Is political hubris an illness? (2017)

“… I asked Lord Owen if Trump meets the threshold of hubris syndrome, he replied it was a hard case, … “He obviously has hubris, but did he acquire it …? What was he like when he was twenty?”

The New Yorker Daily Comment
5 May 2017, Evan Osnos

…”Though politicians often accuse each other of being crazy, Trump has inspired a more clinical and sober discussion. (In the magazine this week, I write about proposals in Congress to assess the President’s mental health.) In recent days, the discussion of Trump’s stability has entered a blunter phase….

“In the Washington Post on Thursday, the conservative columnist George Will wrote … “Americans have placed vast military power at the discretion of this mind, a presidential discretion, that is largely immune to restraint by the Madisonian system of institutional checks and balances.”

“…When I asked Lord Owen if Donald Trump meets the threshold of hubris syndrome, he replied that Trump was a hard case, because he reigned over a family business for so long before entering politics. “He has obviously got hubris, but did he acquire it in his business? What was he like when he was twenty? I refuse to put a label on him because I don’t know enough.” Owen added, “Watch him very carefully. It’s a phenomenon that needs to be analyzed, but it will not be very revealing to put labels on it that are inappropriate just because you desperately want to say, ‘He’s crazy.’”

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