Alan Zendell, March 16, 2025

When Jimmy Carter was president, things didn’t go very well. The cost of Vietnam and the sharp increase in energy prices left over from the Arab Oil Embargo had led to record high inflation and interest rates, and when our puppet dictator, the Shah of Iran was overthrown by the Ayatollahs, our embassy in Tehran was ransacked and taken hostage. Our government was in terrible disarray. America’s love affair with the Godfather movies had people suggesting that we ought to let the Mafia run the government.

It was an interesting hypothesis. According to a recent research study published in the International Journal of Law and Psychiatry, gangsters, specifically Mafia bosses, consistently display the same sets of traits: “self-centeredness, [a] sense of grandiosity, incapability of feeling remorse, empathy or compassion towards others as well as emotional coldness and parasitic behavior. These traits result in their violating the law and social norms and undermining society structures.” Is that who we want governing us?

The American Psychiatry Association defines the traits associated with people who suffer from Narcissistic Personality Disorder, a serious mental illness, as:

• A grandiose sense of self-importance.
• Preoccupation with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty, or ideal love.
• Belief that they are “special” and can only be understood by other special or high-status people.
• Need for excessive admiration.
• A sense of entitlement (i.e., unreasonable expectations of especially favorable treatment).
• Taking advantage of others to achieve his or her own ends.
• Lack empathy, unwillingness to recognize or identify with the feelings and needs of others.
• Envy of others or belief that others are envious of them.
• Arrogant, haughty behaviors or attitudes.

When I noticed that the personality traits of Mafia bosses are nearly identical to those of extreme narcissists, I thought it was interesting if not terribly surprising. When I looked further, into the characteristics of autocratic leaders, a light of epiphany went on. Many scholarly sources discuss such traits. One describes them as:

• Making decisions without input from others
• Not listening to different points of view
• Not being open to change
• Being inflexible
• Having a “my way or the highway” approach
• Expecting others to follow without question
• Having a very rigid, structured approach

The same source acknowledges that some situations, like wars, economic depressions, and natural disasters can benefit from autocratic leadership. An autocrat with good intentions can produce rapid results and operate efficiently. But autocratic leadership also contains the seeds of its own destruction. A leader whose values and ideals are inconsistent with democracy or concern for the common good will produce catastrophic outcomes like abuse of power, poor decision-making, and suppression of dissent. Autocratic leadership  also causes subordinates and group members to feel unmotivated and uninvolved due to nepotism, favoritism, intimidation, and iron-fisted control.

Do you see what I saw? I’ve listed the traits typically associated with Mafia bosses, people who suffer from extreme narcissism, and dictators like Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping. When I look at them in combination, I see a frightening portrait of Donald Trump.

If you voted for him thinking he was going to reduce your taxes, reverse inflation, and make it easier to raise your family, think again. He only cares about any of those things when he’s trying to buy your vote with false promises. If you’ve been ripped by Elon Musk’s chainsaw, you already know this. If you’re a veteran who is underserved or unemployed because of this president’s callous disregard, you understand what more than half the country knew all along.

Trump only cares about the nation’s economy because if it crashes, so do his wealth and power. He claims to care about the Ukrainian and Russian soldiers who are dying every day, but he doesn’t recognize that killing USAID is resulting in the deaths of countless innocent children in third world countries. He claims to care about antisemitism, but he’s really only interested in the money Jewish billionaires contribute to him. He has no ethics, no moral center, no sympathy or empathy for anyone but himself. Many of his supporters say that’s all right because they love his policies, but except for tax cuts, xenophobia, and arbitrarily slashing agencies he disapproves of, no one has articulated what those policies are.

People who voted for him are realizing they’ve been scammed. Farmers, factory workers, government employees, and all the people likely to lose their jobs when Trump’s tariffs force American companies to reduce their costs will soon see how little he cares about them.

Our president is an insensitive narcissist with the mentality of a gangster. Rationalizing his hateful, vengeful behavior and disregard for anyone who doesn’t help enrich him can only make things worse. That’s why Republicans in the House of Representatives have been told by Leader Mike Johnson to stop holding Town Halls. Communicating with constituents can’t be much fun for House members once voters figure out that they’re complicit with the madman in charge.