People who don’t give ass rats?.. You have to give one or the other, dude.

I believe it is. See my reply to DrSoap in this thread for details, but it’s a famously difficult task to put oneself in the mind of another, especially one with a definable mental illness. It’s much simpler to imagine evil being an intentional act. It allows us to hate a person we consider evil without any strings attached, because it was their choice to be evil. It’s a bit uncomfortable to imagine evil acts being caused by a mental condition that’s listed right alongside autism and schizophrenia, which we usually consider as sympathetic, but I think that’s what we’re dealing with. Most of his followers get roped in with a cult ideology, which is its own bag of worms. To clarify, I don’t see this as an excuse, only a reason. It’s hard to remember that, in his mind, he’s doing the right thing, because he’s doing what’s best for himself, and that is the only thing that has any value to him. I try to view this sort of thing the way I would see a rabid dog. I don’t hate the dog, and I know it’s not the dogs fault that it has rabies, but that doesn’t mean that it can keep going around biting people either. He has to go away.

In case anyone reads all that, and their only take away is that I don’t hate Trump, yes I do, he’s in the worst category of humans that plague the planet, but I try to keep these things in mind, because unbridled hate only and always leads to more hate.

I don’t think you fully understand how narcissistic personality disorder works. If a healthy person starts getting a little too full of themselve, either because of frequent success making them feel infallible, or the Dunning-Kruger effect making them think they know more than they do, they can be brought back down by a reality check, or an embarrassing failure that inescapably shows them that they too have flaws. That’s the “shattering” or the “bubble” you’re referring to. That’s a healthy response. His mind literally doesn’t have the capacity to choose “personal failure” as an option for the cause of ANYTHING except positive results, because it isn’t even in the drop-down list. It’s super tempting to just say that it’s because he’s an asshole (he is though), but it’s a mental illness just like OCD, or schizophrenia. He could probably have masked it a little bit better when he was younger, but the clearly worsening dementia just makes it more obvious now.

That’s literally what narcissism is. The circuitry in your brain that is responsible for feeling shame and guilt and finding fault within yourself just doesn’t exist in an affected brain. The idea that something negative that happened could be his fault is like you trying to understand how 2+2 could possibly equal 5. It doesn’t even cross your mind as a thing that’s worth considering as a possibility.

I think the wording is meant to contrast how few Americans actually want it, vs, how much Trump wants it, who, as president, should, in theory as an elected figure, represent the majority opinion of the people. So, they are calling attention to the fact that it’s a low number, but for a different reason than your reading.

17% feels about right in my subjective experience.

Yes. With and without -a flag. Same result.