A liberal discusses a “clinical narcissist”
Marty Peretz in TNR:
If Obama could not get Chicago over the finish line in Copenhagen, which was a test only of his charms, how will he persuade Tehran to give up its nuclear weapons capacity or the Arabs, to whom he has tilted (we are told) only tactically, to sit down without their 60 year-old map as guide to what they demand from Israel.
What I suspect is that the president is probably a clinical narcissist. This is not necessarily a bad condition if one maintains for oneself what the psychiatrists call an “optimal margin of illusion,” that is, the margin of hope that allows you to work. But what if his narcissism blinds him to the issues and problems in the world and the inveterate foes of the nation that are not susceptible to his charms?
Chicago will survive its disappointments and Obama will, as well. It is the other stage sets on which the president struts — like he strutted in Cairo and at the United Nations — that concern me. I know that the president believes himself a good man. My nervy query to him is: “Does he believe America to be a good country?”
And Frank Rich has become very critical of President Obama as well. Former radical Roger Simon has already drawn his conclusion about all this.
October 7th, 2009 at 3:24 am
Hilarious. For 8 years, the left accused Bush of being a lunatic and/or being mentally ill in one form of illness or another. Untrue, of course. Now, nine months after their Messiah takes office without anyone, including the Lunatic Left, knowing who the hell the guy was, suddenly they’re forced to admit that he’s, . . . wait for it, mentally ill, and are reduced to parsing whether this illness is something bad, or something not quite so bad.
Imbeciles.