The Enigma of Obama
By Paul Shlichta, The American Thinker, Oct 3 2008
Excerpt: A school of thought is emerging that Barack Obama has an advanced form of narcissistic personality disorder. I heartily agree with Robert Bowie Johnson and Dr. Sam Vaknin in their shared conclusion, but I reached it from a somewhat different route. I had been trying to write an article comparing our political candidates to circus freaks such as chameleons, phoobs, and contortionists. But I was stumped when I came to Obama, who seems to partake of all of these metaphors.
How can one categorize a man who combines:
a revivalist's grandiose and extravagant oratory,
bewilderingly contradictory changes in positions on issues,
a squidlike ability to befog and blur statements into ambiguous or ominous vagaries,
an inflated image (and self-image) covering a naïve and meager mental ability,
a penchant for gaffes and misstatements combined with a dismissal of any corrections as irrelevant or malignant,
a humorless rigidity, elitist aloofness, and perpetual air of condescension, and
a thin-skinned aggrievement at being misinterpreted or of having his privacy violated.
It's like trying to cram a three-ring circus into a pup tent. Unlike a chameleon, he maintains a constant personal image; it is only his positions that change. He shares the ignorance and self confidence of megaegos, but they doggedly stick to one set of dogmas while he changes them with the ease of a shapeshifter.
I tried thinking of him as a Jekyll-Hyde case. I imagined the leftist Dr. Barack, having won the nomination, drinking a potion and turning into the centrist Mr. Obama for the final campaign. I had to discard this model because Obama manages to hold conflicting positions simultaneously, like one of those images under ridged plastic that changes back and forth as you tilt it.
..But his most prominent trait is the incongruous combination of meager mental resources, as evidenced by his frequent gaffes and childishly naïve pronouncements, with a greatly inflated self-image of his expertise and capabilities.
.. the traits would alert a psychologist to the likelihood of narcissistic personality disorder (NPD), whose symptoms include
An exaggerated sense of self-importance; exaggerates achievements and talents; expects to be recognized as superior without commensurate achievements; Need for excessive admiration
A sense of entitlement; Selfishness; taking advantage of others to achieve own ends; Lack of empathy
Arrogant, haughty, patronizing, or contemptuous behavior or attitudes.
It is important to realize that NPD is much more dangerous than simple vanity.
"Narcissists have normal, even superior, intellectual development while remaining emotionally and morally immature. Dealing with them can give you the sense of trying to have a reasonable discussion with a very clever six-year-old.."
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