lousy with them. It’s one of the professions closest to the top of the list for attracting NPDs.
President Trump has quite the healthy self esteem going on which gives him his resilience, but, he is absolutely *not* a narcissist. He is missing the most important element: lack of empathy. He is actually very empathetic and he’s not faking it.
It’s important to think of all mental disorders on a continuum. We all have a degree of narcissism. That’s what drives us to care about our appearance and achievements. It’s only when you get to the outer extremes that there is trouble.
Btw, despite what people post, Hillary is *not* a narcissist. She lacks the charisma. In fact, I’m suspicious that she may be on the spectrum. I can’t decide whether she is a plain old sociopath or a true psychopath. Need more info.
The best treatment for the Cluster Bs? Piranha tanks. They serve no legitimate purpose, do horrific damage, and need to be dispatched like rabid dogs, but with less concern over using humane methods.