Thread by @HoarseWisperer

Following up on my threads last week on John Kelly, Donald Trump and what it takes to manage a narcissist...

We have a problem. 1/

People with narcissistic personality disorder like Trump have a profound gift for whipping people up into outrage. They're pros at it. 2/

They are masters at pushing people's buttons... and then the second they have, they walk away. Mission accomplished. 3/

While the outraged people they left behind simmer and stew, they move on to truly not giving one hot damn about the subject. 4/

Putting people "on tilt" serves them well. It keeps people off balance. It keeps people from rationally focusing on other things. 5/

Last week, Trump and then John Kelly put all of us on the left pretty darn squarely on tilt. Outraged to the nth degree. 6/

If you'll notice, since then, Trump has been downright sedate. No insane, manic tweet storms. No unhinged hissies. The guy is all zen. 7/

In his mind, he successfully managed to entirely distract people from his ACTUAL failures and instead turn them towards Kelly's speech. 8/

In Trump's mind, he's having the best week in a long time. The guy is positively enjoying this week and the continued outrage of the left.9/

As I said last week, narcissists win when they can get you off balance. The second you match their outrageousness with outrage, you lose.10/

No matter how awful and offensive and wrong Kelly's words were last week, our reaction is now playing right into Trump's hands. 11/

Trump will not only NOT be moved by the continued outage, he'll be delighted by it. His ploy worked like a damn charm. 12/

While this is counterintuitive to ppl who haven't dealt with a narc, reacting strongly to bad behavior actually reinforces it... 13/

It teaches the narc that they can get your goat - and once they have, they can run off and do whatever the hell they want while you stew.14/

As distasteful and unpleasant as this is, to combat a Trump, we can't be blown off course by every new outrage. We just can't. 15/

This week, despite a looming tax reform bill that would crush social programs, Trump is having a just fine week... 16/

That's what happens when a narcissist has won the battle for control of your emotions. You're mad; they're happy. 17/

What Kelly said was terrible but just like w every other terrible thing said by his Admin, focusing on it is actually helping him. 18/

We've got to stick to our knitting and focus on the issues. If the subject is our outrage over words, we're losing. Badly. <end>