I never put this on Daily Kos because the above story was far, far more important.
Trump has repeatedly said,when trying to minimize the extent and danger of Russian hacking, that it could have been others. According to Trump, it could have been other countries and the now classic morbidly obese man sitting in his bedroom. How can anyone forget that? It will go down in history as one of Trump’s greats hits.
The Republican presidential nominee came up with many alternative possibilities at the first general election debate on Monday night.
"It could be Russia, but it could also be China. It could also be lots of other people," he said during the first presidential debate. "It also could be somebody sitting on their bed that weighs 400 pounds."
He also devoted a portion of his answer about cyberattacks to the precociousness of his 10-year-old son.
"So we have to get very, very tough on cyber and cyber warfare. It is a huge problem. I have a son. He's 10 years old. He has computers. He is so good with these computers, it's unbelievable. The security aspect of cyber is very, very tough. And maybe it's hardly doable," he said.
My notion may be balderdash, a flight of fancy on my part; but with Trump, we are discovering anything is possible when it comes to reckless disregard for the consequences of his words.
It may be true that there have been attempts to hack into America cybersystems which were thwarted by our cybersecurity agencies. If this happened it presumably would have been communicated to him in top-secret intelligence briefings.
We know that North Korea was able to successfully hack into Sony Pictures way back in 2014:
On November 24, 2014, a hackergroup which identified itself by the name "Guardians of Peace" (GOP) leakeda release of confidential data from the film studioSony Pictures. The data included personal information about Sony Pictures employees and their families, e-mails between employees, information about executive salaries at the company, copies of then-unreleased Sony films, and other information.[1]The perpetrators then employed a variant of the Shamoonwipermalware to erase Sony's computer infrastructure.[2]
In November 2014, the GOP group demanded that Sony pull its film The Interview, a comedy about a plot to assassinate North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, and threatened terrorist attacksat cinemas screening the film. After major U.S. cinema chains opted not to screen the film in response to these threats, Sony elected to cancel the film's formal premiere and mainstream release, opting to skip directly to a downloadable digital release followed by a limited digital theatrical release the next day.[3][4][5]
United States intelligence officials, after evaluating the software, techniques, and network sources used in the hack, alleged that the attack was sponsored by North Korea.[6]North Korea has denied all responsibility. Wikipedia
Under attack, Trump may not even realize that when he brings up other hackers besides Russian cyber-spies as he did once again he is exposing the abilities of our intelligence agencies to identify and stop such attacks.
Trump may have been briefed on this and he may not remember it. My impression is that is memory is highly selective. He may think this was his brilliant analysis and not highly classified information.
Regardless of the hows and whys, if this is the case then Trump once again revealed highly classified information as he did almost exactly a year ago:
President Donald Trump last week shared highly classified intelligence with the Russian foreign minister and ambassador in an Oval Office meeting that was so under wraps that American allies were not aware of the information, The Washington Post reportedMonday.
Current and former anonymous US officials told The Post that Trump's disclosures to Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Ambassador Sergey Kislyak jeopardized a key source of intelligence about the Islamic State terror group, as the source had not given the US permission to share the intelligence with Russia.
Officials told The Post that Trump's disclosure risked the cooperation of an ally that has access inside of ISIS. Matthew Rosenberg of The New York Times told CNNon Monday that the intel came from a close "Middle Eastern ally."
Trump "revealed more information to the Russian ambassador than we have shared with our own allies," one official said. The incident happened last Wednesday, one day after Trump fired FBI Director James Comey.
The FBI is investigating any potential collusion between the Trump campaign and Russian officials to swing the 2016 election as a part of a counterintelligence investigation into Russian interference in November's presidential election.
If Trump really is doing this I can imagine our dedicated career intelligence agents dreading what he is going to say or do next.
Once again New Yorkers wake up and head to the subway seeing a Trump cover on newsstands all over the city.
Unlike the clown depictions of Trump, which I suspect got under his thin skin, this cartoon showing him on Fifth Avenue shooting Uncle Sam while holding hands with a shirtless Putin may be the most devastating one of all.
The Murdoch owned NY Post also has a cover about this.
The other Murdoch owned American newspaper was not kind to Trump either:
Good quotes -- For the first time in history I think narcissism is the most frequently used word to describe a president and his policies. For example: "One of the problems with narcissism as a foreign policy doctrine is that it hides national challenges from the president that are blindingly obvious to everyone else. While Trump employs a mirror, others in the federal government have been using a magnifying glass to find a direct and growing threat to U.S. national security." From Trump replaces national pride with personal vanity by Michael Gerson Here's another good quote, this from Alexandra Petri in the WaPo: After this stunning pronouncement, Anderson Cooper tore his desk in half and threw it on the ground, and for several hours Republicans forgot what they were supposed to be doing and actually denounced the president’s behavior. Paul Ryan emerged from a sarcophagus where he has been hiding from the news for the past several months and said he was disappointed in the president’s performance and he needed to do better, as did several other Republicans who had been cryogenically frozen for months so as not to have to offer any comment on the Trump regime, including but not limited to Bob Corker, and Marco Rubio, kind of, while Fox News was not afraid to observe that The Media Has A Lot Of Criticism For Trump’s Helsinki Performance. But then again, maybe everything is an illusion and nothing matters! Is this Canadian professor calling for a military coup? "Perhaps the military will give Trump a parade and remove him. After all, extraordinary violations of norms call for extraordinary remedies." July 16, 2018 Who is the Mr. Browder Putin mentioned in the press conference?
July 15, 2018
Sure the diary above is page 6 fodder. However, we do know that Trump’s admiration for Putin has to be worrying just about every career diplomate at State and our own intelligence agency spies and analysts. They have to be wondering about this and trying to assess the reasons.
It wouldn't surprise me if they all have their own copy of “The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump.” Hell, I bet Putin has a dog-eared copy himself.
I bet Putin would like to give Trump some truth serum and find this out:
Putin’s elite spy world has been penetrated by U.S. intelligence. That’s the implication of the extraordinarily detailed 29-page indictment of 12 Russian military intelligence (GRU) officers handed up by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s investigators on Friday. The 11-count charge includes names, dates, unit assignments, the GRU’s use of “X-agent” malware, its bitcoin covert funding schemes and a wealth of other tradecraft.
Putin must be asking himself: How did the Americans find out all these facts? What other operations have been compromised? And how much else do they know?
“The Russians have surely begun a ‘damage assessment’ to figure out how we were able to collect this information and how much damage was done to their cyber capacity as a result,” says Jeffrey Smith, a former CIA general counsel, in an email. “They are probably also doing a CI (counter-intelligence) assessment to determine whether we have any human sources or whether the Russians made mistakes that we were able to exploit.”
Must the GRU assume that officers named in Friday’s indictment are now “blown” for further secret operations? Should Russian spymasters expect that operations they touched are now compromised? What about other Russian operations that used bitcoin, or X-agent, or another hacking tool called X-Tunnel? Has the United States tracked such operations and identified the targets? Finally, how are U.S. intelligence services playing back the information they’ve learned — to recruit, exploit or compromise Russian officers?
I don’t see the bigotry nor do I see any reason for a suspension from the site. Such reeks of censorship, which is one of those things that Trump favors, not something that I thought readers/writers at DK supported. I see nothing homophobic about the article, and if I did I would be quite offended by it just as I am always offended by bigotry of any variety.
My answer:
I want to get this on before Daily Kos cuts off comments to this diary.
I appreciate what you wrote more than words can easily convey. The attacks against me, especially the personal ones, by those who made comments hurt, but the attack by whoever at Daily Kos admonished me for being a bigot — writing
”We're giving you a three-day time out duringwhich we urge you to reflect on Daily Kos's zero tolerance policy for all forms of bigotry"
— like I was a recalcitrant schoolchild was deeply offensive. This stung not only in its harshness but because it is about as far from the truth as possible.
It reminded me of a frequent commenter who accuses me in every article I write about Trump’s psychopathology of not caring about people suffering from mental illness when I devoted my entire career to helping such people.
I will not be surprised if my comments today will be flagged and that I will end up being banned from Daily Kos forever without being told why in an email (and Kos does have my email so if I am banned I won't be able to read messages and I won't be able to know their reasoning unless they email me).
If anyone still wants to read my opinions they can do so on my blog if they Google my name and Trump.
I owe it to all of those who commented to respond as I always do to critiques of my diaries.
/////////
I couldn’t comment on this for three days because I'd been suspended for bigotry. I consider this strong condemnation to be outrageous and incorrect, and a gross misinterpretation, a distortion in fact, of my words and intention. This is what a moderator, hopefully, in consultation with other moderators since a suspension for bigotry is a major decision, wrote to me thougha Kos message: -------
"The diary you posted today has earned well-deserved pushback. As commenters have pointed out, speculating that latent homosexuality is the reason for Trump's atrocious behavior is homophobic. As you certainly know, straight men can exhibit atrocious behavior without being closeted homosexuals. So until you have some actual evidence for this theory, you should leave gay people out of it. This is not your first post that has been met with significant and proper pushback for running afoul of site norms, and which you've then only grudgingly edited. We're giving you a three-day time outduring which we urge you to reflect on Daily Kos's zero tolerance policy for all forms of bigotry." -------- To start: There is nothing pathological, abnormal, or “wrong” with being gay or having thoughts, fantasies, and impulses about same-sex attraction. In factas I wrote many or even most straight men have varying levels of conscious, preconscious, or unconscious elements of same-sex attraction. The same goes for women. It is the society that makes such things feel unacceptable. Kids, mostly boys, are mocked and worse for showing signs of feminity or attraction to other boys. Homophobia can and does sometimes lead to violence. This is no joking matter and deserves not only condemnation but serious study as to the psychological causation among those who act out their homophobia with violence.
Since writing this diary I have done more than "reflect" over these three days. I did my own version of peer review, regretfully after the fact, both in person and via email with six experienced therapists who read the diary, including one who wrote a chapter in "The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump" and with several non-therapists. Some said that while they took issue with the Freudian slant. I think Freud was wrong in his views of homosexuality but not in his understanding of the power of the unconscious. They saw no signs of bigotry or homophobia in what I wrote. They did not think there was any hint that I suggested gay sex or anything under the general heading of homosexuality was a mental illness. IT IS NOT. It never was and the those who thought it was dida horrible disservice to the mental health profession and the general public.
////////////
Nobody at Kos ever responded to my message back to them. Here it is with now with several typos corrected. /////// For one thing, like most of those who commented negatively, it does not appear that you (the moderators) actually read, let alone understood, my diary. This was a psychologically sophisticated attempt to analyze a possible underlying, i.e. unconscious, motivation behind Trump’s seeming infatuation with Putin. I think it was well reasoned and articulated. I addressed every accusation in the text before I posted the diary, not afterward (except for the introduction). This is something the critical commenters ignore. They gave it a superficial reading and responded with their own prejudices. Just because an article generates negative comments doesn’t mean it should result in a suspension. I have written over 500 diaries for Kos and this has never happened before. You say that this is not the first story that has generated negative comments. If you review those you will see that they came almost exclusively from two people, Remembering Jello and Hugh Jim Bissell. You are giving them more credence than they deserve. In factI sent you a comment that the later was trying to hijack the comment thread on one of my diaries with a point of view he posts on every diary I write about Trump’s psychopathology. I am sorely disappointed in whoever made this decision. Kos should be a forum for diverse ideas and discussion. If you lose me you will have no member of the community who is an experienced psychotherapist, an early and respected member of the Duty to Warn group, and someone who posts regally on Trump’s psychopathology. I suggest that you have someone with a high level of psychological sophistication review the article as I did with several members of Duty to Warn. //////// I have not decided where to go from here. I may no longer put anything on Daily Kos although I think in fairness to their readers it would be good to be transparent and publish the message I got from them and my response. I have no problem with someone putting it in the comments to the original article if anyone is still reading it. ///////
As an aside, I did a web search simply for" Trump Putin gay" and noted that there are articles from straight and gays publications, some dating back to 2016 when Trump starting effusively praising Putin, which either sayAS I DID that I didn't think this was something to suggest was true and make fun of, or in gay publications showing cartoons of Trump and Putin being gay lovers. Of course, as I started my diary writing, both the NY Times and Washington Post came under deserved fire for publishing such cartoons.
Someone, not me, will write the definitive psychobiography of Donald Trump. This will not happen until he is out of office. At present everyone in our field (duty to warn therapists) writing or speaking about Donald Trump is focusing on alerting the public to how dangerous he is not only because of his drive to be an autocrat, but also because of elements in his personality discussed ad infinitum here and elsewhere.
The psychobiography may or may not be written by a well- known member of the so-called duty to warn group. In a way, I think it would be better received if someone like Michael Beschloss wrote it.
Once there is no pressing need to inform decision-makers and the public about why Trump's personality is dangerous someone will dig deep into his personality without being faced with accusations of having a political agenda.
In the liberal media, it is already a given that Trump isn't psychologically healthy. For example, I just heard on MSNBC about Trump's performance at NATO and in the UK that he was expressing "his need to get his ya-ya's of aggression out."
I made the mistake of trying to dig deep with a hypothesis in my Daily Kos article, the one that got me suspended. To say it was not well taken is an understatement. I will leave it up to you to whether it was a valid thought exercise.
I may no longer write anything for Kos, either just disappearing or write a brief last article.
Mocking strongman leaders is a cathartic exercise and one favoured by protestors around the world, particularly in authoritarian regimes. In response to Vladimir Putin’s repressive treatment of LGBTIQ people in Russia, including the notorious anti-gay propaganda law of 2013, a neon Warholesque image of Putin in full make-up replete with lipstick was widely shared across social media.
The image became so ubiquitous that Kremlin officials worried that the Russian president’s sexual orientation would be called into question and in 2017, the Russian justice ministry banned the image. However, Kremlin-approved images of the masculine Russian leader shirtless on horseback remain in circulation.
My comment: I wasn’t aware of the depictions of Putin as gay and how Putin reacted to this.
Recently the New York Times and the Washington Post published cartoons be well-known artists suggesting Trump had a gay crush on Putin. These were criticized as being homophobic. As a duty to warn therapist who has written extensively about Trump being a dangerous malignant narcissist I wrote on another website what I hoped would be a serious Freudian analysis of how repressed homoerotic impulses sometimes influence attitudes and behavior.
The title was "Trump could be repressing homoerotic feelings towards Putin. If so the results could be significant." You can find it on Google.
I intended this as a thought exercise, a POSSIBLE if unlikely element in Trump's admiration of Putin and other world autocrats (aka strongmen). I was exoriated in the comments - over 100 - accusing me of being homophobic and a bigot. By the end of the day I was suspendeded from posting new stories or even commenting for three days. I was sent this message - indicating to me that whoever wrote this didn't read my article carefully.
"The diary you posted today has earned well-deserved pushback. As commenters have pointed out, speculating that latent homosexuality is the reason for Trump's atrocious behavior is homophobic. As you certainly know, straight men can exhibit atrocious behavior without being closeted homosexuals. So until you have some actual evidence for this theory, you should leave gay people out of it. This is not your first post that has been met with significant and proper pushback for running afoul of site norms, and which you've then only grudgingly edited. We're giving you a three-day time out during which we urge you to reflect on (our) zero tolerance policy for all forms of bigotry."
My comment: If I've learned a few things from trying to explain what Dr. Lee so adroitly lays out in laymans term to readers at Daily Kos. On Kos you don't have to be an eminent mental health professional like Dr. Lee to post your opinion. (Google my name and Trump and you can find some of them.)
Anyone can post there. I've written over 70 pieces about Trump's mental health and I'm not even semi-eminent. I'm just a retired clinical social worker who began writing about Trump being unfit and psychologically dangerous to be president well before he was elected.
As demonstrated in the comments to my articles I discovered that even on a liberal website like Daily Kos many readers think the fields of psychiatry and psychology are so bogus they don't even deserve to be called scientific.
There are also many readers, again as judged by the comments, who don't have any or much curiosity or basic knowedge about the psychology of personality. Everytime I respond to a comment I have to tread very carefully lest I be called out because I am narcissistic (guilty at times) , an elitist (guilty), or a pompous ass (often guilty). I shouldn't be astounded or dismayed when the typical reader has never heard of a hero of mine, Robert Jay Lifton who wrote a chapter in "The Dangeorus Case."
Many readers insist that there's no way any mental health professonal has enough information to assess Trump's fitness for office and dangerousness unless they see him in person.
They do not understand what Bandy Lee and others have laid out time and time again not only in "The Dangeorus Case of Donald Trump" but also in many articles in major publications that uniquely with Trump we have ample examples to lend support to our conclusions, or dare I use a term from experiemental psychology and statistics innumerable "data points."
There are always a few commenters who believe that to suggest Trump is mentally impaired means we are demeaning those who are struggling with mental illness. This is despite the fact that all of us have devoted our careers to helping those very people.
Some commenters have had bad experiences with mental health professionals and are generalizing this to condemn the entire profession.
I hope Bandy Lee and others keep publishing their opinions. I hope that on major sites like this which allow comments she and others don't get discouraged.
I am going to stop writing for Daily Kos. I know that there are more than a few readers there who will say "good riddance." Some who never read anything by me may say the same thing here.
Meanwhile for all the Trump supporters who may read this and exoriate me six ways from Sunday here I have to say that I don't care a whit since the breaking news today about the indictments of 12 Russian militrary agents has inoculated me from being upset. July 12, 2018 This is the first day in a year that I couldn't write a story for Daily Kos where there would be a chance more than those who occassionally look at this blog would read it. While I am angry and disappointed at the reaction I got from the previous story (below) and especially being suspended from writing stories or even commenting in a sense I am relieved. I can take a break and reassess whether it has been healthy for me to put so much meaning behind trying to share my ideas with a wider audience than with those who follow me on this blog. Trump's narcissism on display at a press conference at the NATO conference: "I'm a very stable genius." Political junkies: What to watch on TV today. If you saw Rachel Maddow last night you know that Peter Strzok was, for 20 years, the spy's spy who brought down the most notorius Russian agents posing as Americans in the United States. He was in charge of the FBI's counter-ntelligence division. He has been in Republicans' sights for several months after a Justice Department inspector general investigation revealed that he exchanged text messages before the 2016 election that were critical of Donald Trump with Lisa Page, a former FBI lawyer with whom he was having an affair at the time. A quick look at the news:
Kelly no longer hears anything the president says. Trump’s words are a kind of soothing low dog-whistle that plays in the background at all times, a sort of mosquito hum that he checks only periodically to make certain it is still complaining that anyone not from Norway would have the temerity to come to America seeking a better life, and then goes back to ignoring.
The reason Kelly shifted and bobbed uncomfortably in his seat while the president spoke about Russia and Germany, the reason Kelly wore the facial expression of someone who had hungrily devoured a mouthful of expired egg salad, was certainly not anything the president said. It was not shame or chagrin that we were saying this right in front of our allies. It is just that Kelly was enraged by cheese. And pastries!
Kelly had been insulted with a continental breakfast — Barely! Barely! — rather than a full, hot one. The organizers of this summit had clearly treated the critical problem of breakfast with scarcely more regard than this administration gives to reuniting children with their families. It had been an afterthought — or less! Kelly was right to shake with rage.
July 11, 2018 The following story was so negatively received it resulted in a three day suspension from posting on Daily Kos. Not only can't I post a new story but I can't put any comments on my own or any other stories. Therefore I can't put this article, "Could Trump be a repressed homosexual" from Quora on. A year ago there was another story, this one on Slate:
I think he is such a narcissist, it’s possible he is mentally ill in a way, and this is on the table. I said it months ago, and now everyone is starting to say it like it’s new, and it’s OK to say. He’s not well. At the very least, he’s not well. And he’s so narcissistic, he does not believe the rules apply to him, and that’s where the ignorance label may apply because this is a man who says he can grab women anywhere because he’s famous… I THINK THERE’S AN INNUENDO TO PERHAPS THE OTHER SEX….
Scarborough proceeds to talk over Brzezinski and they go to break…
When Morning Joe comes back from break Brzezinski says:
ALL I SAID IS THAT AT THE VERY LEAST YOU HAVE A SEVERE CASE AND I MEAN IN A SERIOUS WAY OF NARCISSISM AND PROBABLY OF IDENTITY ISSUES.
The diary you posted today has earned well-deserved pushback. As commenters have pointed out, speculating that latent homosexuality is the reason for Trump's atrocious behavior is homophobic. As you certainly know, straight men can exhibit atrocious behavior without being closeted homosexuals. So until you have some actual evidence for this theory, you should leave gay people out of it. This is not your first post that has been met with significant and proper pushback for running afoul of site norms, and which you've then only grudgingly edited. We're giving you a three-day time out during which we urge you to reflect on Daily Kos's zero tolerance policy for all forms of bigotry.
For one one thing, like most of those who commented negatively, it does not appear that you (the moderators) actually read, let alone understood, my diary. This was a psychologically sophisticated attempt to analyze a possible un darling, i.e. unconscious, motivation behind Trump’s seeming infatuation with Putin. I think it was well reasoned and articulated. I addressed every accusation in the text before I posted the diary, not afterward (except for the introduction). This is something the critical commenters ignore. They gave it a superficial reading and responded with their own prejudices. Just because an article generates negative comments doesn’t mean it should result in a suspension. I have written over 500 diaries for Kos and this has never happened before. You say that this is not the first story that has generated negative comments. If you review those you will see that they came almost exclusively from two people, Remembering Jello and Hugh Jim Bissell. You are giving them more credence than they deserve. In fact I sent you a comment that the later was trying to hijack the comment thread on one of my diaries with point of view he posts on every diary I write about Trump’s psychopathology. I am sorely disappointed in whoever made this decision. Kos should be a forum for diverse ideas and discussion. If you loose me you will have no member of the community who is an experienced psychotherapist, an early and respected member of the Duty to Warn group, and someone who posts regally on Trump’s psychopathology. I suggest that you have someone with a high level of psychological sophistication review the article as I did with several member of Duty to Warn. I trust you will get back to me ASAP. Hal Brown, MSW
IN ORDER TO WRITE A COMMENT YOU HAVE TO REGISTER AT DAILY KOS.
Introduction
Update: This is proving to be a controversial dairy, at least in the comments, though so far not in the poll. It is after all on a sensitive subject. I anticipated that it might be offensive to some people if they gave it a cursory glance. This is why I broke it down into three chapters. Each is meant to be read in sequence. Each is meant to be read in its entirety. Because this article posits a hypothetical it is a thought exercise. Furthermore, it is a thought exercise about the power of the unconscious to influence conscious feelings and behavior. Not everyone takes this seriously. There are many people who don't even believe there is such a thing as the unconscious.
Part 1 The wisdom of mocking the Trump for having homosexual impulses towards Putin
The New York Times was roundly criticized for a cartoon they published last week: “ The New York Times is under fire for 'homophobic' cartoon of Trump and Putin.” This isn’t what led me to write this diary. The thought occurred to me independently. I only found the article when doing some Googling related to writing this, however, it is relevant.
Trump and Putin: A Love Story,” featuring cartoon versions of the two leaders. The video opens with audio from a 2013 interview during which Trump was asked if he had a relationship with the Russian president. “I do have a relationship with him,” said POTUS. “He’s done an amazing job — he’s put himself really at the forefront of the world as a leader in a short period of time.” This week the newspaper ran a minute-long video called “Trump and Putin: A Love Story,” featuring cartoon versions of the two leaders. Yahoo Lifestyle
I have had two requests from RT to be interviewed in person about my views about Trump’s psychopathology. In both cases, they said they would fly a reporter from San Francisco to Portland. I declined.
The Washington Post GIF (right), an animated cartoon, of a naked Putin and a naked Trump engaging in anal sex would be x-rated if it was a video of real people.
I see these depictions as distractions and sideshow intended to embarrass and mock the president. They open Trump critics to justifiable attacks for being insensitive towards the LGBT community.
just last night I watched “The Last Laugh” about how far comedians can and should go when making jokes about highly sensitive material like the Holocaust. It was made clear that non-Jews had to dread very lightly when they dared delve into this area, and as Jewish comedians Mel Brooks and Rob Reiner said in the documentary, the jokes better be damn funny.
My feeling is that if anyone is going to draw a gay cartoon or make a gay joke about Trump and Putin they 1) ought to be gay and 2) the jokes better not be cheap shots but rather should be damn funny. The LGBT community has been maligned and worse for centuries, and is under attack now with the new Supreme Court which could undo many of the gains made in assuring they have the same rights as any other citizens.
I think gay jokes about Trump and Putin should be avoided. This doesn't mean I think trying to understand Trump's psychology and how it may affect his relationship with Putin is off limits.
Part 2: Does Trump have repressed homosexual impulses and why, if he does, it could be significant?
I don't think it is far-fetched to think Trump may have repressed homoerotic impulses and feelings for Putin. Sometimes this is called latent homosexuality:
Latent homosexuality is an erotic attraction toward members of the same sex that is not consciously experienced or expressed in overt action. This may mean a hidden inclination or potential for interest in homosexual relationships, which is either suppressed or not recognized, and which has not yet been explored, or may never be explored. Wikipedia
It would explain a lot. These feelings could have national policy implications.
This is all conjecture. There’s no way to know, however, consider some evidence:
Trump's womanizing could mask an underlying attraction to men.
His leering and lustful displays around busty women whose sexuality is exaggerated and this also could be an unconscious attempt to appear to be anything but gay.
His smug gleeful braggadocio about his prowess with women as evidenced by his own words from the Access Hollywood tape and on the Howard Stern show could be his trying to prove what a man’s man he is.
His thinking he could impress Putin by inviting him to visit the Miss Universe Pageant
--
His military school experience where he was a cadet captain may have some hints. It is common for men in enforced same-sex situations participate in homosexual experimentation, called situational homosexuality. They later go on to have heterosexual lives and are not considered latent homosexuals. If Trump enjoyed such encounter this would have driven his fears of being a homosexual even deeper. According to the Washington Post “ he ordered the officers under his command to keep strict discipline. Shoes had to be shined. Beds had to be made. Underclassmen had to spring to attention.” By being so strict he might have felt nobody would question his sexual proclivities. He was transferred out of that position to one where no cadets were under his command. Reasons for are unclear but he said “he was elevated as a reward for stellar performance. “I had total control over the cadets,” he said in a recent interview. ‘That’s why I got a promotion — because I did so good.’ “
According to the Washinton Post: “He often left campus on weekends and drew the envy of fellow students for his habit of bringing attractive women to the school.” This could be another attempt to prove how straight he was.
This may be far out, however, we know that Trump enjoys watching wrestling matches and is friends with Vince McMahon. I am dismissing the famous photo-op of Trump smooching Rudy Guiliani who was dressed like a woman because it was most likely a publicity stunt and because, be real, who would be turned on by Rudy in drag? I include the following article by a clinical psychologist about boxing and wrestling because it fits the paradigm:
The two sports boxing and wresting latent homosexuality is quite evident. And where many of the features involved in the act of intercourse between two lovers are present in the ring. For example, in both boxing and wrestling the participant hug, embrace, stroke the opponent's sweaty and scantly-covered body like any couple engaged in sexual activities. Many psychoanalytically oriented psychotherapists postulate the theory that both the boxer and the wrestler experience profound rage and guilt for their exhibitionist conduct, and for giving in to their homosexual desires. Therefore, each participant is highly-motivated to punish each other, sometimes ending in death, for gratifying the unconscious homosexual desire to embrace and make love to another man. from: “Latent Homosexuality: Paranoid Delusions Rage and Anxiety” By William L. Smith Ph. D. |
ALL THESE COULD BE A REACTION FORMATION* TO THESE REPRESSED (UNCONSCIOUS) URGES.
* Reaction formation is a type of defense mechanism in which a person acts in the exact opposite manner to his own disturbing or socially unacceptable thoughts or emotions. This behavior is often unconscious and appears exaggerated, perhaps in an effort to overcompensate for the embarrassment, guilt or repulsion the person feels regarding his private thoughts. PsychCentral
3. A Straight man on repressed homosexuality
Gay men are invited to correct me about any of the following.
Let’s be clear. It is not pathological, in fact, it is quite normal for some, perhaps many, heterosexual men to be sexually attracted to other men at times. Some men easily accept these feelings, others find them mildly disquieting, while other find them abhorrent.
Sometimes both conscious, partially conscious, and deeply repressed homosexual feelings lead men to become homophobic.
We see church leaders and politicians who rant against same-sex marriage and then are caught in compromising situations with other men. Closeted gay sexuality isn’t the same as latent homosexuality. Closeted gay men know at some level they are homosexuals, although some may be bisexual or leading a life of a lie with their wives.
On a list of the five most well known gay ministers who were outed the only one I’d heard of was Ted Haggard. “He was the pastor of the New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Colorado and was the president of the National Association of Evangelicals, and would meet with figures such as President George W. Bush. Haggard would campaign against gay marriage and bash homosexuality in Church. In 2006, a gay male prostitute claimed that he had regular sex with Haggard and also used with methamphetamines. Haggard would admit to being gay and having a relationship with a male church member.” From NewsOne
In the worst cases, some homophobic men become violent towards openly gay men. From what I can tell “ gay bashing” was added to Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged, in their 1991 edition though obviously, it had been going on for many decades prior hollywoodlife.com/
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The stereotype of the macho man who is a closeted gay man is often depicted in movies and on TV as a gangster, for example Vito Spatafore Sr., played by Joseph R. Gannascoli, a fictional character on the HBOTV series The Sopranos. He was a member of the DiMeo Crime Family and a subordinate of Tony Soprano. He was married to Marie Spatafore with two children, Francesca and Vito Jr., and was a closeted homosexual. This was revealed in the show's fifth season, and became one of the more prominent subplots in the sixth season. (Photo) These men aren't the same as men who repress their feelings if they know they are gay but are consciously hiding it.
4. Why is any of this relevant to Trump and Putin’s relationship?
If Trump is repressing homoerotic urges it could explain his attraction to authoritarian leaders, otherwise known as strongmen. Strong-men are the ver antithesis of feminine men.
Ipso facto having a reaction formation to unconscious homosexual urges is not dangerous in a president. Even having conscious homoerotic attraction isn’t problematic. However, if it leads Trump to try to curry favor with, or to please a leader like Putin it could be dangerous.
It makes him open to being manipulated.
Maybe all of this goes back to Trump’s childhood and his need for his father’s approval. He could unconsciously see Putin as a kind but tough father figure who he is desperate to please.
Or perhaps his affinity for Putin is a combination of a deep desire for paternal acceptance mixed with homoerotic feelings.
Rarely is anything easy or simple when trying to analyze the unconscious motivations of someone like the president.
Speculating about Trump's unconscious psychodynamics is exceedingly difficult. This is even more difficult than trying to understand his patholgical lying. There are always alternate explanations for any of the behaviors I've listed besides latent homosexuality. It is in fact far easier to add up all of his other manifest behaviors and try to fit him into the DSM-5 diagnostic characteristics or toss the DSM and go to Erich Fromm’s formulation and assess him as being a malignant narcissist with an impulse control disorder and an addiction to pathological lying.
Of course, Trump could be a run-of-the-mill heterosexual male who just happens to be a cruel misogynist pig and an evil dictator wannabe who is the model of mental health that Dr. Ronnie Jackson says he is.
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About me:
After running a mental health center in Michigan (the Mason Mental health Center) for 20 years, my wife and I moved to Massachusetts where I was in private practice for 20 more years.
I have written nearly 60 articles on Daily Kos about Trump’ s dangerous psychopathology (and more than 500 other diaries on related political subjects). I was one of the first members of Dr. John Gartner’s groundbreaking sometimes controversial Duty to Warn Group. He is one of the most prolific clinicians writing in major publications about Trump.
Using homosexuality as a cudgel to attack someone’s motives is clearly homophobic. Your attempts to straight-splain that I haven’t really read your piece or “just don’t get it” are both condescending and offensive. You should be embarrassed.
I’m not embarrassed though I am sorry you think I should be. Why is it condescending to defend myself by urging you or anyone to read an entire story before jumping to conclusions and cite particular parts which you or they find offensive or incorrect? Also, I am not attacking Trump’s motivation. I am offering a possible explanation. It is not meant to be the only explanation, it may be a portion, even a lesser portion, of his motivations for admiring Putin so much.
Please don’t assume that we haven’t read your diary in full. I’ve read the whole thing, plus your comments. My thorough review of it doesn’t make me like it any better.
Well, of course for decades the psychiatric/psychological community claimed that homosexuality is a mental illness. Homosexual attraction and engaging in homosexual sex was even listed in the DSM as a mental illness. Even today, there are practicing psychiatrists and psychologist who continue to tell anyone who listens that being gay is an illness.
(Interesting aside: how did the psychiatrists decide that homosexual thoughts and feelings are normal and not an illness? What research was done to remove homosexual thoughts and behaviors from the DSM? They held a vote. That’s right: psychiatrists determined that being gay was not a mental illness thru the very scientific process of holding a vote. More evidence that whether or not something is considered a mental illness by psychiatrists has nothing to do with science or biology or pathology.)
While it is true that you do not explicitly claim that being gay is negative, the entire point of your diary is to link gay thoughts and feelings with two of the very worst humans alive today. The implications of your words are negative in the extreme towards homosexuality.
HalBrown — In your block quote from Yahoo Lifestyle there are several sentences that repeat. I’m not sure how that happened, but you should edit them out.
I don't think that latent or repressed homosexuality adds anything to our understanding of the Trump-Putin dynamic. I'm no psycholgist, but I dont think it's diagnostic of the Occupier's psychopathology, and will, in fact, provide easy grist for those who seek to demean psychologists in the Duty to Warn movement.
Narcissism and a perception of being the sort of "strong man" he seeks to associate with are just as powerful motivators as any sexual component, and Putin's cultivation techniques are too sophisticated to be derided as boiling down to Putin being bait in his own honey trap for Trump.
I might also add, that psychologically he may be more motivated by seeking his daddy’s love and respect. Putin and the other dictators he loves are very much cut out of the same cloth as don the con’s dad.
You are right. However, I did write the following:
Maybe all of this goes back to Trump’s childhood and his need for his father’s approval. He could unconsciously see Putin as a kind but tough father figure who he is desperate to please.
Or perhaps his affinity for Putin is a combination of a deep desire for paternal acceptance mixed with homoerotic feelings.
Rarely is anything easy or simple when trying to analyze the unconscious motivations of someone like the president.
It is frustrating and I admit annoying when people write comments not having read what I wrote carefully.
I think people are “reading” you just fine. I think your defensiveness is keeping you from looking carefully at what your critics aresaying, especially what the gay folks on the site are trying to tell you.
This diary is ridiculous. There are other more reasonable explanations for Trump being loyal to Putin which have nothing to do with sexuality. Additionally, even we could prove there was an attraction, it’s a moot point. How would knowing that be useful for achieving tactical or strategic goals?
I didn't read this but I think it's stupid. The idea that you have to read something to know it's stupid is popular among the writers of stupid stuff who demand attention.
As Bob Newhart said on his show when the adopted son of Larry, Darryl, and Darryl ran away: “I can think of a lot of reasons you would want to run away from there. Which one did you pick?”
It doesn’t dis the LGBT community, other than inferring Dump is a member, which he isn’t. He doesn’t have to read to see the WashPo gif—though I wouldn’t use that one myself, unless it had the gray bar through the middle.
Well, the human mind works first and foremost by association, right alongside or underneath the “logical: content of a statement. Especially where symbols and visual representations are involved. But others have stated this in the comments better than I could.
I thought I made it clear the WaPo GIF was offensive. If a gay magazine wants to publish cartoons with funny captions depicting sex acts, even between Trump and Putin, that’s up to them. This GIF toon should not have been published in the Washington Post. As for the NY Times cartoon, either it has been taken down or it is getting so many hits it is overloading the server so you can’t see it. My impression it doesn't depict a sex act, rather it is showing a gay love relationship.
Applying Occam’s Razor here. Methinks the simplest explanation is the one many people have suggested — Pootie-Poo has the goods on Drumpf that he can use as leverage.
What we know is that heterosexual men like Trump are greedy, abusive, bullying, manipulative, narcissists who enjoy the company of other heterosexual men who are greedier, more abusive, more narcissistic, more manipulative, assassins so they can share notes about how to be the epitome of women-hating and human-hating heterosexuality to the envy of other heterosexual men.
Your diary feels like speculating that men who gang rape and beat up women aren’t just rotten evil heterosexuals, but really super rotten closeted homosexuals, because they are so evilly heterosexual.
Trump and Putin are heterosexuals, like you. You own them, you explain them, and leave us out of it. Sometimes heterosexual men are just rotten and evil men, because of, or irrespective to, their impulses to engage in sex with women.
A little wisdom, I believe, from AlAnon: trying to “figure out” a person who is off the rails just drags the thinker into the craziness. (Or as Nietzsche put it, “the abyss also gazes into you.”)
The only thing we control is our own choices, to limit the damage, to stop it.
Speculation about the abuser’s subjecive, unconscious reality is of no use. One could equally speculate that Putin has assumed the place of tRUmp’s own abusive father. This also would make no difference, even if it were true. Or more simply, that birds of a feather flock together.
In addition I am made quite uncomfortable by the implication that same-sex attraction somehow would explain this latest iteration in a lifelong, complex pattern of mendacious, self-centered, racist, misogynistic, grandiose, vindictive behavior, now reaching a culmination in dictatorial ambitions and betrayal of his country. It is too much like the stereotypes of old, which assumed there was something innately criminal about same-sex attraction.
I’ve reccd some of your work enthusiastically in the past; this isn’t up to to scratch IMO.
Why are people always trying to turn evil individuals into repressed homosexuals? Sometimes awful people are just awful and not battling secret homosexual urges. This diary is silly.
Frankly—and I feel confident that I speak on behalf of the majority of gays—we don’t plan to claim him. He’s all yours.
This received a negative reception in the comments. In my defense, I don't think many of those who were critical of it read the entire piece carefully. I was very aware as I wrote it that I was putting forth a hypothesis and a thought exercise that people might find offensive or misunderstand if they didn’t read it carefully.
I broke it down into three chapters to be read thoroughly in sequence for this reason. Chapter 1 is as important to my conjecture as chapter 2, which leads to and is as important as chapter 3.
I anticipated all of the critical comments posted so far and I think that each one is addressed in the text. I knew this was a long exposition of a theory and it wouldn’t be read carefully by everyone.
The fact of the idea of Trump having a sexual attraction to Putin is fodder for cartoonists and comedians which is why this is chapter 1 in this diary.
I will only say to anyone who makes a critical comment to cite the passage or passages which illustrate your point.
You’re right. I didn’t read the piece. I didn’t need to read it to understand that it is completely ridiculous and that even if the premise is true, it is of no use to us.
Maybe the problem isn’t with the people reading the diary. Getting this level of criticism might cause some people to step back and rethink things, but apparently the real problem is that people aren’t reading carefully enough to appreciate your brilliant analysis. Your diary isn’t that complicated, dude. I did read it fully, btw.
I read the whole thing, and it’s homophobic for reasons you seem incapable of understanding. It’s not one single passage, it’s the content taken as a whole. The reason is that you’re generally using homosexuality as a rhetorical cudgel against Trump and his supporters, and no matter how humorous you seem to find it or how much you try to obfuscate that point with how you “address” them in the text, that simply isn’t funny or welcome to most queer people and their allies.
When you write something that is universally panned, the problem is not typically that the audience misunderstands you, but that you misunderstand the audience.
The reason is that you’re generally using homosexuality as a rhetorical cudgel against Trump and his supporters
I think everybody knows that there are some people on the other side of the aisle with repressed urges that become virulent homophobes. But the seemingly constant desire of some straight liberals to use repressed homosexuality as a rhetorical weapon against right-wing enemies gets really old. If gay people want to have this conversation, that’s one thing, but straight people need to knock that shit off.
Especially in this case, when there are soooooooo many other obvious explanations.
It is being panned by many in the comments which always reflect the thoughts of those who feel the most strongly. Most of the critical comments are by readers who admit they didn’t read it in its entirety. However, the poll tells a different story. I see now that I should have added another option or two to the poll: I think this is a homophobic diary (please comment), and I didn’t read this carefully (please comment).
Say what you want, argue all you want about the diary...I offer no opinions on it. However, anyone hiding this comment has no grounds, Hal is explaining his thoughts and breaking no rules doing so. DBAD applies here to anyone wanting to hide, IMHO. So that is reason for my uprate. We can be adults here.
People are missing the point. So many male rabid homophobes turn out to have affairs with men on the side . . . Stereotypes exist because they are based on facts.
In Trump’s case, I doubt the pussy-grabber has many homoerotic urges, not ever for the 9s and 10s. Putin just represents what Dump would like to become.
Mike Pence though . . . have you seen the way he stares lovingly at the back of The Donald’s head? As if he would like to run his fingers through that long, beautiful haarr . . . What would Mother think?
As an LGBT person, I'm very grateful for your insights. Trump is acting very strange around the hyper masculine Putin. While Trump might be fawning over Putin because he's subject to blackmail, it's also possible Trump finds Putin to be hot. That, obviously, makes Trump vulnerable, and easier to manipulate. We live in bizarre times! A President of the USA has a "relationship" with the former head of the KGB. Life is truly stranger than fiction!
You are demonstrating that you are thinking outside the box as far as many of the comments here go. I appreciate this. I am not attacking Trump or anyone else for unconscious latent homosexual impulses. I’ve had some dreams with homosexual themes so obviously, somewhere in my unconscious, I have them.
So if you have had dreams with homosexual themes, did the presumptive underlying state of affairs cause you to fall in love with Putin? Or any other fellow?
Did it lead you to have compulsive affairs with women and enter into elaborate arrangements to keep them from talking?
After reading the comments I added an introduction.
Update: This is proving to be a controversial dairy, at least in the comments, though so far not in the poll. It is after all on a sensitive subject. I anticipated that it might be offensive to some people if they gave it a cursory glance. This is why I broke it down into three chapters. Each is meant to be read in sequence. Each is meant to be read in its entirety. Because this article posits a hypothetical it is a thought exercise. Furthermore, it is a thought exercise about the power of the unconscious to influence conscious feelings and behavior. Not everyone takes this seriously. There are many people who don't even believe there is such a thing as the unconscious.
I didn’t know that non-registered readers could take the poll. I think this is good because it enables us to get a picture of a larger group of mostly liberal readers. What the general readership thinks is relevant and polls useful when they are well constructed. As noted in another comment, I should have added more options to the poll. I considered the first and last one to be the same as “I disagree.”
The last graf of the diary itself actually states my reaction pretty well.
This is all speculation about an individual’s inner and not even conscious reality, with other perfectly reasonable explanations equally available.
Of all things in the world, “unconscious motivations” have got to be the most slippery, subject to mistaken pattern identification and the observer’s own unconscious biases.
No firm conclusion can be reached, no action taken.
So what is the compelling power of this particular speculation, to motivate a whole diary? A diary that, as well, predictably causes offense?
One might as well speculate that he has victimized so many women because of that Freudian projection, “women’s innate masochism.”
Oh sure. RT is a propaganda arm of the Russian state. They promote all kinds of crazy theories in the hope that American Progressives will fall for them and fracture the Party or make themselves look foolish.
I suggest everyone read the article that accompanies the video. Of course, I know what RT is. What I find interesting is why they posted this video and story. I know what they are, which is why I refused to be interviewed by them on two occasions even though they were willing to send a reporter to Portland, Oregon. I saw what happened when John Gartner agreed to be interviewed on Watters World on Fox. It was a disaster. They have the final edit rights and can make someone really look bad.
The NY Times has gone off the rails quite a few times recently. This cartoon was created by critically-acclaimed animator Bill Plympton who probably gave no thought to it being perceived as homophobic. He’d previously made cartoons in a series ‘Trump Bites’ which about Trump’s statements illustrating his paranoia, narcissism, and xenophobia. If Trump has a conscious, preconscious, or unconscious physical attraction to Putin, as I apparently was unable to get across, there’s nothing wrong with that unless it makes him susceptible to being influenced. I prefer George Clooney, Robert Redford, or Sean Connery types, but I can see where some men might find Putin attractive.
From a gay man who has researched homosexual behavior for both my Masters and Doctorate degrees I have to say you sir, are an asshole.
You mix Freudian nonsense with a little, (And in this case a little knowledge does not go a long way) of psychology to produce this crap.
Please use DOCUMENTED research not tossing terms such as “unconscious” around with personal anecdotes and expect to be given anything but the little respect you have gotten.
Sorry for the personal attack, and if I am given a TO so much so.
I’d have recc’d you, man, if you hadn’t included the “asshole” part. I understand the sentiment and share it, but we’re not allowed to insult other users on DK.
The premise of this piece was both objectionable and a useless dead-end, so I didn’t bother to read it. My comment only has to do with your conduct in the comment threads, where you solidly come across as an arrogant condescending heterosplainer, and your assumption that anyone who disagrees with you didn’t read your piece carefully enough smacks of projection on the part of someone who doesn’t pay any attention to the words or thoughts of anyone besides himself.
You went from an emergency psychiatric diagnosis of unfitness to be president to dragging in your fantasy of his hypothetical latent homosexuality and suggesting that it is a significant issue?
July 10, 2018
I figured many people will be writing about how the five Catholic males on the Surpreme Court will soon be asserting their dominion over the uteruses of American women so I wrote about something non-political today.
A Catholic fundamentalist who controls a network of right-wing groups funded by dark money has put three justices on the court. He’s about to get a fourth.
The Daily Kos story which got me suspended for three days.
Once again New Yorkers wake up and head to the subway seeing a Trump cover on newsstands all over the city.
Unlike the clown depictions of Trump, which I suspect got under his thin skin, this cartoon showing him on Fifth Avenue shooting Uncle Sam while holding hands with a shirtless Putin may be the most devastating one of all.
The other Murdoch owned American newspaper was not kind to Trump either: 
Take Note:
