President Trump, deprived from birth by some genetic accident of all natural human empathy—one should listen to a recently recovered tape of Trump, speaking to Howard Stern, in which he is actually boasting of his indifference to a man he thought was dying—speaks empathy as a foreign language and makes the kinds of mistakes we all make in a second language that we have barely mastered, placing adjectives in places that no native speaker ever would. Who sends warmest anything to the families of murder victims? Vice-President Mike Pence, who is not a sociopath, merely a Republican, knew that the right language is the language of bafflement, talking about “senseless violence” and the rest.Pretty harsh, but I suspect it may be right. He certainly doesn't seem to have the normal range of emotions.
Tuesday, October 03, 2017
Gopnik goes there
Yes, I think any normal person hearing Trumps tweet of "warmest condolences" to the families of victims of the Las Vegas shooting must have thought "that's a very peculiar way of wording a condolence message". Gopnik thinks it tells us something about Trump's personality:
I have one word. Aspergers!
ReplyDeleteerr yeah Homes, someone with Aspies can make even more crowd rousing speeches than the teleprompter reader Obama
ReplyDeleteI don't think an Aspie should be diagnosing others with aspergers
you are on drugs again Trump couldn't make a crowd rousing if he tried.
ReplyDeleteThe idiots whop turn are going to say yey to anything he says even when those proposed policies are bad for them.
Who said Aspies cannot make crowd rousing speeches anyway.
do not diagnose then Soony!!
Homes
ReplyDeleteTrump has more people skills than Teleprompter'Bama. He was in the real estate business for yonks while all Obama has ever done is 'community organising'. No way in hell he could have Aspergers
I suppose Jason's point is that being able to read a crowd indicates he doesn't have Aspergers, which is usually said to involve not being able to "read" emotions in other people.
ReplyDeleteNot sure that it's technically a very valid point, though: "reading" a crowd is pretty dead easy - you listen to the applause and cheers, you don't have to read the individual faces or body language.
That said, the other things said to be typical of Aspergers - an intense interest in some topic or other and a strong application of reasoning skills - doesn't seem evident in Trump.
I therefore would suspect that you're both wrong in your own ways.
Trump is an incredibly thin skinned bullshit artist who may have managed to convince himself that some of his bullshit is true, and he does display low empathy. But I doubt his issue would be diagnosed as Aspergers. Borderline personality defect, I would have guessed.
you do not need people skills in real estate just the ability to bullshit.
ReplyDeletenow if he had done community organising you would have a case. foot in mouth again Soony!
Obamna could make a speech . Trump cannot.
All Trump has ever done is promote trump. He had other people to do the footwork in business.
moreover his Aspbergers would get worse with age. his 'people skills' have been non-existent in foreign affairs where they would be noticed.
not thinking things through very well are you.
Very Catallaxian in fact
Yes OK: Trump's "success" in real estate - a schmoozy line of business - would go against talk of Aspergers too.
ReplyDeleteNot sure why you go on about Obama by comparison. I didn't think he was the greatest orator, but lots of people thought he could be pretty rousing. And why the issue with using teleprompters? Great speeches could be read from notes, now they are from teleprompters - so what?
If you're indicating that you are in any way impressed that Trump managed to impress crowds of disenchanted dummies who can't see through him - well, that would be a worry.
Aspergers can go from mild to extreme. Most people should know that.
ReplyDeleteno-one is talking about extreme.
Intelligence is a no no as well Trump is 71, He is clearly affected by age yet when he was young he was quite intelligent.
Has no on empathy , he insults people regularly. I have dealt with his real estate skills!
He has been shown up as having no people skills at all in foreign affairs.
Three cases of Aspergers. mild but still Aspergers.in reality you only need one!
Let me get this right.. I also have to sit down, so let me gather my thoughts. Homer Paxton, the person thrown of several blogs due to chronic stupidity , the man who reckoned skanky ho was an Asian warlord’s mistress is now diagnosing mental conditions. Strike a light.
ReplyDelete"you do not need people skills in real estate just the ability to bullshit."
ReplyDeleteYou don't need to be nice to people, you do need to be able to 'read' them. Aspergers' people can't do that, it's not that they want to. It's the distinction between inability vs motivation. Trump was highly motivated to *use* his empathetic skills in real estate and was clearly good at doing so.
", He is clearly affected by age yet when he was young he was quite intelligent."
Whereas you have never been intelligent
Yeah Soony but he lost it all when he was hopeless in Europe! He not only couldn't read anybody there he was totally blind.
ReplyDeleteYou are officially in the Katesy idiot class.
Homer
ReplyDeleteStop the stupid crap, as it's embarrassing the blog. You have no business being here. Shoo.
People who know next to nothing about psychopathology should stop playing Dr. Freud.
ReplyDelete