Tag Archives: Trump

October 24, 2025 · 12:26 am

From WIRED Magazine –

From Julie: When you read this article that I have put below, think about it for a minute, marvel at the evil present in these people’s actions and their bizarre ideas. When you can, read it again. Then, please send it to everyone you know, and post on all of your social media pages! And then send it out again next week , and the week after that, and the week after…..!( I have another that talks more about the origins of much of these Techie billionaires.)

Cory Doctorow warns of “enshittification,” where tech companies degrade services for profit, harming users and workers amid mass layoffs. He urges tech employees to unionize for better wages, job security, and ethical influence, countering monopolies and fostering industry accountability. This labor movement could reverse the trend and empower creators.

Written by Lucas Greene

Monday, October 20, 2025

FOR DECADES, ALLIES of the United States lived comfortably amid the sprawl of American hegemony. They constructed their financial institutions, communications systems, and national defense on top of infrastructure provided by the US.

And right about now, they’re probably wishing they hadn’t.

Back in 2022, Cory Doctorow coined the term “enshittification” to describe a cycle that has played out again and again in the online economy. Entrepreneurs start off making high-minded promises to get new users to try their platforms. But once users, vendors, and advertisers have been locked in—by network effects, insurmountable collective action problems, high switching costs—the tactics change. The platform owners start squeezing their users for everything they can get, even as the platform fills with ever more low-quality slop. Then they start squeezing vendors and advertisers too.

People don’t usually think of military hardware, the US dollar, and satellite constellations as platforms. But that’s what they are. When American allies buy advanced military technologies such as F-35 fighter jets, they’re getting not just a plane but the associated suite of communications technologies, parts supply, and technological support. When businesses engage in global finance and trade, they regularly route their transactions through a platform called the dollar clearing system, administered by just a handful of US-regulated institutions. And when nations need to establish internet connectivity in hard-to-reach places, chances are they’ll rely on a constellation of satellites—Starlink—run by a single company with deep ties to the American state, Elon Musk’s SpaceX. As with Facebook and Amazon, American hegemony is sustained by network logic, which makes all these platforms difficult and expensive to break away from.

For decades, America’s allies accepted US control of these systems, because they believed in the American commitment to a “rules-based international order.” They can’t persuade themselves of that any longer. Not in a world where President Trump threatens to annex Canada, vows to acquire Greenland from Denmark, and announces that foreign officials may be banned from entering the United States if they “demand that American tech platforms adopt global content moderation policies.”

Ever since Trump retook office in January, in fact, rapid enshittification has become the organizing principle of US statecraft. This time around, Trumpworld understands that—in controlling the infrastructure layer of global finance, technology, and security—it has vast machineries of coercion at its disposal. As Mark Carney, the prime minister of Canada, recently put it, “The United States is beginning to monetize its hegemony.”

So what is an ally to do? Like the individual consumers who are trapped by Google Search or Facebook as the core product deteriorates, many are still learning just how hard it is to exit the network. And like the countless startups that have attempted to create an alternative to Twitter or Facebook over the years—most now forgotten, a few successful—other allies are now desperately scrambling to figure out how to build a network of their own.

INFRASTRUCTURE TENDS TO be invisible until it starts being used against you. Back in 2020, the United States imposed sanctions on Hong Kong’s chief executive, Carrie Lam, for repressing democracy protests on China’s behalf. All at once, Lam became uniquely acquainted with the power of the dollar clearing system—a layer of the world’s financial machinery that most people have never heard of.

Here’s how it works: Global banks convert currencies to and from US dollars so their customers can sell goods internationally. When a Japanese firm sells semiconductors to a tech company in Mexico, they’ll likely conduct the transaction in dollars—because they want a universal currency that can quickly be used with other trading partners. So these firms may directly ask for payment in dollars, or else their banks may turn pesos into dollars and then use those dollars to buy yen, shuffling money through accounts in US-regulated banks like Citibank or J.P. Morgan, which “clear” the transaction.

So dollar clearing is an expedient. It’s also the chief enforcement mechanism of US financial policy across the globe. If foreign banks don’t implement US financial sanctions and other measures, they risk losing access to US dollar clearing and going under. This threat is so existentially dire that, when Lam was placed under US sanctions, even Chinese banks refused to have anything to do with her. She had to keep piles of cash scattered around her mansion to pay her bills.

That maneuver against Lam was, at least on its face, about standing up for democracy. But in his second term, Trump has wasted no time in weaponizing the dollar clearing system against any target of his choosing. In February, for example, the administration imposed sanctions on the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court after he indicted Benjamin Netanyahu for alleged war crimes. Now, like Lam in Hong Kong, the official has become a financial and political pariah: Reportedly, his UK bank has frozen his accounts, and Microsoft has shut down his email address.

Another platform that Trump is weaponizing? Weapons systems. Over the past couple of decades, a host of allies built and planned their air power around the F-35 stealth fighter jet, built by Lockheed Martin. In March, a rumor erupted online—in Reddit posts and X threads—that F-35s come with a “kill switch” that would allow the US to shut them down at will.

Sources tell us that there is no such kill switch on the F-35, per se. But the underlying anxiety is not unfounded. There is, as one former US defense official described it, a “kill chain” that is “essentially controlled by the United States.” 

Complex weapons platforms require constant maintenance and software updates, and they rely on real-time, proprietary intelligence streams for mapping and targeting. All that “flows back through the United States,” the former official said, and can be blocked or turned off. Cases in point: When the UK wanted to allow Ukraine to use British missiles against Russia last November, it reportedly had to get US sign-off on the mapping data that allowed the missiles to hit their targets. 

Then, after Trump’s disastrous Oval Office meeting with Volodymyr Zelensky in late February, the US temporarily cut off intelligence streams to Ukraine, including the encrypted GPS feeds that are integral to certain precision-guided missile systems. Such a shutoff would essentially brick a whole weapons platform.

Communication systems are, if anything, even more vulnerable to enshittification. In a few short years, Elon Musk’s Starlink satellites—which now make up about 65 percent of all active satellites in orbit—have become an indispensable source of internet access across the world. On the eve of Trump’s second inaugural, Canada was planning to use Starlink to bring broadband to its vast rural hinterlands, Italy was eyeing it for secure diplomatic communications, and Ukraine had already become dependent on it for military operations. But as Musk joined the Trump administration’s inner circle, a dependence on Starlink came to seem increasingly dangerous.

In late February, the Trump administration reportedly threatened to withdraw Starlink access to Ukraine unless the country handed over rights to exploit its mineral reserves to the US. In a March confrontation on X, Musk boasted that Ukraine’s “entire front line would collapse” if he turned off Starlink. In response, Poland’s foreign minister, Radek Sikorski, tried to stand up for an ally. He tweeted that Poland was paying for Ukraine’s access to the service. Musk’s reply? “Be quiet, small man. You pay a tiny fraction of the cost. And there is no substitute for Starlink.”

It isn’t just big US defense contractors that might enforce the administration’s line. European governments and banks often run on cloud computing provided by big US multinationals like Amazon and Microsoft, and leaders on the continent have begun to fear that Trump could choke off EU governments’ access to their own databases. Microsoft’s president, Brad Smith, has claimed this scenario is “exceedingly unlikely” and has offered Europeans a “binding commitment” that Microsoft will vigorously contest any efforts by the Trump administration to cut off cloud access, using “all legal avenues available.” 

But Microsoft has failed to publicly explain its reported denial of email access to the International Criminal Court’s chief prosecutor. And Smith’s promise may not be enough to ward off Europeans’ fears, to say nothing of the Trump administration’s advances. The European Commission is now in advanced negotiations with a European provider to replace Microsoft’s cloud services, and the Danish government is moving from Microsoft Office to an open source alternative.

Of course, the American tech industry has famously cozied up to Trump this year, with CEOs attending his inauguration, changing content moderation policies, and rewriting editorial missions in ways that are friendlier to administration priorities. And as always, what Trump can’t gain through loyalty, he’ll extract through coercion. Either way, the traditional platform economy is being reshaped as commercial platforms and government institutions merge into a monstrous hybrid of business monopoly and state authority.

IN THE FACE of all these affronts to their sovereignty, a chorus of world leaders has woken from its daze and started to talk seriously about the once-unthinkable: breaking up with the United States. In February, the center-right German politician Friedrich Merz—upon learning that he’d won his country’s federal election—declared on live TV that his priority as chancellor would be to “achieve independence” from the US. “I never thought I would have to say something like this on a television program,” he added.

In March, French president Emmanuel Macron echoed that sentiment in a national address to his people: “We must reinforce our independence,” he said. Later that month, Carney, the new Canadian prime minister, said that his country’s old relationship with the US was “over.”

“The West as we knew it no longer exists,” said Ursula von der Leyen, the head of the EU Commission, in April. “Our next great unifying project must come from an independent Europe.”

But the reality is that, for many allies, simply declaring independence isn’t really a viable option. Japan and South Korea, which depend on the US to protect them against China, can do little more than pray that the bully in the White House leaves them alone.

For now, Denmark and Canada are the other US allies most directly at risk from enshittification. Not only has Trump put Greenland (a protectorate of Denmark) and Canada at the top of his menu for territorial acquisition, but both countries have militaries that are unusually closely integrated into US structures. The “transatlantic idea” has been the “cornerstone of everything we do,” explains one technology adviser to the Danish government, who asked to remain anonymous due to the political sensitivity of the subject. Denmark spent years pushing back against arguments from other allies that Europe needed “strategic autonomy.” And according to a former adviser on Canadian national security, the “soft wiring” binding the US and Canadian military systems to each other makes them nearly impossible to disentangle.

That explains why both countries have been slow to move away from US platforms. In March, the outspoken head of Denmark’s parliamentary defense committee grabbed attention on X by declaring that his country’s purchase of F-35s was a mistake: “I can easily imagine a situation where the USA will demand Greenland from Denmark and will threaten to deactivate our weapons and let Russia attack us when we refuse,” he tweeted. But in reality, the Danish government is even now considering purchasing more F-35s.

Canada, too, has already built its air-strike capacities on top of the F-35 platform; switching to another would, at best, require vast amounts of retooling and redundancy. “We’re going to look at alternatives, because we can’t make ourselves vulnerable,” says the Canadian adviser. “But we would then have a non-interoperable air force in our own country.”

If allies keep building atop US platforms, they render themselves even more vulnerable to American coercion. But if they strike out on their own, they may pay a steeper, more immediate price. In March, the Canadian province of Ontario canceled its deal with Starlink to bring satellite internet to its poorer rural areas. Now, Canada will have to pay much more money to build physical internet connections or else wait for its own satellite constellations to come online.

If other governments followed suit in other domains—breaking their deep interconnections with US weapons systems, or finding alternative cloud platforms for vital government and economic services—it would mean years of economic hardship. Everyone would be poorer. But that’s exactly what some world leaders have been banding together to contemplate.

IN EUROPE, DISCUSSIONS are coalescing around an ambitious idea called EuroStack, an EU-led “digital supply chain” that would give Europe technological sovereignty independent from the US and other countries.

The idea gathered steam a couple of months before Trump’s reelection, when a group of business leaders, European politicians, and technologists—including Meredith Whittaker, the president of Signal, and Audrey Tang, Taiwan’s former minister of digital affairs—met at the European Parliament to discuss “European Digital Independence.” 

According to Cristina Caffarra, an economist who helped organize the meeting, the takeaway was stark: “US tech giants own not only the services we engage with but also everything below, from chips to connectivity to cables under the sea to compute to cloud. If that infrastructure turns off, we have nowhere to go.”

The feeling of urgency has only grown since Trump retook office. The German and French governments have embraced EuroStack, while major EU aircraft manufacturers and military suppliers like Airbus and Dassault have signed on to a public letter advocating its approach to “sovereign digital infrastructure.”

In all the European capitals, the Danish government adviser says, teams of people are calculating what elements should be folded into the effort and what it would cost.

And EuroStack is just one part of the response to enshittification. The European Union is also putting together a joint defense fund to help EU countries buy weapons—but not from the US. The EU’s executive agency, the European Commission, is patching together a network of satellites that could eventually provide Ukraine and Europe with their own home-baked alternative to Starlink. Christine Lagarde, the head of the European Central Bank, has also started talking pointedly about how Europe needs its own infrastructure for payments, credit, and debit, “just in case.”

Robin Berjon, a French computer scientist who spoke at the first EuroStack meeting, acknowledges that the project has yet “to get proper financing and institutional backing” and is “more a social movement than anything else.” If these projects succeed, they will be expensive and slow to bring online—and most will almost certainly underperform cutting-edge US equivalents. But Europe’s issues with American platforms are no longer just about ads and cookies; they’re about the very future of its democracies and national security. And in the longer term, the US itself faces a disquieting question. If it no longer provides platforms that the rest of the world wants to use, who will be left—and whose interests will be served—on American networks?
After Doctorow’s platform monopolists enshittified the user experience, they turned on the businesses that were their actual paying customers and started to abuse them too. US citizens are, ostensibly, the true customers of the US government. But as difficult and expensive as it will be for US allies to escape the enshittification of American power—it will be much harder for Americans to do so, as that power is increasingly turned against them. 

As WIRED has documented, the Trump administration has weaponized federal payments systems against disfavored domestic nonprofits, businesses, and even US states. Contractors such as Palantir are merging disparate federal databases, potentially creating radical new surveillance capabilities that can be exploited at the touch of a button.

In time, US citizens may find themselves trapped in a diminished, nightmare America—like a post-Musk Twitter at scale—where everything works badly, everything can be turned against you, and everyone else has fled. De-enshittifying the platforms of American power isn’t just an urgent priority for allies, then. It’s an imperative for Americans too.

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Aside

Fighting Fascism: Biden’s Achievements Against Trump’s Deception

I watched, of course. I watched the debate with my friend Marie, who is not as annoying as I am about politics, but is very intelligent and informed, and what we came away with was that yes, Biden did not do well. Like all good Democrats, our hands settled into the appropriate wringing position that so accompanies our ever-present anxiety, our optimism stunted once again by the overblown bluster that diminished President Biden that night and reintroduced the familiar dark cloud that finds us so easily in uneasy times.

But today, after a fitful sleep and several days of televised, electronic, and newspaper “autopsies” of the event, I got up, shook off the cloud, and got angry. Because what I realize, and what I want the anti-fascists everywhere to understand is that there was NEVER a chance that Joe Biden could have won that debate. How could ANYONE who is intelligent, accomplished, and honest even begin to debate such a creton like Trump? When we were watching the show, my friend & I were so dumbfounded about the size and speed and frequency of Trump’s lies that we were tripping over each other trying to refute the disgusting things Trump was saying, one after the other and other and other- we were getting dizzy just trying to keep up! And our conversations were full of mouth-hanging-open-Incredulity, barely able to make full sentences.

So, yeah, I’m not the President, who obviously does know the truth to all of Trump’s lies. What he didn’t have was time; to have to respond immediately to the filth being spat by Donald Trump was impossible. But that doesn’t mean that he has gone soft in the head, or that he is some sort of doddering, foolish old man. If two politically active, reasonably intelligent women who are a couple of decades younger than either candidate couldn’t squeeze out a few rejoinders to the mud Trump was wallowing in, tossing out the Prez because of some perceived “frailty” is just stupid.

It’s stupid because, despite the absence of media coverage, Joe Biden has accomplished more in 3 1/2 years than any President since FDR. He has a list of accomplishments that are jaw-dropping in themselves. He has done more for the American people than most people can even imagine. He doesn’t pretend to be Presidential, he IS Presidential. He doesn’t pander for votes, he EARNS them by listening to what the citizens say, thinks about them, and finds ways to help or fix the greatest number of problems in the most coherent and concrete way possible. His efforts to reduce and eventually eliminate child poverty; absolving students with stifling college debt; creating grants to help first time home buyers; funding for historic colleges, lowering prescription drug costs; fully funding the Veterans Administration and studies to help determine cures for the damages of war, and providing Child Tax Credits for young parents have created what should be a great “safety net” for our Democracy for millions and for years to come. And he did it at the same time he REDUCED THE NATIONAL DEBT! But those are not the things that we hear about. Donald Trump is today’s political version of P.T. Barnum, and the civilian audiences turn to see whenever he points to another ring in the circus.

His sleight of hand is successful, too, because he knows that our weakness, as citizens, is that we aren’t really paying attention to what is REALLY happening, so his forked tongue picks up our ignorance and turns it onto us. He listens (or rather, his dangerous and greedy minions listen) to what good things we hear about when we are driving or between dinner and Netflix and bedtime, and he flips the story. For all of the things that Joe Biden has accomplished, Donald Trump claims them as HIS. He lies, boldly, loudly, and without embarrassment, that it is HE who has “done more for our Veterans than any President ever….” after denying his calling the fallen and wounded or captured soldiers “suckers and losers” in lieu of attending ceremonies to celebrate our heroes. He claims that “EVERYONE” wanted to reverse the Roe v. Wade decision and send it “back to the states” where “it belongs”, and even though most states have voted exactly OPPOSITE that position, he has said he will sign a federal ban once elected.

But those are not the things being written, spoken, debated about after last week’s debacle. And neither are we hearing about his indictments for 34 FEDERAL CRIMES, his CONVICTIONS for fraud and RAPE, the more than 35,000 PROVEN lies-that’s right, THIRTY FIVE THOUSAND lies he told during the 4 years he lived in the White House ; an average of 21 lies PER DAY! (How hard to you have to work to reach that level of deception?!). Just to be clear- he hasn’t stopped that behavior-he still lies as easily as he breathes, accusing the “radical left” of every single thing he and his thugs have done AND CONTINUES TO DO.

It is nearly impossible to imagine any person of honor and integrity like Joe Biden, who has served his constituents and our country for decades, being able to counter the diatribe of lies and libelous accusations that were blown at the President Thursday night. But that was the point, right? Because Donald Trump, as far as we know, has claimed to read only two books in his lifetime. He claims (not convincingly) that he has read the Bible and that Adolf Hitler had some good ideas in Mein Kampf. Whether we believe he actually read either of those books, one thing is clear- someone around him obviously did. (My money is on Steve Bannon and Steven Miller). Because he is the perfectly diabolical example of the Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels’ appalling assertion that “if you tell a lie often enough and loud enough, soon, it becomes the truth”. It would appear that it was true of the German reich’s propaganda, and has had the same effect here in the US in 2024.

So, all the anxiety we are feeling and the hand wringing we are doing is JUST EXACTLY WHAT TRUMP WANTS. In that way that a snake weaves his way through grass, Trump (and his minions on the SCOTUS) the White Christian Nationalists, and the rabid MAGA acolytes that he has managed to convince of his divinity, Trump has learned the “survival skills” one must have in order to slither into the White House. All he has to do is amplify Goebbels’ contention and do it on tv or in his tent-revival rallies, and that’s what many millions of people believe. Even more frightening is that Trump has added the despicable practices of name-calling and calling on his rabid followers to destroy any one and everything that he believes is “out to get him”, and he can sit back and watch as his bile drips and slimes over our nation’s “light on the hill”.

This process works, he knows, and people begin to fear speaking out against the horror they see and feel brewing just beneath the surface.

I make campaign buttons for various Democratic campaigns. Mostly they are very positive, specific to supporting a particular candidate or issue. But I admit, I do enjoy coming up with some humorous ones that are not necessarily endorsed by “official” communications offices, and I’ll take advantage of my ability to create them myself to take a “dig” at the opposing candidate. Some of the favorites this year are the ones that are defiantly anti-Trump. I take the buttons to various campaign events, send them out to different supporters, and pass them out when people ask me about them.

The buttons I make are free, with no restrictions for how many they can take, and are not copywritten, available for anyone to make copies for themselves. I’ve done this for several years now, and for quite a few campaigns, and they are always a hit. For the last few years, however, since Trump was elected the first time, when I share the buttons with the crowds, the absolute favorites are those that say “Make Trump Lose Again” or “NO MAGA”, and others similar, with amusing images and so forth. And EVERY TIME, at every event, people pick up the anti-Trump buttons, laugh, tell me they LOVE them, but put them back into the box and say, “I’d be terrified to wear that one” or “I don’t want to get shot”. Yeah. And they aren’t laughing when they say it. TRUMP IS WINNING, folks.

But after I did my day of Democratic hand-ringing, I realized that I did not want to live like that! I refuse to live the last years of my life under some nasty, ignorant fascist Russian/Heritage Foundation puppet. I will FIGHT for my grandchildren to keep that element from gaining power over them.

But of course, a couple of campaign buttons and an anti-fascist editorial now and then will make no difference if the progressive, liberal, democratic, flower-child, and “outsider” communities give up. We CANNOT allow these people to take the reins of our Democratic Republic and shred them in order to squeeze out every penny, every bit of hope from those of us who know what they are doing. So I’m begging all of you, my timid, loving, generous friends, even if, like me, you don’t have a lot of money to spare or if you don’t think you have anything to offer, PLEASE, PLEASE, find the Democratic headquarters in your city and volunteer. Do it for a weekend, join the phone banks or text messaging teams- for the Democratic candidates in your communities and up the ticket to the Senate (Sherrod Brown, Ohio!) and for the President, Joe Biden.

It might seem like everyone everywhere is overreacting to this contest, claiming this “the most important election of our lifetimes”. Of course, they have said that for every one of the past 25 years or so, and maybe before that, too! I kind of thought that way, too, until I read the 900 pages of the Project 2025 Heritage Foundation manifesto that the Republican Party has adopted essentially word for word as their party platform. Honestly, I’m not sure I’ve slept soundly since I read it. This election quite literally will mean the difference between democracy and the destruction of everything we love about being Americans. It is THAT important:

They will do away with nearly 2000 government agencies (they have already done a couple hundred!) that are populated with governmental employees with expertise in their professions. They will have turned those positions into “appointed” positions that will be distributed to those people the President feels will be loyal to him, whether they have any expertise-or even any KNOWLEDGE in the job they are given.

They plan to eliminate the Department of Education, with the curricula designed not by teachers or educators of any stripe, but by the President! There will be no unions, especially the teacher’s unions, so that teachers that go “rogue” and teach students REAL history, REAL social studies, REAL language arts, etc. or who don’t follow the radical “white christian national” program sent from the President can be fired without warning or recourse, or even arrested!

If those brave teachers are arrested, then, their luck has just about run out, because the Justice Department will no longer be a separate Department, away from political influence. The Justice Department will also be filled with appointments by the President, and will be able to be fired without warning or recourse should they stray from the President’s official demands for his notion of “justice’.

And of course, your communications will be compromised. Privacy on line, on your phone, or in your doctors’s offices? Don’t count on it. They are potentially up for “inspection”, because even if they don’t dismantle the Department of Homeland Security altogether, they have promised that the “security” they are looking for is investigating anyone and everyone they suspect of not conforming to what the Office of the President feels is enough. So, that would also mean that I could be arrested for writing this post; you could be under suspicion for clicking on it, doubly if you actually read it, and “watched” for what kind of response you have to it.

And god help you if you are black or brown skinned, LGBTQ+, disabled, Muslim, Jew, or any other religion they do not approve of. Do not protest having to walk past statues celebrating Confederate Generals or “Christian” heroes or imagery when walking into the DMV. Civil Rights? Look at what the Trump-enabled SCOTUS did today. As long as he is sitting in that White House, he can do nearly anything as part of his “official duties as President of the US”.

It really does sound a lot like what George Orwell imagined so many years ago when he wrote “1984”, doesn’t it? We’ve had a few years now where every now and then that phrase comes up in conversation when we talk about the worst possible thing that could happen to our country or our world. Because that is what it would be-the worst possible thing that could happen to our society. And that is exactly what they are proposing in the Project 2025 manifesto, plus much, much worse. They have the foundational structure already in place. How many times have you seen politicians saying things like, “Trump is a lunatic, I would never support him”, only to have them turn around a few days later and start talking about how much they LOVE him and want to kiss his ass? And pretend that they never said the things that we SAW AND HEARD THEM SAY? Forget 1984…this is more like “Invasion of the Body Snatchers”! Only, this is not fiction, this is real.

We cannot let them win. You don’t like Joe Biden? Fair enough, you don’t have to like him. You don’t have to want to go hang out in a bar with him and have a beer. You might think he looks old and feeble and doubt his ability to be energetic on the job. I get it, it would be nice to have a younger, funnier, more vigorous leader, one that looks good performing on television or in front of a big wound-up crowd of supporters who travel with him all over the US. Even one like Trump that will tell you that he is “sent by God” to be your “savior”, that he is “the only one who can save this country” (all words uttered, by the way, by the aforementioned leader of 1940’s Germany) or that he will provide “your retribution” for whatever issue you have in your own life.

But he is NOT sent by God, nor is he your savior, or the only one who can save the country. He may provide “retribution”, but it won’t be for you, it will be solely for his own grievances. He doesn’t care about you. At all. Except when he needs your vote. But once you vote him into office, he won’t even need you for that. He will name himself or one of his rich money lenders as “President for Life” or declare that it is his family that will take over for him in case he isn’t immortal as well. Just think….you could have Don Junior or Eric or his favorite, Ivanka, as your next President! Personally, I think maybe the highly educated, civil servant and Vice President of the US would make a better choice.

So wash your hands, splash a little water on your face, take a breath, pull up your britches and do what you need to do. Don’t do it by yourself, bring along some friends. Get in touch with your local Democratic Party, or the League of Women’s Voters, or the campaign headquarters of a candidate running locally and volunteer. Or apply for a job. They actually have a lot more jobs for people to work with campaigns now, since Trump and his MAGA goons have scared off many of the older and experienced election workers. But you have to muster your courage and not let them win before the campaign even gets going. But it’s got to be done, and it’s got to be done NOW! There are only a few months before the election- and we don’t have much time.
(And just so you know, for those of you who fear Trump’s effect on our society and are thinking that you might have to “move”….. Canada, Australia, and most countries in Europe do not want us! (My daughter Cassady worked for two immigration law firms in the past 12 years, and shared some of that knowledge, but not enough for me to quote it to you, sorry!) As far as I can tell, the only options of countries with a “western” culture open to U.S. citizens (and I am in no way professing to know for sure) are New Zealand, maybe Mexico, and maybe South Africa. )

WE CANNOT ALLOW THEM TO WIN!

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July 1, 2024 · 10:49 pm
Aside

A LITTLE MORE CONVERSATION – OR DEBATE

FROM A REDDIT READER:

I understand Trump lied every time he got spoke, but that doesn’t explain Biden’s poor performance. Biden looked weak from the first sentence he spoke before Trump even had a chance to speak. How are Trump’s lies preemptively causing Biden to mumble? Plenty of people could do the job and speak in full sentences. Obama definitely wouldn’t have crumbled. Newsome or Whitmer could definitely stand up to Trump.

Biden was already struggling in the polls before the election. I believe we are likely to lose the election because of Dem’s blind loyality to Biden and their inability to see reality.

*******************************************************************************************

MY RESPONSE:

You can’t buy into the notion that Joe Biden is not able to lead. As explained above, the “technique” that Trump used to ruffle Biden, the Gish gallup, (with Trump is less about “technique” than it is about bad manners) successfully worked on Biden, which is much easier to do when the “victim” is a stutterer, as President Biden is. When you watched the debate, were you as taken aback as I was in trying to just yell at the tv “that’s a lie!” or “that’s not true, never happened, that’s what Trump did, not Biden….” ?  The lies were coming in so fast and furious with no fact checking…well, I guess there was fact checking, but the NPR fact checker  couldn’t keep up and couldn’t release his data until well after the debate was over. 

So, yeah, the debate was a debacle. But changing lanes at this point would be a complete disaster. The problem has been, for me, that everyone is so concerned about Biden’s age-a concept that the Trump camp has been rolling out for months now, even though the difference in age is negligible. The real difference, which is what Trump wants people to forget, is that he is a lying, conning, raping danger to American society who is a narcissistic sociopath who can’t put a cogent thought together even though the rot he spews is loud and full of false bravado. THOSE are the things that should be talked about! 

The other issue is who will leave office with the condition of the country in better condition? The plans that the Biden Administration have long-lasting value for US citizens; the condition Trump left the country in when he finally decided he couldn’t take his ball and go home was in disastrous circumstances. He continues to disparage our country, the one he wants to lead, the one that MOST Presidents (the reasonably sane ones, anyway) love and want to maintain as a “shining light on the hill” as a “dump” , a “disaster”, with murderers, rapists, and murderers around every corner. My feeling is that his paranoia is a far more dangerous point of view than Biden’s astonishment over the filth that Trump was throwing at him. Trump’s vision is always one that he ends up creating…and he does nothing to stop it, he just makes people fear and hate more than ever. 

Then, of course, there is the fact that we don’t even know who Trump will call to be his VP. After the way Trump shit on Mike Pense every chance he got while they were in the WH, and he did NOTHING while the mob at the Capitol chanted and built a gallows in order to HANG him, the only people who would want to walk into that situation are those whose craven ambition for power is equal or greater than that of Trump’s!  I’d lay my bet on the intellectually superior, “seasoned” politically astute Kamala Harris over any slime bucket Trump would tap to be part of his Administration. and I’d bet on Biden 100% over Trump as someone who could finish a four year term with usable brain matter in his head, since Trump is so obviously lacking in that already. And if Trump’s brain continues to deteriorate at the rate it’s going, he’s likely to slip further into the even more “primitve” parts of his brain, which means even more hate, ugliness, and violent rhetoric. That has to NOT be allowed to happen!  

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July 1, 2024 · 10:42 pm
Aside

Libs and Cons…Part 2

The Republican Party has made no secret of their alignment with the conservative, Southern, Christian evangelical movement. They used to be the party of law & order, the “Party of Lincoln” that signed the Emancipation Proclamation. But then they realized that the “Southern Strategy” to appeal to the racism of Southern voters didn’t work nationwide and that the Democrats had been welcoming African American voters, electing Lyndon Johnson in a landslide in 1964. 

The Republicans, searching for a new strategy and voters, realized that the Evangelical Christian movement may be their best bet. They decided that they could convince a huge block of white voters that they were the Party of “American Values”; not exactly the same as their disastrous Southern Strategy, but still recruiting from much of the same voting block. They cast their lots with the likes of Billy Graham, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson (who ran for President in  the 1988 Republican Party) and their various Christian organizations. They would become the “pure” Party, the Party of God, Guns, Apple Pie, and Patriotism. They didn’t need any of those liberal socialists anyway. And they might just be able to pull it off.  They heard what LBJ said, and they knew that was where they could exploit millions of hard working, faithful, Christian men and women to join them. 

“If you can convince the lowest white man he’s better than the best colored(sic) man, he won’t notice you’re picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he’ll empty his pockets for you”.  Lyndon Johnson, 1964

As crude as LBJ’s words are, it may be the way to understand the devotion of Donald Trump’s followers, and the loud “mean girl” strategy being used during this election season. 

The Republican Party has been referred to recently as “the party of grievance”, or the “just say no” party:

  • No health care, 
  • No abortions
  • No voting for black folks,
  • No mercy for people crossing into the US from dangerous countries 
  • No Social Security or Medicare for old or disabled people, 
  • No funding (especially)for Medicaid, of course 
  • No funding for public education (but using that money for private charter schools is ok), 
  • No rent assistance, 
  • No debt forgiveness, 
  • No nutrition assistance for children or families, 
  • No books that may have social or political themes, 
  • No allowances for gender differences, 
  • No gay marriage 
  • No restrictions on gun ownership or guns in public places, 
  • No restrictions on the destruction of public lands by private oil companies, 
  • No money to fund the maintenance of bridges or highways that are crumbling, 
  • No restrictions on greenhouse gasses or funding for alternative energy sources, 
  • No restrictions on ownership of media or what is said by such,  
  • No restrictions on the amount of money corporations can use to fund and support candidates that they know will vote on legislation in the best interest of the corporation rather than the best interests of the people of the United States (dark money aka bribes). 

Grievance politics means that the rules of behavior (good manners) that you learned in elementary school as early as kindergarten no longer apply, and anyone can say or do anything they want to do. If you disagree, then you are ridiculed as “woke”, “elitist”, “socialist”, “snowflakes” or other terms they consider insulting. 

Better than some of the invectives thrown around during the Civil Rights era, yes, although I’m not sure why they think the appropriated term “woke” is disparaging…and I embrace that one. I’m proud to be awake, aware of what’s happening around me, aware of what they are attempting to do….”snowflakes” are beautiful in winter, none of them exactly the same as another, just like humans…”socialist”…well, I do appreciate the services provided by the fire department, police department, public hospitals, Veteran’s benefits, Unemployment insurance, FEMA, the GI bill, the National Parks, the FDA, NASA, the CDC, the Post Office, and, of course, the military. Soooo, yep. That one works for me, too. (Plus, I’m on Social Security and Medicare, the truly evil socialist programs the Republicans have been trying to dismantle since they were developed, and have promised to do just that if they are able to gain the Senate and House majorities again) 

The “elitist” one cracks me up.  The Republican Party “ruling class” is made up almost entirely of extremely wealthy “legacy” rich white men with degrees bought and paid for by ELITE wealthy parents who realize that their offspring don’t have a dime of common sense or interest in actual learning. They may have excelled at the expensive private prep schools they attended in the arts of bullying, hazing, drinking, cheating, and womanizing (ahem, Brett Kavanaugh) and know that they will have to provide large “gifts” to the Ivy League institutions they insist their offspring attend in order for said offspring to graduate. Now, who are you calling “elitists”? 

Elitists? I’ve often wondered how they can launch that term at Democrats with a straight face. Then, a couple of weeks ago, I was informed by a former Republican friend that “elitists” actually refers to “the Jews”.  Yep, that same old trope that’s been floating around, sometimes under cover of what Republicans call “political correctness”, sometimes blatant, and sometimes fatal. The trope that says that all Jews are connected by some sort of  international cabal that starts with that most dangerous Jew, George Soros, and makes its way throughout the world by way of his support for organizations that promote democracy, peaceful governments, and “socialist” ideals like feeding the poor and hungry and providing health care to the most needy, especially on continents like Africa and Asia. Of course, his “influence” is aided and abetted by the “elites” of Hollywood, New York, and the Democratic Party.  (I guess that must be when we aren’t all gorging ourselves on the blood and flesh of the children we have molested and kept prisoner under a pizza shop in NYC)(You know I’m joking, right?) 

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October 31, 2022 · 5:57 pm
Aside

The Unfortunate “defund the police” Tag

Look, folks. The “defund the police” meme was a stupid, lazy mistake-someone trying to put a big idea into a small, bumper sticker-sized slogan, and it’s backfired. Shame on us. The truth is, and you all know it, even though you may pretend to be shocked and outraged by the “anarchists” who want to “defund the police”, I’m a lifelong (63 years) lefty, and I’m here to tell you that nobody wants to shut down the police, and no one wants anarchy in the streets. Nobody. Despite what this President and his believers and spokespeople tell you, inciting fear and loathing for the people who are angry about the power and violence that seems to be built into the police departments of cities around the country we are not calling for the elimination of the police. Those you brand as “Antifa” don’t want chaos and violence any more than you do. And if you’re sure it’s that group of folks you fear, know this- most (nearly ALL) of us want nothing to do with them-as I hope you feel about the KKK, “Boogieboys” or Qanon who hijack your reputations. What we are trying to say is that we are not out to turn our country into a “socialist state”. We are not for a government that wants to keep you locked up and to tell you how to live. We don’t want that any more than any one of you. What we do want is for the people of this country to acknowledge that while our country is a wonderful, strong nation, we are not perfect and never have been. We want to acknowledge that there is an unequal access to most things for some, and the most obviously one-sided and dangerous thing right now is the disparity in justice for folks who are black, brown, and poor. It is the endless roadblocks to housing, employment, health care, education, and wealth, and especially the repeated violence of police-white police- against black men that has created the violence and anger that has spilled into the streets. The “defund the police” thing is a shortened way of saying that rather than filling police departments with enough military firepower to create a war, and then handing that firepower to poorly-trained, uneducated young men with with a desire to “save the world” and be a hero or prove his manhood is a recipe for disaster from the start. The “defund the police” call is saying that it’s time to take the money that’s been set up to give military-level weaponry to fight against our own citizens and use it to better train the police, and better educate them. It’s saying that it’s time to redistribute some of that money into programs for community policing programs, uplifting neighborhoods, providing physical and mental health care for everyone, including rehab programs for drug addicts and those formerly incarcerated, and more assets and attention to understanding of, resolutions for, and the bitter effects of poverty and bigotry on individuals and communities. It might take a bit of discomfort for you to consider that what the police in our country are afraid of is the same thing the police in all fascist nations fear, and that causes all of that poison and anxiety and terror to threaten law enforcement- it is the knowledge that everyone they see or are called to assist is quite possibly in possession of at least one firearm. Oh, the idea that someone’s precious second amendment rights may be stepped on is a horror. It’s ironic then, isn’t it? That the very “right” they fight for so strenuously has caused the greatest fear that the police have nowadays in doing their job. Those who are insistent upon their “right” to own and carry weapons whenever & wherever they please, for “protection” or intimidation are the creators of the biggest problem the police face, and is the thing that makes their trigger fingers twitch as they walk out the doors of their stations. Tough to “protect and serve” when you can’t tell who needs protecting from who needs arresting. Put together the elements of bigotry, abuse, and fear and there will never be peace. We aren’t saying we don’t want to have law enforcement; what we are saying is that we want to stop throwing more & more money and fatal weapons at police, hoping that by doing the same thing over & over, they will create a different result one day. Rather, let’s take some of that military funding and spend more of it toward finding ways of PREVENTING violence and desperation in the first place. Not only will the communities feel safer, so will the cops. This campaign cycle is already ugly; it’s going to get a lot worse, and you all know why. It is Donald Trump. Plain and simple. That’s not a future tense-his brand of ugliness started before Obama was ever in office, but became obsessive when he became President. His belief that no black man should be President has never been a secret, and his rage over the fact that not only was a black man President, he was a well-respected, honored, immensely intelligent black man who managed to dig our country of a dangerous financial depression and left office beloved by millions around the world. There is no doubt that, whether you believe the man is guilty of the many crimes he’s been accused of, or maybe you can get past his association with criminals that he’s hired, then fired, and who have subsequently been arrested and sent to prison; or even if you buy into his fake “Christianity”, and his pretending to be a “moral” man of fine character, (all of which are delusional fantasies he’s sought to implant in your brains) you undoubtedly know that his claim that “Sleepy Joe” is going create chaos and anarchy and set the world on fire is ridiculously stupid on its face. First, is he “Sleepy Joe” or is he Josef Stalin? Is there a way to be both? Hardly. But he offers up two different disparaging monikers so you have a choice of which one you relate to best. But really, you do know, (or can find out if you are interested) that Joe Biden has spent the last 30+ years in public service, actually giving a damn about this country and it’s people instead of his own pocketbook and ego. And besides, all the terrible things Trump is threatening WILL happen in the future under a Joe Biden presidency are already happening NOW! Under THIS president! You remember how violent and destructive it was when Obama had that spiteful Joe Biden as his menacing and vindictive VP, right? And how everyone was so afraid of Biden’s malicious temper and his use of belittling nicknames and obsessive need to prove his “greatness” at the cost of destroying everyone around him? What a miserable time it was.... Oh, wait...that’s not what it was like...the leaders of our country then, while obviously not perfect (but who were actually humble enough to admit that) were calm, informed and dignified all those many years ago. Remember? Back when the rest of the world didn’t consider our once revered nation a complete laughingstock... Or could never believe that we would align with the world’s most dangerous despots and dismiss our allies...or that we would become a people to be pitied or dismissed. No. The thing is, that is exactly what’s happening right now as you read this. As our soldiers still languish in wars promised to end. As our families, friends and neighbors die of a virus that he knew was deadly but refused to act because the earliest victims were old and predominantly black and brown, and who bold-face lied about it to his own citizens. And lied. And lied some more. And as our longest lasting, most aggressive nemesis manipulates our democratic elections in order to prove that the great experiment in democracy has failed. Think about those things. Think about what your words and choices really are, and what your vote says about you in the eyes of your children and grandchildren.

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September 13, 2020 · 5:29 am
Aside

IMPEACHMENT

I don’t know if or who I will work for in the 2020 election, but of course, it will be ANYONE other than the dolt currently inhabiting the White House. 

This is a dangerous time for all of us, and for our kids and grandkids and their families onward.  I’ll draw your attention to the hearings to determine if the “president” should be impeached and the venom being spewed by the conservative party threatens to infect millions of followers thanks to the support and misinformation being spread by conservative politicians and media talking heads.  They claim that the only reason the Dems are moving to impeachment is because we are ‘sore losers” and we just “hate Trump” because Hilary Clinton lost.  Nope.  We Dems are aching for impeachment, or we have learned to “hate Trump” because of who he is, and because of what he has done.  

The Right continues to call the hearings a “witch hunt” and that he has done NOTHING wrong. They have claimed that he is a president that has been CHOSEN BY GOD to lead this country according to his whims and interests. What kind of heresy are evangelical Christians hanging on to? As I write this today, the leaders of our longest held allies- France, England, and Canada- have been caught laughing at and making fun of our clown-in-chief.  I don’t know about you all, but the fact that Donald Trump is being ridiculed by the likes of Boris Johnson is just plain humiliating. But Trump’s sycophants have been so successful in redirecting the attention of the public toward unrelated matters at the behest and planning of former-KGB-agent and President of Russia Vladimir Putin that many are actually falling for it.  And Tucker Carlson exclaims on his own tv show that he “doesn’t care about Ukraine” and that he’s “rooting for Russia”! For RUSSIA. Remember when Russia was our greatest adversary? Oh yeah…they still are.  

Remember that what you are hearing from most of the media is incorrect. Before you decide to cast a vote, before you make up your minds about the “fairness” of what is being done or said, check the facts. Nixon quit before he could be impeached for attempting to cover up the actions of his minions; Clinton was impeached for getting a b…-j.. and lying about it.  Trump is selling out the sanctity of our elections for MONEY and POWER. That (excuse the awful pun) trumps any of the previous impeachment efforts, as I see it.  This is not about any other President. It’s not about feelings that have been hurt. This is about Donald Trump and the vicious attacks he has made against our nation and its people. In a scary mirror of Nixon’s Mitchell, Haldeman, Erlichman, and Liddy, Trump has his Barr, Pompeo, Nunes and Miller.  Sadly, it doesn’t look like Rudy is going to be our John Dean.

I believe that nothing this administration had done has been in the best interests of our people-not our parents, our children, or our grandchildren, but maybe if we stand together, look beyond political interest, and act with love, we will save our futures and bring us closer to the most important goal-a peaceful world.      

FactCheck.org®https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/

https://www.snopes.com

Media Bias/Fact Check News

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December 5, 2019 · 3:56 am
April 13, 2019 · 12:26 am

In Response to Dumpy’s Video relating Congresswoman Ilhan Omar with 9/11 video.

https://t.co/VxrGFRFeJM?ssr=true

https://mobile.twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1116817144006750209

Yes, she used an unfortunate choice of words, perhaps, but the sniggering and fear-mongering and the parsing of her words by our leaders in Washington have taken my breath away. The video was sent VIA TWITTER by the ever distinguished & mature US President. I saw the news clip just after she said it, and knew this would provide a great talking point and provide the Republicans with a perfect target. I don’t know anything about Ms. Omar except that she is a progressive Democrat 🥰 and she is a woman🥰 from Somalia😳 and is a Muslim😳, so my reaction to this whole thing is not about her politics-she was voted into office by a large constituency, so I can’t defend or condemn her for anything she says; she is passionate about her citizens and defends her faith, which are guaranteed rights by way of the constitution, if I remember correctly?

But the obviously venomous hatred in the posting of this video, and many of the responses were so ugly against HER that I had to respond, but I don’t know how to do it so that my tweets come up in any sort of order. So…here’s all of it at once:

What a bunch of f-ing hypocrites! You stand up for this pig of a who has had his son-in-law schmoozing with the Saudi’s since elected..a guy with no proper security clearance, btw… and Dumpy goes & plays with Putin, Jung-Un, and you TRUST him to do what is right?

And you vilify Ms. Omar because she’s Muslim and angry for the death threats and harassment she’s gotten since 9/11? Because you folks aren’t intelligent enough to know the difference between a Saudi terrorist and a Somali-AMERICAN trying to do what is right?

Oh, I see, she’s a Muslim…and she’s a threat to you how? Because you’ve bought into the all-Muslims-are-Evil stereotype that our liar in chief has been selling you so you will stay afraid? Even as he is talking about KNOWN murderous dictators as if he were a ….teenager with his first crush… And to those of you who are stupid enough to deny that we have our own, home-grown terrorists in the US? Remove head from ass, please. There are black churches, temples, and mosques being blown up or shot up or vandalized every day here…

…by good, ol’ white “Christian” bigots who have bought it too. How is it you all can accept that hideous video, blame all MUSLIMS and call them evil when you don’t blame all the “pure-hearted” Christians responsible for Oklahoma City, & other terrorist acts?

…or you don’t look at Columbine & Newtown & Parkland& Las Vegas and hold every single WHITE AMERICAN who owns a gun for those atrocities? In fact, you make EXCUSES for those people! You say, “ well, one bad apple…” Or two. Or ten. Or thirty….”not everyone with a gun does that”…

…well then, maybe you should rethink that “all Muslims are evil” thing. And if you are one of those sick victims of the “White is Right” movement, pouting b/c your “rights” to be assholes are being ridiculed for the idea that 1) white people are discriminated against, and…2) that Donald Trump gives a flying f-k about you, you are too stupid to even be a part of any argument about “good and evil”…because you obviously cant tell the difference.

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Filed under Dumpy, Trump, politics, elections,, Ilhan Omar, New Congress, Muslims, Nationalists, In the news, Personal politics

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May 29, 2017 · 2:24 am

Well, of course he’s narcissistic! (Trump psychology, part 2)

This is starting to get ugly…and we are only on the second issue! Yikes! It’s not unusual for a politician to be fairly narcissistic…they are, after all, putting themselves up as someone who knows better than we do what is best for us.  And they  have to sell that to us. What does it mean, though, when the Politician-in-Chief, who is NOT a career politician but an inheritance millionaire is so much worse than the worst politician you’ve ever seen? 

 

9 Things A Narcissist Will Never Do

By
~ 5 min read

Looking back, it’s my hopefulness that irritates me most. I kept thinking that he’d see the light, get what was wrecking our relationship, understand that I couldn’t live with his constant manipulation. He’d placate me with promises but I don’t believe he ever intended to behave any differently. Actually, I think he liked jerking me around.

As I can personally attest, it’s not always easy to recognize that the person you’re with is high in narcissistic traits. (I’m using the masculine nouns and pronouns because there are more men at the end of the spectrum but feel free to switch up the gender.) Not everyone is the “Look at Me!” type, full of grandiosity, constantly needing to be the center of attention, and wholly self-referential. The narcissist in your life may be soft-spoken, even a bit shy, but the tip-off to who he really is isn’t so much as what he does but what he doesn’t do.

I didn’t realize it while I was in it but he manipulated me in every discussion I tried to have about the problems in our relationship. He’d either refuse to talk about it outright—by stonewalling or saying something like ‘Not that again. Do we have to cover the same ground over and over? It’s always the same tattoo”—or he’d turn the tables on me, saying I was unhappy because I made myself unhappy. Or he’d deny there was a problem at all. It took me a while to realize that he never took responsibility for anything.  He blamed other people for doing things to him, including me. It was mind-bending.

What the person high in narcissistic traits doesn’t do constitutes a pattern of its own and, in many ways, makes him easier to identify. Once you’ve focused on what he isn’t doing, you can see that what motivates him isn’t the need to connect to you in any meaningful way—which is, of course, what you’ve been hoping for all along—but a very private and specific agenda which is making sure that his vision of himself stays protected and invulnerable.

So, if he’s not doing any of the following nine things—which people who actually want real connections do all the time—you need to wise up pronto.

      1.Own his feelings

Dr. Craig Malkin calls this playing “emotional hot potato” because it’s a common pattern –ascribing whatever he’s feeling in the moment to you which is a form of projection. This becomes a manipulative tactic as well, especially if the narcissist in your life also uses stonewalling and can be emotionally very confusing. (I am speaking from experience here.) Let’s say that you want to talk through a problem and you begin calmly, stating what the problem is. He reacts defensively and he’s clearly getting angry—you can tell by the way he’s folding his arms over his chest, how his jaw muscles are working, and how the furrow between his eyes deepens—and says he doesn’t want to talk about the issue. You start to feel angry and frustrated but you try again and he cuts you off. You ask him why he’s getting so angry and he responds by saying he’s not angry but you are. Yes, that’s the hot potato moment but the fact is that you are angry and getting angrier by the minute. Escalation is built into this and now you’re screaming at him and he looks at you and says, “I’m tired of your anger” and leaves the room.

The truth is that you’ve been played but the likelihood is that you don’t know it. The narcissist is expert at making you feel unsure.

      2. Stop playing games

And it’s not just about emotional hot potato either. People high in narcissistic traits want to be in relationships but only on their terms and they thrive on feeling that they have power and control over their partners, as studies show, and feel autonomous.

So, no, playing games isn’t coming off the menu any time soon.

      3. Care about emotional consequences

It’s widely known that people high in narcissistic traits have impaired empathy but the better way of thinking about it is that they—unlike most people—don’t care about the emotional fallout from their behaviors. Most of us care about being well-thought of and we also like thinking of ourselves as people who don’t hurt others deliberately; we’re more likely to fall into the trap of becoming inveterate pleasers to avoid upsetting others than we are to engage outright war. None of that is true of the narcissist.

If he has to burn every bridge to win and feel good about himself, he’ll grab the kerosene. This is especially important to remember if you are divorcing a narcissist.

      4. Stop one-upmanship

This is closely allied to #2 and #3 but being indefatigable is also a hallmark of the narcissist. As Dr. Joseph Burgo notes in his book The Narcissist You Know, the narcissist is highly vindictive. Burgo believes that what motivates the narcissist is his need to cover unconscious shame and whenever that shame starts rising into awareness, he feels under siege and reacts to deflect the feeling and to wreak revenge.

There is no “off” button as those who’ve been unlucky enough to be the target of the gossip and slurs a narcissist will avail himself of.

      5. Tell the truth

The irony is that the narcissist only recognizes one brand of truth (his own) and it doesn’t really matter whether his version of events is utterly contradicted by facts or even a paper trail. He’s sticking to his guns because you are the liar.

       6. Apologize

Since the narcissist never takes responsibility for his acts, words, or feelings, what’s there to apologize for? He only did what he had to do in response to other people’s actions, after all.

       7. Make peace

Not happening for a number of reasons.

First and foremost is his need to feel superior to others and to be in control; he likes the rough-and-tumble of conflict and discord because it makes him feel powerful.

Second, because he sees himself as merely reactive to slights and provocations by others, he’s not going to yield and look like a weakling.

Third, he’s happy with scorched earth if that’s what’s needed to feel like a winner. This is why divorcing a narcissist is an utter nightmare—don’t count on him to negotiate or meet you in middle—and why co-parenting is an extended one.

       8. Let you go

Not until you’re replaced. The narcissist needs you as a planet circling his sun to feel good about himself so he’s not going to go no contact until he’s geared up and found someone new. He’ll keep on engaging—sending you texts, writing you emails, leaving you voice mail—just to try to keep you in his orbit so he can feel good about himself and winning.

       9. Change

Barring an out-of-body experience or major epiphany of near Biblical proportions, not likely.

 

 

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May 29, 2017 · 2:06 am

Is Trump Pathological?

Hello my friends….this is an article I found that reassures me that “it ain’t me” that is losing the marbles…. cannot say the same for the current White House resident. This is the first in a series of examinations of the President and why he acts the way he does.  This could describe any number of people in DC, but is particularly frightening how many of the characteristics fit Mr. Trump….

6 Subtle Characteristics of The Pathological Liar

By
~ 6 min read

Pathological lying (PL) has been defined by the Psychiatric Times as a “long history (maybe lifelong history) of frequent and repeated lying for which no apparent psychological motive or external benefit can be discerned.” There is no real consensus on what pathological lying is and many people have developed their own definition. Pathological lying is something that has negatively affected many people, even professionals, who are often unaware of the psychiatric instability or personality disorder of the liar.  For example, in one of my previous articles I focused on Judge Patrick Couwenberg, a Superior Court Judge of California, who lied repeatedly while serving the public. The former Judge maintained the lie that he was a Caltech graduate, a wounded war veteran, and a CIA operative in the 1960s. All of these statements were easily identified by his peers as unreliable and inconsistent, but Couwenberg continued to attempt to evade others. He was later removed for “willful and prejudicial misconduct” for lying about attending Caltech. This education was critical to his Judicial position.

 The sad part about this story is not so much that the former Judge lost his job in the end, but that he lacked insight into the fact that his steps could be traced and that many people would ultimately find him out. An appropriate level of consciousness was missing from Couwenberg and is missing in so many other people who are compulsive liars. The very fact that a lie could be found out does not affect the pathological liar. They have an inability to consider the consequences or even fear being found out. It’s as if the pathological liar believes they are smarter than everyone and will never be found out. The very fact that the pathological liars’ work-life, home-life, or reputation could be in jeopardy as a result of the lies, does not phase the liar. Guilt, shame, or regret does not affect the liar. Consequences also do not seem to affect the liar. So then why does the liar engage in such behaviors? 

Multiple research studies have attempted to find an answer to this question to no avail. Trying to understand the mind, behaviors, and intention of the pathological liar is not an exact science. It is very much an inexact science and entails years of study. Humans are complex and trying to understand the reasons for why they do all the things they do takes more than a graduate school degree in psychology and years of work experience. For many mental health professionals and psychiatrists, trying to understand the pathological liar (or sociopath and narcissist who engages in this behavior) will entail a combination of intuition and science. Science alone cannot answer the many questions we have about pathological liars, but experience can offer some clues. We now know that pathological lying is spontaneous and unplanned. Impulsivity is often the culprit. We also know that pathological lying is more likely to occur in certain disorders or among individuals who have certain personality traits. Some diagnoses that might include pathological lying includes but is not limited to:

  1. Personality Disorders:
    1. Antisocial Personality Disorder (better known as sociopathy)
    2. Borderline Personality Disorder
    3. Narcissism or narcissistic personality disorder
  2. Behavioral disorders:
    1. Conduct disorder (often diagnosed in children and teens who have criminal-like behaviors or who demonstrate sociopathic traits such as animal cruelty, fire setting, and oppositional behaviors toward authority)
    2. Oppositional Defiant Disorder (ODD) and CD (conduct disorder)
    3. Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) often combined with ODD or CD

Certain personality traits where pathological lying may occur include:

  1. Narcissism or self-centered behaviors and thought patterns
  2. Selfishness
  3. Abusive attitude
  4. Obsessive, controlling, and compulsive behaviors
  5. Impulsivity
  6. Aggressiveness
  7. Jealous behavior
  8. Manipulative behaviors
  9. Deceptiveness
  10. Socially awkward, uncomfortable, or isolated
  11. Low self-esteem
  12. Tempermentalness
  13. Anger

It is important to keep in mind that there are pathological liars who quite frankly just cannot help telling so many lies. It is almost like an automatic thing for the liar. Their world is much different from our world. But there are also liars who are gratified by telling lies, are good at it, and do not regret anything they have ever said. These individuals are “skillful” liars who attempt to evade and harm everyone they come across in their lives. In fact, these liars would meet diagnostic criteria for antisocial personality disorder (or sociopathy). They also tell truths in ways that give incorrect perspectives. In other words, they tell the truth in a misleading way to cause people to view things in an incorrect fashion. Such individuals enjoy and get much gratification from keeping you confused and believing their stories. It is the experience of watching a “victim” run through the maze of confusion that gives gratification to most liars.

Based on my clinical experience and general research of the profession, I encourage you to keep 6 things in mind as you deal with the pathological liar:

  1. Know that a pathological liar will study you: The goal of the liar may be hidden, but you can count on the fact that the they don’t want you to know the truth. In order to evade someone, you certainly need to study the person and examine what that person might or might not believe. Liars, often sociopaths, are known to “study” the person they hope to take advantage of. In other words, they look for weaknesses.
  2. Don’t forget that the liar lacks empathy: As hard as it is to believe, it is true. The liar does not have any moral consciousness of how the lying behavior may make you feel. The liar does not think before he lies: “oh, I better not say that or I could hurt that person or mislead them.” The liar does not care anything about your feelings and never will. A question many parents of my former clients have asked their child who lies is: “Why don’t you just tell me the truth? Why is that so hard!?” As difficult as it is to believe, it is not that easy for the liar to divulge the truth. The liar lacks the ability to consider what you might feel in response to their lie (which is empathy).
  3. Normal people feel guilty and are relieved when you change the topic or stop asking questions: This was an interesting point that I learned about as I studied forensic psychology as a graduate student some years ago. While working with juvenile delinquents, I found that the pathological liar shows no emotion when lying which makes them believable. A person who is lying and has normal levels of empathy and concern for others, will often show relief when the topic being discussed is changed. For example, if someone told you that they grew up in a concentration camp and experienced a lot of trauma as a result, you would ask questions about it to further understand. If you changed the topic at the point when you observed stress or anxiety in response to your questions, you would see the person relax because they are aware of the consequences of their lying. Most of us will relax when others cease from asking too many questions about a topic we are lying about. A pathological liar is not fazed. You will rarely if ever see emotion.
  4. All liars do not do the common things you think liars do: Believe it or not, liars do not always touch their nose, shift in their seats or from one foot to the next, or even look sneaky when lying. Some really experienced liars are good at giving you direct eye contact, seeming relaxed or “laid back,” and may appear very sociable. The thing to look for is eye contact that feels piercing. Some sociopaths have learned how to evade people with direct eye contact, sociable smiles, and humor. Trust your instincts and discernment. What do their eyes tell you? What does their behavior or laughter tell you?
  5. The most sneaky liars are manipulative: I once heard someone say “we all manipulate.” While this might be true to a certain degree, the liar tends to manipulate more than anyone else and has learned how to become a “pro” at doing it. There is nothing impressive about the dangerous or evil manipulator. They know everything to say and do, they know what you want and don’t want, and again, they will “study” you. In fact, many pathological liars (and sociopaths) use sexual or emotional arousal to distract you from the truth. Proceed with caution when dealing with someone who seems to be directing their attention to you in such a way as to stimulate your arousal to distract you. That arousal could be psychological (peaking your interest), emotional (causing you to feel connected to them), or sexual.
  6. Pathological liars exhibit strange behaviors: Can you remember how you felt, perhaps as a child or teen, after you were caught lying to a teacher, a parent, or friend? Did you feel guilty, sad, or afraid that the other person would no longer accept you? Some research suggests that pathological liars show no discomfort when caught lying, while other studies suggest that liars may become aggressive and angry when caught. The bottom line is that no pathological liar is the same.
 As you can see, trying to understand the liar is as difficult as trying to understand how the world began. It’s something that requires a lot of study, patience, intuition or discernment, and wisdom. Research continues in trying to understand the mind and behavior of the pathological liar. Psychiatrists and mental health professionals continue to research the liar in order to understand why they do what they do and how we can protect their victims.

I wish you well

About Támara Hill, MS, LPC

Támara Hill, MS, LPC, is a licensed therapist and certified trauma professional, in private practice, who specializes in working with children and adolescents who suffer from mood disorders, trauma, and disruptive behavioral disorders. Hill strives to help clients to realize and actualize their strengths in their home environments and in their relationships within the community. She credits her career passion to a “divine calling” and is internationally recognized for corresponding literary works as well as appearances on radio and other media platforms. She is an author, family consultant, and founder of Anchored in Knowledge.com. Visit her at Anchored-In-Knowledge or Twitter.

 

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