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We remember: In the US election campaign in 2016, the so-called "email affair" was the big deal. Hillary Clinton, as Secretary of State, used her own e-mail server and private account. Donald Trump and his supporters pumped up the process of the largest state scandal since Watergate, they saw the US national security at risk. "Lock her up," was her battle cry, meaning Hillary Clinton.
For Trump the affair was practical. Whenever he was accused of misconduct - and there was plenty of cause for it - he simply said, "But Hillary's emails!"
The process is typical of Trump: The US President masterfully manages to influence public opinion in his favor. All the things that are accused to him, he just reflects immediately. He distracts from his own transgressions by submitting to his opponents at least the same, indeed, perhaps even more monstrous acts.
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In Trump's twisted world, everyone else is corrupt, not him. In Trump's twisted world, everyone else abuses their offices, not him. In Trump's twisted world lie his opponents, not him.
A perfidious and effective defense
In psychology, this defense mechanism would be called projection. The projection can be a very perfidious, very effective defense, because the truth is fogged. Hardly anyone uses them as intensively as Trump in today's politics. In the echo chambers of the Trump world, Fox News and its fans in the network, the projections of the President find the appropriate distribution.
In Video: Trump demands closed ranks from his party
Yuri Gripas / POOL / EPA-EFE / REX
A few days ago, the US State Department completed the investigation into the Clinton emails. So the affair was not a second Watergate, she probably was not even a real affair. There was no evidence that confidential information had been deliberately misused, investigators said matter-of-factly. Case closed.
Hillary Clinton is convinced that the email affair has spoiled her choice. And Trump's political opponents of today must be prepared for the fact that the president could succeed again with his methods. Current examples of how Trump uses projections are plentiful:
- His own, now widely used attempts to use the presidency to stir up political filth in Ukraine against his democratic rival Joe Biden calls Trump "completely fine". The President simply turns the tables: not he is the villain here, but the Biden. He calls Joe Biden and his son Hunter "corrupt." He does not provide evidence for that. But the thing works. Trump fans are already shouting at the president's election campaign: "Lock him up!" Meant is Hunter Biden.
- Trump's actions in the Ukraine affair may have violated the constitution and his own oath of office. This is how the Democrats argue. In Trump's world, however, the investigation against him represents the actual constitutional violation: "The President has done nothing wrong," proclaims the White House in Trump's name. "This is a coordinated smear campaign by left-wing MPs and radical, unelected bureaucrats who wage a war on the Constitution."
- When Nancy Pelosi, the leader of the Democrats, recently said after a meeting with Trump about the conflict in Syria, that the president was "flayed out" in their conversation, Trump found out a short time later, not Pelosi have had the Ausraster. She was "crazy". Since then he calls Pelosi "Crazy Nancy".
- Investigations by ex-FBI chief Robert Mueller into the Russia affair have not revealed any legal evidence of coordinated cooperation between Russia and Trump's campaign team. But Mueller has presented detailed evidence that Trump has repeatedly tried to obstruct the investigations of the judiciary in the matter. In Trump's twisted world, however, it's exactly the other way around: Here, the Mueller investigations are the real "dizziness". His supporters even speak of a "conspiracy" of a "deep state", of a state in the state, against the president. The fact that many of the investigators belong to Trump's own party, which means they are Republicans, is deliberately kept secret.
It's already clear that Trump will continue to use the method. His advantage is that as president he has the biggest megaphone of the whole country, yes, the whole world. No matter what he says, his projections are broadcast on the net and in the TV channels daily and non-stop in all households.
He already has the biggest campaign budget of any candidate today. He can use that to spread his sight. And Trump seems willing to turn up the volume further. That's no problem for him. In the meantime, one has to assume that he actually believes in what he says.
"But Hillary's e-mails!", That was once. From now it says: "But the Bidens!"
