But students of history tend to be less anxious because we have seen this act many times before. And it’s always the same ending for the narcissistic leader and empire.

Many have compared Trump’s rise to Hitler’s and the German Social Democrats Party, The Third Reich. 

Driven by Germany’s “humiliation” after World War I, The Treaty of Versailles imposed extremely harsh conditions on Germany, forcing them to accept full responsibility for the war ("war guilt clause"), cede significant territory, pay large reparations, and drastically reduce their military strength. This led to widespread resentment and contributed to the rise of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party. But that’s too easy of an explanation. The long and short is Germany, aided by the Pope in Rome, allowed a repeatedly failed egotistical little man, a narcissist, to exploit their fragile vulnerabilities of white supremacy and imperialistic dreams of grandeur: end democracy in Germany. 

It’s a similar trajectory with Trump, driven by vulnerabilities of the white, non-college-educated demographic. Those who lost faith in the myth of the American dream have seen significant losses of high-paying, easy-to-get manufacturing jobs over the last three decades. This has led to the build-up of despair and the need to blame someone else.

As usual, it’s minorities and immigrants’ fault for their society’s failures. White Nationalism began to rise, and drug addiction became widespread, with disproportional rates of suicide for white males who have given up and are now angry at everyone except themselves.

Nevertheless, Trump is not the cause, just a symptom. All of this existed before Trump; he’s just throwing fuel on an already burning fire. Trump is an opportunist, taking advantage of desperate people.

Manifesting a world of hate and misinformation in his image, setting the stage for his ascent to the throne of a fragile and superficial American republican-based democracy experiment. Unlike parliamentary democracies, the American system is largely based on ceremony and tradition, and politicians and the people who respect it. But it’s not holding. It’s shattering. 

Narcissistic leaders are people who have a mental health condition called narcissistic personality disorder (NPD), and they use their power to prioritize their own needs over the needs of others. They are usually arrogant, dominant, and hostile against reason and intelligence. Self-centred, only interested in themselves, inflated egos and a lofty sense of their own importance, lack empathy, a critical characteristic required for good leadership.

They are unable to understand or care about the feelings of others. Narcissists can’t take criticism, are intolerant of criticism, have difficulty listening, and often lash out at others. They are abusive, they casually lie to their followers, don’t think highly of them, nor do they take responsibility or accountability for their own mistakes. They are always in need of admiration and have an insatiable need for attention.

Trump plays well to the vulnerable, the poorly educated, wilfully ignorant crowd. Narcissistic leadership preys on those misinformed and desperate people, but history has informed us that their actions eventually destroy the morale of those they lead and bring down their culture, productive value, and the wealth of their nation.

Trump and Nero – Core Characteristics for Failure

The Roman emperor Nero is the best historical comparison to Trump as a narcissistic leader, particularly in the context of the ending of the Roman Empire. 

Nero, the fifth Roman emperor, was the beginning of the end of the Roman Empire. His narcissistic tendencies and plain stupidity saw a reign marked by civil war and widespread misery. Today, while America has significant problems, like climate change, inequality, affordability, healthcare, housing crisis, failing schools, diminishing global economic power and relevance, and the need for comprehensive AI safety, Trump is focused on trivialities and brutality like banning birth-right citizenship, rounding up immigrants, freeing criminals, causing chaos in the global economy with big talk but little intellect. He is ignorant of the effects of tariffs on his own economy. Moreover, these stupid acts of a self-absorbing narcissist have him handing over America to the Big Tech billionaire Oligarchs.  

“Nero fiddled while Rome burned,” and Trump is engaging in narcissistic nonsense trivialities while the American ‘empire’ experiences a precipitous and steady decline, completely blind to the self-harm they are causing themselves.

“Narcissistic leaders react with great rage, thirsting for vengeance, full of a sense of righteousness…”

—Robert Greene    

Narcissistic leadership has been prevalent throughout human history, and the commonality is that, eventually, they bring down everyone with them—people, companies, societies, and the nation-state. Trump has the most in common with Nero. Both are vain and excessively hubristic in classic Shakespearean fashion, which leads to dramatic downfalls. Both Nero and Trump had a spoilt and immensely privileged upbringing and never had to work for anything. It was all handed to them, groomed, but not ready for leadership. It’s been reported that Trump inherited $400 million from his father, so he started on the one-yard line.

Vanity was one of Nero’s worst habits, and like Trump, they both love adoration and attention. Both fooled themselves into believing they were/are great leaders without the humility and intellectual capacity to do so. They both cheat: Trump at business, golf, and just about everything, and Nero, for example, once hosted and rigged the Olympics so he could participate in events he wanted to win. Nero also liked to write poetry, but when he heard of another more talented poet, he banished him. Trump believed he was a talented real estate developer, but numerous bankruptcies later, he has only proven to be a very talented grifter. He had to pivot to entertainment (The Apprentice) because he was on the brink of another bankruptcy, a collapse that would have brought down his phony real estate empire.

Nero loved attention; he could never get enough of it, like Trump, this addiction to attention made him vulnerable to flatterers, sucking up to Trump has been a very effective strategy for those willing to live life on their knees. Those wanting something from him. Nero was known for having a court of suck-ups and courtiers, too—people wanting something from the emperor, dependent on him—those who told him what he wanted to hear.

More clever people use fragile narcissistic leaders to get what they want (i.e., Elon Musk) or to stay on their good side because their bad side is one of volatility and high emotional knee-jerk irrational reactions. Nevertheless, narcissistic leaders surround themselves with a cast of incompetents, with people telling them how amazing they are and what a good job they are doing. That the people love them, and his court must pledge fealty. This is what narcissistic dictatorship looks like—Nero from the past and Trump modern-day.

However, to be a good leader, you have to seek and know the objective truth and the facts and not make up your own new lies every day to distract from the objective truth and to create an alternative universe where truth doesn’t matter. Trump’s playbook is to gaslight his own people and have them believe in lies more than truth, muddy the water enough for him to win and lead with organized chaos. In an environment where truth doesn’t matter and where the data says that a majority of Americans read at a fifth-grade level, ignorance is truly bliss!

Nero believed he was smarter than everyone else, that he was brilliant, and Trump has self-appraised himself as “a very stable genius.” But what we do know is neither Nero nor Trump read, and they can’t hear anything or anyone other than themselves—no virtue, self-control or empathy. So, without adults in the room, these leaders fall deeper into self-delusion, and their narcissism grows uncontrollably, like a runaway train. But the wheels eventually do fall off, as history has shown, the train derailed into a ditch. Ending the narcissist’s ride and so too the empire.

The author of The Power Broker, Robert Caro, writes that power doesn’t corrupt, that’s too simple, he says. Instead, power reveals what’s already there. The easy narrative for Trump is that he’s been corrupted by power, but Trump was already corrupted, big league, for the vast majority of his adult life.

What you see is what you get. However, corruption, Caro explains, is usually based on mental fragility and the lack of confidence is substituted with arrogance because they can’t achieve without cheating. So, self-adulation is necessary for their own fragile self-esteem. Failure, therefore, on a grand scale, is inevitable for the narcissistic leader.

What may look like confidence to the less observant eye is really insecurity, fear and paranoia. Both Nero and Trump know they are not worthy, so they practice chaos to distract, even themselves. Constantly compensating for their shortcomings as human beings with the absurd to make themselves feel deserving and better. They believe their own bullshit.

They try to cling to power by any means necessary because of the fear that their bad deeds will eventually catch up to them, so staying in power and exhausting everyone is just a delay tactic. Like the great fire that burnt down Rome while ‘Nero slept,’ Trump, too, is incapable of making rational leadership decisions. Unless it’s in his interest, of course. Trump’s fire was a dumpster fire—the COVID crisis of 2020. Trump fiddled and fooled like a mad king, telling people to drink cleaning liquids.

Narcissistic leaders are unable to properly do their jobs and do not take responsibility when they screw up royally! They find scapegoats instead. Therefore, crisis reveals a leader’s true character: fragile, weak, scared, and hiding behind bluster—narcissists are inherently cowards, and so too those who acquiesce to them!

Therefore, in times of great uncertainty and angst, turning to history to learn and understand and to navigate through those turbulent waters in the sea of life is the most intelligent thing one can do. Everything today has happened yesterday, so don’t degrade your intelligence. Apply it to learning from history to think critically. The process will give you a better perspective and less stress and anxiety…because you know this, too, will pass. 

Don’t waste precious time with things you can’t control. Our time in this world is infinitesimal. Use your applied intelligence, your “ai” efficiently and effectively and focus your life on those value-adding tasks, what’s in front of you and what you can control—this is how you will thrive in the 21st century and the chaos.