Trump Is Collapsing

That Donald Trump no longer has the juice is not a question.

The Big Boy, teetering on his back foot for the first time in his nine years at the head of the Republican Party, is utterly juiceless in his tired, low-energy speeches to adoring fans who have heard the same boring shtick for years and years and still summon the energy to cheer as if they are in the presence of a tax-cutting, immigrant-hating deity.

You saw it and I saw it during Trump's disastrous Thursday press conference at Mar-a-Lago: The man mumbled and stumbled through the presser, inventing stories about almost dying in a helicopter crash and belittling his opponent, Kamala Harris, as mentally and intellectually unfit for the presidency. It was the purest form of projection I've ever seen. The man was furious, apoplectic.

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The juice is gone. Trump isn't even campaigning anymore. He's golfing and lying about his golf scores and sending the creepy, weird JD Vance to stalk Vice President Harris on tarmacs across our great land while he compares himself to the obnoxious losers in HBO's Entourage.

Far-right billionaires are reportedly spooked by Trump's unwillingness to push back against Democratic enthusiasm since Joe Biden mercifully withdrew from the race and Harris quickly drew party support to become the new nominee (right-wing bad-faith reaction to Harris taking over as the nominee without a real primary process has been fun to watch, as conservatives and fascists alike have suddenly discovered a new appreciation for democratic processes now that their preferred opponents – Biden – is no longer at the head of the ticket). Right wingers on the X platform are once again becoming RFK-curious with Trump's prospects tanking and little to no effort being made by Republicans to save a once-unbeatable campaign.

I'm no doctor, nor do I play one on social media. Even so, I'm curious as to what, exactly, is going on with Trump as both swing state and national polling numbers have turned dramatically in Harris' favor. This curiosity brought me down an online rabbit hole that led to the concept of narcissistic collapse. Though I had never heard the term before my frantic online search for what might be happening to the Big Boy, diagnosis of narcissistic collapse sure does check a lot of boxes.

Mental health experts have observed that, sometimes, when a narcissistic person doesn’t receive the external validation they believe they deserve, it can result in a high level of stress and hurt. This emotional pain may turn into narcissistic rage. This rage is at the core of a narcissistic collapse.

Dr. Alexander Lappa, a psychiatrist in the United Kingdom who has researched and treated narcissistic personality disorder (NPD), said narcissistic collapse "happens when a person with NPD can’t maintain their superior or confident image," adding such a collapse can be "triggered as a self-defense technique if they feel their self-image or self-esteem is being threatened."

Like I said, the boxes are being checked. More and more are saying so.

Trump, now longing for the days of his matchup with Sleepy Joe, has been exposed in recent weeks for what he is: An unquestionably weak candidate with no real ideas or policies who has a solid base of voter support and nothing else. The version of Trump that terrified the American left and any other freedom-loving person in the United States is no more. That version of Trump, held together with the learned helplessness of national Democrats and major media outlets' laundering of Trump as a viable presidential, is gone for good. Trump's self image has been wrecked. Hence, the rage we saw during his Thursday press conference.

He is collapsing. Of that there is no question. And his collapse was always going to be spectacular. A lopsided loss in November will be a generation setback for the American right. It will be their fourth straight election loss, including the 2018 and 2022 midterms, all with Trump as the boss. People forget.

This is a man – Teflon Don – who has seemed invincible for most of the past decade, immune to the laws of political gravity. Not even a loss in the 2020 election could puncture Trump's air of invincibility. We knew he still had a shot of pulling off a coup, and even if that didn't work, he would easily be atop the Republican ticket in 2024 (as he will be in 2028 if Harris wins in November).

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That invincibility is gone. The emperor has clothes, which I know is the most unpleasant thing that has ever appeared in your mind's eye. Democrats' stunning turn toward mockery and dilemma actions – most prominently seen in the coordinated attacks on Vance and Trump as weird – has revealed Trump as eminently beatable. Injecting a little joy and frivolity into the campaign – and American politics at large – has broken the fascist fever and turned fear and anxiety into hope and determination.

For the older millennials out there: It's like when Rocky in Part Four punches the Russian and makes him bleed. It's a startling moment for the audience after being made to believe Drago the Russian was not in fact a human being.

"He's worried! You cut him!" Rocky's trainer, Duke, cries out from ringside as Drago's face bleeds. "You hurt him. You see? He's not a machine, he's a man!"

Finally, Rocky believes he can win. As importantly (more importantly?), the viewing audience believes he can win. The folks filling up stadiums to see Harris and her running mate Tim Walz – a paragon of no-faith politics – firmly believe they can defeat Trump in November.

It's a belief that had waned, if not vanished entirely during the dark days following Biden's debate debacle. Harris and her campaign surrogates and politicians and activists from almost every corner of the American left are showing they believe Trump is not invincible, convincing voters to believe the same. We needed someone in power to tell us this fight is winnable. We can take it from there. And we will.

Follow Denny Carter on BlueSky at @cdcarter13.bsky.social and on Threads and X at @CDCarter13.