The Man With All the Right Answers

A lot of effort goes into trying to make sense of how Donald Trump’s brain works. Most analysis to his way of thinking is geared towards his ego. His need to be the center of attention, the object of adoration.

He sees himself as the man with all the right answers and if those answers come from his sizeable gut instead of his diminutive brain, who cares? Why bother learning stuff when its just as easy to make shit up. And in Trump World, shit he makes up as the weight of factual evidence. If Trump sees himself as always having the right answers, then whatever he says must be by default always true. 

Except this cannot be attributed to just ego. There’s a lot of people who have a very strong and powerful view of their self worth.

You can’t put yourself out there to host a TV show or star in a movie without some sense of “Hey, there are people who want to see ME! There are people who want hear what I say!” 

You can’t seek the be the CEO of a Fortune 500 company without thinking, “The best person to run this billion dollar enterprise is ME!”

You can’t run for public office, like say President of the United States without thinking, “You know who has two thumbs and is the most qualified to lead the most powerful country on Earth? This guy!” 

Barack Obama had ego. Mitt Romney had ego. So did Hillary Clinton, George W Bush, John McCain, John Kerry.

Having an ego is not inherently a bad thing. Ego is the strength of confidence that separates leaders from followers. But for most people with some degree of ego, there is something to back it up.  Your TV show has the highest ratings! You have Oscars on your bookshelf! You have a degree from a prestigious university on your wall! Your book is on the bestseller list!

But Trump is ego unchecked. Trump is “great” because he thinks he’s great. Yes, he’s had some accomplishments but usually attained with the considerable assistance of others.  Trump wouldn’t have a rep as a real estate mogul without Roy Cohn as his fixer. Trump the TV star would not have existed without Mark Burnet. But Trump in Trump World sees only himself. He counts only his wins. Any failures can be attributed to the faults of others. Trump has always spun his own narrative as a powerhouse and a player. His skill was getting other people to believe that narrative. 

Trump is ego unchecked by facts or evidence or accountability. He says something and he expects it to be so. Like a child playing a make believe game in a world his own design. Except he has deluded himself to think the rest of us live there too.

I think the key to Trump’s thinking is summed up in three words in the previous sentence: “Like a child”.  

Let’s consider Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian meddling in the United States’ election process. Apparently Mueller wants to have a chat with Trump about this. There have been concerns expressed by Trump and his minions about Mueller setting a perjury trap.  Here is how Trump see this: 

“So if I say something, and he [Comey] says something, and it’s my word against his, and he’s best friends with Mueller, so Mueller might say, ‘Well, I believe Comey,’ and even if I’m telling the truth, that makes me a liar. That’s no good.” 

What is the foundation of Trump’s distrust of Mueller? Trump thinks Mueller will accept Comey’s word over Trump’s because Mueller and Comey are besties and Trump will get zapped with a perjury charge based on that.  

It’s been suggested by many helpful people on Twitter that Trump can avoid a “perjury trap” with a simple two word plan: Don’t lie. 

Except lying is 2^nd nature to Donald Trump even if he is too deluded to see it himself. He sees himself as the man with all the right answers. And any answer he gives must be right. But if Mueller believes his best pal Comey, the problem  can be attributed to the faults of others. It can’t possibly be that Trump’s right answers are not “right”.  

If Comey said one thing and Trump says another, I don’t think Robert Mueller would hand down a perjury charge simply because he believes one person and not the other. To think that might be an outcome is childish thinking, detached from the real world.  I think Mueller would need a more solid evidentiary basis for taking such action. Evidence like Trump’s own words and actions would be a start. 

Trump may have the child like conviction that  his is the man with all the right answers. And that may be true in his world.

But not in the real world.