2017 Mar 23^rd

Much of the human brain is given over to inhibition. The ability to inhibit a tendency to club to death anyone offering us a slight is critical for the development of civilization. When someone suffers from brain damage, they are more likely to be surly, pugnacious and more obnoxious than they were before their stroke or accident. Even for folks with intact brains there are wide individual differences in their ability to inhibit when inhibition is called for. There are wide individual differences among people on this characteristic just are there are wide individual differences in sociability or intelligence. Another name for this ability to inhibit is impulse control. Impulse control can be learned but only if there are negative consequences for its absence.

President Trump is an interesting case in this regard: Recall his infamous tape made on the bus with Billy Bush. He claimed (or is it bragged) about his irresistible impulse to kiss any pretty girl he saw to the extent that he always carried breath mints with him. We’ve had several women airline passengers who claimed they had to change seats because Trump insisted on fondling them.

You couple this lack of impulse control with an inability to admit error, add substantial wealth and the result is enormous volatility. Remember that Trump took out full-page ads in four New York dailies demanding the death penalty for a rapist gang who confessed to assaulting and raping a central park jogger. The gang members were convicted but subsequently the conviction was vacated because hard evidence proved their innocence. Trump continued, in interviews and other media, to insist on their guilt. Trump could not admit he was wrong. His attorney for a time was Roy Cohn, the same Cohn who supported the infamous Senator Joe McCarthy. Cohn’s advice to Trump was never back down and never apologize. Trump took the advice very seriously.

Trump tweets describe a fantasy world that has now become described as alt-facts.  He has declared that Muslims cheered in New Jersey when the twin towers fell. He insisted his inauguration crowds were larger that Obama’s, that his electoral college majority was the largest since…and on and on. Now he claims that former President Obama has wire tapped his phones and he says that Obama’s behavior is “sick.”

When the news organizations question his assertions he declares them “the enemy” and deliberately excludes his least favorites from his press conferences. He has not filed many second tier appointments to his administration and blames the absence of these people on Democrat’s unwillingness to confirm people he has never put forward as his choices for the positions.

As a result of this man’s obsession with himself and his lack of impulse control his approval rating at this time in his presidency is the lowest on record. Many even  question his sanity and odds-makers believe his chances of finishing his term of office is at best about even.