Cultural wars go to the couch: TDS (Trump Derangement Syndrome) or the politics of madness

"Trump derangement syndrome (TDS) is a neologism describing a reaction to United States President Donald Trump by liberals, progressives, and anti-Trump conservatives, who are said to respond to Trump's statements and political actions irrationally and with little regard to Trump's actual position or action taken.^[1] The term has been used by pro-Trump conservatives to discredit criticism of Trump's actions"  Wikipedia

"Derangement is the state of being mentally ill and unable to think or act in a controlled way. "   Collins Dictionary

I was recently diagnosed with "TDS" by a friend with strong pro-Trump views. 

Not being a FOX or any other cable channel regular viewer, I looked up for help in Wikipedia: "Tax Deducted at Source" showed up on top, but didn't seem the case. I kept searching until the word "Trump" appeared. Then, I was able to track its origins back to its sources: FOX channel and the self-proclaimed conservative media.

Looking at the levels of anger around the public persona of Donald J. Trump I couldn't help but to remember similar reactions towards his three predecessors: Barack Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton. Presidents before Clinton (1992) were contested -Reagan being the most obvious example- but not with the intensity that the last four have experienced. 

I looked up again and noticed a revealing marker: 1993. It was the year Rupert Murdoch and Roger Ailes launched Fox News Channel with the explicit mission of promoting a militant, anti-liberal agenda and the candidates of the Republican Party.

Over time, MSNBC took FOX's role on the Left camp and CNN turned to what its critics (mostly in FOX) nicknamed "Clinton Cable News".

The rise of partisan mass-media combined with the populist politics of personal attacks and slander campaigns has created a toxic atmosphere that turns politics into a civil war re-fought by other means.

In such a climate, paranoia prospers and spreads -conspiracy theories, "us-versus-them", identity politics and so on- and finds constantly malignant and insane enemies in those who think, look or live differently from "us".  

The newest fashion promoted by FOX channel is the ultimate "psycho-insult": calling on others the "TDS syndrome" (for Trump Derangement Syndrome), a new epithet meant to dis-qualify any criticism directed toward Donald Trump as a mental instability problem of the critic. 

The problem with encouraging self-made psychologists to engage in drive-through psychoanalysis  is that ill-defined categories can be obviously applied back the other way around. 

Let's stop for a minute on the "D" for Derangement in TDS. 

If we follow the definition of the term:

"Derangement is the state of being mentally ill and unable to think or act in a controlled way. "   Collins Dictionary

When we think of "Derangement" we should  include "Trump-lovers" in addition to "Trump-haters". Love and hate, after all, have little to do with reason. And infatuation can turn into hate and vice versa. As it did with Hillary and Donald's views on each other before and after the 2016 election.

The good old days when Donald was a Clinton fan -and Hillary loved his jokes-

If there is such a thing as a Trump Derangement Syndrome, it seems as accurate to describe unconditional and fanatical allegiance as hate. In both cases, irrationality is on full display, and both TDS-negative and TDS-positive types can close their minds and ears to each other's views and arguments. Family and friends included. 

Psychoanalyzing others instead of discussing facts and arguments ratchets up another notch the barriers to rational discussion and communication. Both TDS-positive and TDS-negative might find comfort in saying: "after all, why bother listening to deranged people?". Mental institutions are crowded with people feeling that way.

Civility takes a serious blow each time discussions turned into personal arguments and character attacks. On this area, Left- and Right-wing extremist media -from Mother Jones to Breitbart- not only excel, but thrive as a cottage industry catering to extremism and reciprocal paranoia.

TDS is the Trumpian-intolerance equivalent to Left-wing "safe zones". It has the same uses -preventing any contact with those who think differently, enabling aggression and shutting down any criticism. 

Both forms of TDS serve the purpose of erecting walls between Americans. Walls much thicker than physical barriers and much stronger than party registration.  The Anti-Trump Far Left sets its TDS walls in the campuses calling them "safe zones". 

The Pro-Trump Far Right  has created its own version of "safe zones" with "TDS" shutdowns.

The danger of this psychological "TDS walls" is precisely that they shut down peaceful communication,  escalating the inevitable contact with the "others" into physical confrontation.

The "TDS" category is also a recycled product. 

It used to be called "BDS" for Bush when it was first invented by FOX news to use against any Bush 43 critic. 

There was, of course, also an "Obama Derangement Syndrome" (ODS) as well -used by Obama fans to shut down Obama critics as bigots and those like talk show host Glenn Beck to shut down Obama supporters:

And, of course, we don't have any moral or rational reason to listen to haters. 

We actually are told (by partisan media) that we have a moral and rational obligation not to listen to those we diagnose with TDS.

Each time we use the "TDS" argument to shut down others, we engage in cultural warfare and become part of the TDS syndrome we just tagged to others.

This rant scene of the old Network film was very popular among anti-Obama Tea Party conservatives, back when Trump campaigned on questioning Obama's birth certificate. It is a good example of Derangement Syndrome (you choose the first letter for the object of deranged passion) and it summarizes the power and the danger of "TDS" and the politics of madness:

The Wizard of Oz Presidency

"Pay no attention to that very bad man behind the curtain" 

Wizzard of Oz, Vincent Minelli

Donald Trump made a media career by playing the role of the successful businessman and executive. He sold his name and exhibited his properties as symbols of his ability to run businesses and published several ghostwritten books to foster his reputation as an expert.

His public persona as a businessman was further fostered and showcased in cable TV with The Apprentice, a show designed to present Trump as a mix of Peter Drucker and Jack Welch, mentoring young hopefuls into his own companies.

For those looking more carefully into the substance of shows, it was pretty evident that Trump Inc. looked pretty much like a mom and pop operation staged in luxury towers. With big double-stretched limos and helicopters landing on the towers' roofs. Exactly as in Hollywood.

There were no professional managers or directors around. Just Trump and his children auditioning candidates to play as if they were managers in a real business operation. There was no MBA stuff, no business plans, just the kind of operational stuff that concierges and real estate agents have to handle.

And that might be as much management as Donald J. Trump has done during his entire life as CEO, President and owner of Trump Enterprises. There is no much more to Trump Inc than there was to Kramerica Indusytries in Jerry Seinfeld's famed comedy:

Only that now, the joke is on those who voted a Wizzard of Oz into the White House expecting something like professional management. Or those -many more- who expected Trump to move from campaigning on cultural war to governing on the Constitution -like most previously aggressive and controversial campaigners (think of Reagan or Bush 43) did.

Far from that, the slim but consistent majority of moderate, independent Americans (40 percent of the electorate, check polls) who expected a return to civility and increasingly organized , professional management of POTUS office during the past two years have witnessed a White House ran as a "mom & pop" (or better said, "dad & kids") operation. 

Professional staff positions were not appointed, then gradually cut off  in any form of policy by the President. When finally appointed, those celebrated as heroes at inception ended their short tenures as career military like Secretary of Defense Mattis o General Kelly. To a staggering 65 percent turnover tracked until October (before Mattis and Kelly's departure)  by Brookings Institution.

Managing the POTUS institution has always been hard. As JFK said after a tumultuous first 100 days in office: "there is no school for presidents". 

Historians of the POTUS institution agree, but also remark that JFK called previous president Einsenhower when in trouble. And got good advice. Same did Bill Clinton with Richard Nixon first and Bush 41 later. 

Reagan called James Baker III -who's still around going strong- when things got out of hand. Bush 43 got help from Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, two old hands dating back to Gerald Ford's administration (btw, Gerald Ford was also asked for advice to both Bush and Clinton). There is also a President's Club.

The problem that makes Trump's a Wizard of Oz presidency is not only that he doesn't ask for advice to his predecessors or experienced officers, but that he assumes he knows better and engages in dangerous 'trial and error" experiments led by polls and talk-show hosts. Polls are lagging, not leading indicators. As Henry Ford explained, had he polled people before introducing the car, they would have asked for "a faster horse".

This becomes a serious problem because the office of POTUS is not -and was not- meant to operate like that of a monarch. That was precisely what George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams and James Madison -the Founding Fathers and our first presidents- had in mind to prevent the United States to repeat the catastrophes and chaos of George III's madness or the excesses that turn the French Revolution into the Reign of Terror and the crowing of Emperor Napoleon to restore order.

Chaos, like Saturn, devores those who embrace it. 

 Just looking at the painful saga of the Secretaries of Press Spicer and the "Communications" chief Scaramucci tells the story of a small family business in disarray. 

Hundreds of stories, half a dozen books by and recurring post-exit testimonies (including exit interviews and open letters) from former Secretaries of State and top cabinet officers recurrently describe a one-man show kind of operation, where changes in mood and early morning musings have become M.O. 

That is now what the markets and foreign leaders expect from POTUS and what they discount in their VIX swings at home and preemptive political alliances abroad. And the main reason for such wealth-destroying, dangerous volatility.

Like in a dysfunctional small family-ran operation, Donald J, Trump plays all the roles: he's the Chief of Staff, Secretary of Press, State, Defense, Budget, Fed, DOJ, Attorney General and even rescue operations director. He not only plays the roles. He thinks he can. 

The difference between the Office of the President of the United States, the one that should operate the West Wing and Trump Inc. fades more every day. It has been doing so with each firing of top officers and hiring of lower level, more docile underlings. 

Those who have some experience in small business consulting or  run one are painfully familiar with these kind of scenes. And they worry when they see them because they know that small businesses ran this way end in bankruptcy. Like many of Donald J. Trump previous ventures. 

And current ones, such as the Trump Foundation or his children's fleeting brands.

Mike Bloomberg- a real businessman- minced no words to describe how the business community sees Donald Trump's career and track record:

It's high time for this country and the POTUS office to get some help from a script doctor. The Constitution has SCOTUS and POTUS for that role. They are being tested regularly with tactics reminiscent those of burglars trying to break in during a Christmas vacation.

This two-year run would be a funny series if it only were a sequel of The Apprentice. 

But this is the Presidency of the United States.

Or it should be.