Trumps "Truth" posts add up to the only psychological test you need to diagnose Donald Trump as a dangerous maniac. All the leaders of our allies need to do to be terrifed that he'll be the next president is to read them, by Hal Brown, MSW

In 2017 Dr. John Gartner, the founder of Duty to Warn, wrote 

All I Ever Wanted to Know about Donald Trump I Learned From His Tweets: A Psychological Exploration of the President 

Currently his tweets on what was then called Twitter have been replaced by what he wants to call "truths" (thankfully not in the dictionary like "tweet" is) on Truth Social. Therefore, if one was to write an updated book the title would have to be changed. 

In 2019 The New York Times (subscription) published 

How Trump Reshaped the Presidency in Over 11,000 Tweets

This article was co-authored by Trump's on again off again pal Maggie Haberman and five other Times writers. It begins:

When Mr. Trump entered office, Twitter was a political tool that had helped get him elected and a digital howitzer that he relished firing. In the years since, he has fully integrated Twitter into the very fabric of his administration, reshaping the nature of the presidency and presidential power.

After Turkey invaded northern Syria this past month, he crafted his response not only in White House meetings but also in a series of contradictory tweets. This summer, he announced increased tariffs on $300 billion worth of Chinese goods, using a tweet to deepen tensions between the two countries. And in March, Mr. Trump cast aside more than 50 years of American policy, tweeting his recognition of Israel’s sovereignty in the Golan Heights. He openly delighted in the reaction he provoked.

“Boom. I press it,” Mr. Trump recalled months later at a White House conference attended by conservative social media personalities, “and, within two seconds, ‘We have breaking news.’”

Flash forward to when Trump lost the election. Trump's tweets, and then his truths, gave us a deeper insight into how his mind functioned. It hasn't been pretty.

He used these to send personal vicious messages to individuals but also to the country since he knew the more inflamatory ones would be shared in the media. This is from the Times article:

“Boom. I press it,” Mr. Trump recalled months later at a White House conference attended by conservative social media personalities, “and, within two seconds, ‘We have breaking news.’”

Whether or not the leaders of our allies or our enemies (some of whom may very well have secret channels to communicate with him) are following what Trump says at his rallies, it's reasonable to assume that they are people with subscriptions to Truth Social. A message to us is also a message to them.

I don't know if Trump cares that leaders and residents in other countries would be reading these too and would be wondering what would happen if this unhinged revenge fueled lunatic became president again. Perhaps, given that he's a malignant narcissist, he wants them to be terrified of him. He wants to be feared. It makes him feel powerful. This is the nature of the beast.

Our allies may see Trump as a clown, but they also see him as a dangerous clown:

Above: AI Generated image

Can you imagine what leaders of NATO thought when they heard that told a rally crowd that he “didn’t even know” much about NATO before he became president — but claimed he figured it out fast. (More from the rally speech on bottom of page). Trump was bragging about what a fast learner he was when he said this when if fact he was revealing what an ignorant dolt he was.

Obviously Trump thinks that video clips of his swinging a golf club are impressive or he wouldn't post them (someone shares the Truth Social posts on X):

Between what comes through Trump's brain and out of his mouth and what pops into his mind and onto Truth Social via his stubby fingers leaders of the world's democracies are no doubt dreading the possiblity he'll become president again.

From the rally speech:

Today he’s (Biden) with the people from NATO and these people show up. I know very well every one of them. They’re very smart. They’re at the top of their game, and then they’re saying, “What the hell is with this guy? We know we can’t figure out –”

You know I saved NADDO [sic] because when I went down — hey, Barack Hussein Obama, has anyone ever heard of him?

He would go, he would go and, you know, go to wherever the holding had a meeting and he’d make a nice speech and Bush would go and make a nice speech and he would leave, in all fairness. Bush, Bush!

But he makes a nice speech and they’re all going to make speeches, and then they wouldn’t even stay there a day.

I went and didn’t make a nice speech. I said, what the hell are you doing? Nobody’s paying, nobody was paying.

And I didn’t want to be obnoxious because I felt it was the first time I’d ever done this. And what? I didn’t even know what the hell NATO was too much before, but it didn’t take me long to figure it out. Like about two minutes.

And the first thing I figured out was they weren’t paying. We were paying. We were paying almost fully for, you know, and and I said, that’s unfair, but I didn’t want to make a big mess.

And I was president in — for about 15 minutes. And I didn’t want you to know go after NATO as my first —

But, but six months later, I went back to the second meeting and I said, you know what? You’re not paying your bills. You got to pay your bills. So somebody stood up from from one of the countries, 28 countries, and only seven were paying what they should be paying. 28 countries, think of that. And these countries now we added a couple but 28 countries. And they said, sir, could I ask you? I said, “you have to pay your bills.”

They said, “Sir, may I ask you a question. If we don’t pay your bills, will you protect us from Russia?”

I said, “You mean you’re delinquent?”

They said, “Yes, we’re delinquent. Let’s say we’re delinquent, will you protect us?”

I said, “No, I will not protect you from Russia.”

The money came in by the billions!

You can read this and previous blogs on two websites and on Substack. One may look better than the other because of how the platforms present the page.

Read on the WordPress Stressline.org (you can subscrbe to this on the upper left)

or….

Read on the Google Blogger platform HalBrown.org This version has a Disquis comment section which makes it easy to post links and images.

or… Hal’s Substack where you can sing up to get an email when I post a new blog.

My advice to Pence is to break out his biker self. He should grow a spine and show it

By Hal Brown

 The DonkeyHotey caracatures above represent four stages of Pence. 1) The fawning Trump sidekick angel during his presidency, 2) post election restraining his anger when Trump bgean the Big Lie, 3) after Jan. 6th when he was dealing with the painful realization that Trump had thrown him under the bus, and 4) the past week when he finally seemed to grow a spine and express his at least some of his anger at Trump. Pence needs to refurbish his image. He needs to replace the mental picture people have of him looking like this:

with ones looking like this:

Seee more about Harley biker Pence at the end of my blog.

Above the picture of Pence, on his Harley, the sentence, this would make sense, you misspelled sense. You must’ve been getting very tired near the end.

Modern medicine hasn't figured out how to make someone grow a spine, but Pence may see that his hopes for the presidency at least requires pretending he now has one.

Pence is turning into an interesting story. His recent words about Trump suggests that he knows that the only chance he has to win the nomination is to come out as a milder anti-Trump version of Chris Christie and hope that for whatever reason Trump crashes and burns. He knows there is no way Trump will select him to run as vice presdient again.

This is from ABC News and show the unleashed Pence:

Pence, speaking at the Indiana State Fair in Indianapolis, stressed that he "had hoped that this issue and the judgment of the president's actions that day would be left to the American people" rather than the legal system -- but he also offered some of his strongest condemnations yet of Trump's decisions around Jan. 6.

"Sadly, the president was surrounded by a group of crackpot lawyers that kept telling him what his itching ears wanted to hear," Pence said. "And while I made my case to him, with what I understood my oath of the Constitution to require, the president ultimately continued to demand that I choose him over the Constitution."

That Pence would not do, he said.

"I really do believe that anyone who puts themselves over the Constitution should never be President of the United States," he said. "And anyone who asks someone else to put themselves over the Constitution should never be President of the United States again." 

Does Pence have a chance at being the GOP nominee?

It could turn out that a significant number of Republicans not only sour on supporting Trump but also find the unlikable uncharismatic DeSantis has a case of culture war screaming meemies that makes their skin crawl. 

Of course, those who blame Pence for not overturning the election and who would have been clamoring for him to be hung if they were at the Capitol on Jan. 6th would never support him. 

I assume Pence not only knows how to read but probably reads articles like this from the June 16, 2023 NY Times or other similar articles with photos of the gallows which may stoke the Jan 6 embers in his belly to the burning point. 

Excerpt:

Hours after President Donald J. Trump announced a “wild” rally in Washington on Jan. 6, 2021, his supporters began discussing building a gallows in front of the Capitol.

“Could be built very quickly with the right plan and the right people bringing pre-cut materials to the site!” a user wrote on a pro-Trump online forum. “Anybody got a blueprint for a standing gallows like that? Who’s with me?!”

Days later, a second user posted a diagram describing the cuts of lumber and rope that would be needed to erect a gallows and fashion a noose. A lengthy planning discussion ensued. A third posted a manual on how to tie a hangman’s knot.

“We will be building a gallows right in front of the Capitol, so the traitors know the stakes,” another user wrote.

He knows that Trump defended the rioters chant of "hang Mike Pence" (see article). He might even know that there are songs like this about hanging him which is a parody considering it was sung at a Unitarian Church. 

Not content to just praise the J6 rioters Trump collaborated with the J6 Prison Choir on "Justice of All" a real song that  (read article) which became the number one dowloaded song on several service for a period of time.

Below: Play the song.... 

If you were a masochist and endured this poor excuse for a song here's a treat. Yesterday in my blog about Trump meeting his ultimate fate imprisioned in Georgia I put the You Tube of Ray Charles signng "Georgia on my Mind".

Here's Ray Charles singing "America the Beautiful" a song which Predient Obama called the most patriotic piece of music ever performed (reference).

In her Sun. Aug. 3 column in The New York Times "Mike Pence Spoke, and the Response Was a Kind of Subtle Hell" Katherine Miller wrote that she thinks Pence is disappearing, politically, before our eyes. Here are several excerpts about Pence:

Mr. Pence’s experience highlights the dangers for the individual and the public. In his book,* Mr. Esper (fired Defense Secratary Mark Esper) describes the way Mr. Pence represented a sane, normal presence in meetings. But, Mr. Esper writes, he could never discern how much their boss even considered the vice president’s views: “He was part cheerleader and part sounding board, though I could never tell how much influence he really had with Trump. He often didn’t say much in meetings that the president attended, and he rarely disagreed with Trump in front of us. 

She went on: 

And now, as Mr. Pence runs for president himself, the reward for coming through in a central moment of American history is a kind of surround-sound aversion.

At first, at that dinner in Iowa last week, Mr. Pence talked brightly, in the expectation of applause, which came, sort of, at muted levels, muted even for the kinds of things — like his abortion politics — that resulted in applause for others.

This was tepid, indifferent clapping, a kind of subtle hell worse than booing, where people who knew you have forgotten you. Mr. Pence kept talking, the delivery staying even and polished, the brightness fading, talking about restoring civility. “So I thank you for hearing me out tonight,” he said, almost somber.

*Espers book is titled A Sacred Oath: Memoirs of a Defense Secretary in Extraordinary Time"

Back to Pence's chances to win the nomination:

I wonder if Republican voters may reassess their views about Pence being the best candidate to beat President Biden.  It could happen considering the other candidates:

Click to enlarge

Compared to the above candiates Pence has a lot going for him. 

He has as much name recognition as DeSantis who now polls a distant second to Trump.  DeSantis has wedded himself to being anti-woke which is not something all that many American really care about. 

What Pence can do and DeSantis can't do is carefully and not always honestly play up his role as Trump's vice president. Pence can truthfully claim that he is the only GOP candidate with experience at the highest level of government and run on being the most competent and qualified of all the candidates who will bring conservative polciies and values back to the White House.

Again, Pence's chances depend on Trump being signficantly wounded so he'd be postioning himself to move from second choice to first choice if Trump was bleeding out.

Of the above candidates who are currently polling the highest, Pence never picked a fight with Mickey Mouse and some hyped up hysterical war against woke. In addition while Pence and DeSantis are both uninpsiring and boring, at least Pence is likable.

Scott and Haley are fairly well known, but Pence is not black and not to disparage Scott for something he can't do anything about some people may be turned off by his teeth and gummy smile (see article). Of course, when it comes to Haley the misogynists in the party probaby aren't ready for a female president let alone one who is an Indian American. I'd doubt many would favor an unknown named Vivek Ganapathy Ramaswamy whose parents also immigrated from India no matter how slick and intelligent he sounds. In fact that might be held against him as much as a color of his skin. Here he is explaining his opposition to woke in a manner I doubt too many Republican would understand.

Scott and Haley so far have been sucking up to Trump and appear to be hoping he'll select them to be his running mate. To flip-flop and become anti-Trump would seem like a betrayal, plus who wants someone who thought they were only qualified to be as useless a vice president as Pence was.

Christie is well known and of all the candidates in the crowded field is the most qualified to be president since he is both very smart and knows how to govern a large state.  I can't see him as having a chance at the nomination. He could, however, help Pence by being an attack dog for him in the debates and campaign in his aggressive New Jersey way by hammering home how unacceptable Trump is both as a candidate and as a potential president.

Pence could claim credit for all the things Trump did that poll well. Sure, all he did was stand next to him and smile at him like he was the new messiah, but who knows for sure that it wasn't Pence that gave Trump all the ideas they liked. Trump would poo-poo such claims but Pence could remind voters that Trump was a chronic liar and, chosing his words carefully, say that he had a history of coming up with dumb ideas and that there's no proof he thought up polcies people approved of by himself.

Pence was smart in using a passage in Trump's indictment as a branding opportunity. According to the federal indictment, in one conversation on January 1, 2021, Trump told Pence he was “too honest” when the vice president said he lacked the authority to change the results. It is a clear counterpoint to Trump being known as a notorious and inveterate liar.

If I was advising Pence, knowing the irony of the phrase, I'd tell him to hang in there. 

I might even suggest that Pence, not known for a sense of humor, take to wearing a lapel pin like this 1970's solid pewter chrome effect Hangmans Noose outlaw biker metal pin badge. It was a popular symbol amongst 1%er outlaw bikers since the Sixties. It is available on Ebay for $12.00.

This would make sence since Pence is known for owning and riding Harley'swhich he does at various biker events. 

Republican's seem to love Harley's though from what I can tell from those who rode them at Sen.Joni Ernst's 2023 Roast and Ride.  Pence is the only current GOP presidential candiate to own and ride them.