Can Barack Obama manipulate him?
n addition to offering some hypothetical pointers to Obama, Behary also offered some thoughts on what we should expect from a Trump presidency based on how narcissists operate. They were dark.
One potentially underappreciated threat for these next four years, it turns out, might be boredom on the part of the chief executive. There isn’t really anybody in the world who thinks Trump will enjoy the day-to-day drudgery of being president — the meetings, the fat briefing books, the endless diplomatic visits. During the campaign, Robert Draper of the New York Times even reported that, according to a John Kasich adviser, Trump’s eldest son had indicated that “his father’s vice-president would be in charge of domestic and foreign policy,” making him the most powerful veep in history. The Trump camp denied this, but it’s still reasonable to think Trump, in light of what we know about who he is and his lack of interest in policy, is going to do a lot more delegation than past presidents, especially on the many, many boring tasks inherent to the job.
“I think he’ll recede into the background and delegate as long as the people who are doing his job are doing it well enough so he can take the credit,” said Behary. “Then he can step out like the king and wave to the crowd.” But this won’t always be possible. “I’m more concerned that when narcissists step away from the adulation, the spotlight, the praise, the applause, they get bored,” she continued. “And then they have to find other ways to cook up a stimulating event or something that becomes interesting, stimulating, controversial, competitive, self-soothing. That’s what’s of greater concern — how’s he going to deal with the routine of day-to-day life, which becomes very demanding and not necessarily so stimulating every day of the week, and not necessarily filled with crowd applause?”
One immediate practical concern, Behary said, involves security. “I’ve often wondered how is he going to stay inside his Secret Service detail?” she said. “They don’t follow orders. Narcissistic people don’t take orders, they don’t follow orders — they may do it if it’s serving them and it’s convenient for them, but not when it feels uncomfortable. They’re not good with frustration. They don’t believe they should be able to follow the same rules as everyone else. There’s a lot of wonder and worry on my part and my colleagues who specialize in this area on how will he follow the detail of the Secret Service and stay within the boundaries?” As if on cue, shortly after I spoke with Behary, news broke that Trump had snuck out for a steak with his family without a member of his press pool — a potentially seriousbreach of protocol.
Overall, said Behary, she expected that Trump’s behavior will depend greatly both on how bored he is and how beloved he feels at a given moment. “If his favor goes up, it’s all good,” she said. “I still wonder what he’s going to do with the ants in his pants about needing a new shiny toy, because this type of person can’t stay still and follow monotonized routines, and so I can’t imagine — what’s he going to do without his celebrity-ship? That’s the part that’s really going to be interesting to follow. Will he have to create chaos and create situations and conditions so that he has to step forward? I don’t know. I just can’t imagine him staying still for that long.”
