"A classic God complex": Dr. Justin Frank on Donald Trump's increasing "persecutory delusion"

[marmar]

"A classic God complex": Dr. Justin Frank on Donald Trump's increasing "persecutory delusion"
Experts on why Trump was given a platform by NBC's "Meet the Press" to recruit new members for his MAGA movement

By CHAUNCEY DEVEGA
Senior Writer
PUBLISHED SEPTEMBER 21, 2023 5:46AM (EDT)


(Salon) Donald Trump's "interview" last Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press" was a spectacle, one that embodied many of the failings that the mainstream news media has willfully made throughout the Trumpocene and America's continuing democracy crisis. Trump was allowed a platform to lie, circulate disinformation, amplify his disproved conspiracy theories about how the 2020 Election was "stolen" from him and the MAGA movement, and to act like he is leading a righteous struggle to retake the White House from a usurper. What is perhaps most concerning is how Trump was allowed a platform by NBC and "Meet the Press" where he in his role as a political cult leader could recruit new members for his neofascist MAGA movement.

....(snip)....

As I and others have argued here and elsewhere, Trump's use of political sadism is one of the main reasons why so many among the news media, the country's political elites, and general public are still stuck in a state of denial about the dire and existential threat the ex-president and the Republican fascists and larger white right represent to the country and its democracy.

....(snip)....

Jennifer Mercieca, professor of communication at Texas A&M, and author of "Demagogue for President: The Rhetorical Genius of Donald Trump."

Donald Trump did not "meet" the press, he used propaganda strategies to overrun the press. He portrayed the world in fascist terms: everything is dark and corrupted, the nation is weak and humiliated and only he can fix it. None of that is true, but Trump offered hundreds of different lies and distortions of reality to make it appear to be true.

....(snip)....

Marcel Danesi is Professor Emeritus of linguistic anthropology and semiotics at the University of Toronto. His new book is Politics, Lies and Conspiracy Theories: A Cognitive Linguistic Perspective.

The interview was another Trump performance of defiance and implied potency. As in other interviews he leaned forward as if to listen closer, but he was actually "performing intimidation." Breaching the perceived safe space between oneself and one's interlocutor is intended to induce uncomfortableness and even distress, thus blocking fluid interaction. Another aspect of the performance was his unswerving stare. When asked about the situation in Ukraine, Trump kept his eyes fixated on the interviewer, and then, responding to the question of the inhumanity of Putin's actions, his stare become even more intense, as he opened his hands and moved them apart—a mixed signal that was meant to say "I am open, trust me." In response to the interviewer's question of the possibility that he was going to jail, he answered "I don't even think about it," as the stare on his face became increasingly intense and virtually identical to his mug shot—an expression of anger and defiance that seems to have become his public persona. ............(more)

https://www.salon.com/2023/09/21/a-classic-god-complex-dr-justin-frank-on-donald-increasing-persecutory-delusion/

[SCantiGOP]

1. This is a cheerful damn article

How did the crazy guy take over?

[SpamWyzer]

2. Almost

anytime one goes crazy, it is a matter of manipulation. Most fear uncertainty in communications, esp. with people like PO11etc. Crazy people have run the world many times and each time killed MILLIONS of us. The fascist worldview is sick beyond compromise and negotiation. The fascist wants to kill us. I say you will fail. WE, the decent and good people of the world, will smash your asses like grandpas did before. WorldWar3 will be the absolute end of fascism.