"It’s less politics and more psychology these days."
"It’s less politics and more psychology these days."
The President of the United States only has a few weeks remaining in office. He knows it, the people around him know it, the whole world knows it. He lost the elections, fair and square.
Yet he continues to stand his ground insisting he was cheated. He takes to Twitter, with his all-caps messages and exclamation points, to say he concedes nothing, that he will prevail in the end. Why, his Secretary of State even had the gall to mention a smooth transition into a second term!
It is not at all difficult to imagine the leader of the free world as a toddler who refuses to leave the playground even when it is clearly time to go. He throws a tantrum and takes steps to bring down the institution any way he can.
This, in itself, is a tragedy, a very clear assault on democracy. That it is happening during a raging pandemic makes it doubly so.
* * *
More and more, it is becoming apparent that whatever is happening is no longer just in the sphere of politics, but psychology. What exactly is the president’s state of mind? Does he honestly believe that he could get what he wants through a display of defiance and petulance?
Aside from his last, disastrous appearance where he declared that cheating was going on – the US networks had not yet called the contest for his opponent then – Mr. Trump has mostly shied away from public appearances, venting his desperation on the golf course and, of course, on social media. This was when many networks decided to stop airing his speeches because they were so full of lies and nonsense.
Now we hear he has given specific instructions to his underlings not to cooperate with the transition team of the President-elect.
Is it just an obstinate refusal to accept defeat? Or is it a basic pathological inability to comprehend the demands of being a statesman, or at least a decent human being?
Sometimes I think about the president’s lawyers. I am sure they had ambitions when they first set foot in law school, ambitions that were loftier and more honorable than defending the indefensible. I wonder how they feel about subverting the law that they swore to protect and uphold.
I wonder, too, why the people around him—other government officials, his aides—stand by and enable the deranged behavior? If the person in question is hopeless, shouldn’t those other people who claim to be public servants know better?
* * *
From Mr. Trump’s words and actions, it is easy to see parallels. The spectacle that is US politics reminds us, even from halfway across the world, that:
Leadership is determined by consistent deeds. You are not a good leader just because you say so, or because many people are afraid of you, or because you are good at insulting others whom you feel are a threat to you.
Leadership is service. When you make even small things about you, make excuses for your inaction, and when you lift yourself by bringing other people down, that is not leadership. That is narcissism.
Leadership is respecting institutions instead of bamboozling them to do your bidding. Government lawyers are not your lawyers. The military or police force is not yours, and neither are public funds.
Coherent speech is a sign of a coherent mind. The opposite is self-explanatory.
The loudest, most venomous people are often the most insecure. In this case, “tough on the outside, fragile on the inside” is not cute. When the interest of the nation is at stake, we need just the opposite: A strong, determined, undeterred person with a lot of humanity and compassion.
Appearances mostly hide a sinister truth. Those who obsess about appearances are all too often afraid that, once these appearances—of toughness, of being in control, of being loved and adored by millions of trolls, er, people —are gone, then everything will start to crumble.
No wonder their knees quiver even as they make their voices louder and their insults more vile.