Citizen Trump And The Boulevard Of Bedlam

What does it portend that President Trump spent his Christmas in the White House, home alone, without even his family? How prophetic that in 2016, then-President-elect Trump revealed to The Hill that his two favorite all-time films are “Citizen Kane” and “Sunset Boulevard.”  His taste cannot be faulted as these Oscar winning films ranked as # 1 and # 12 respectively on the American Film Institute’s list of 100 best films of the century. Through their angry self-destructive impulses, they were the architects of their own misfortunes. They both depict the late career collapse of mercurial exploitive extreme narcissists who retreated into the isolation of their grotesquely excessive palaces. The demagogic media baron Charles Foster Kane was furious over his lost public support as fallen silent screen star Nora Desmond was furious over her lost audience appeal.

I have been studying self-styled heroism and CEO exits for over 35 years as represented by my 1988 best seller The Hero’s Farewell (Oxford University Press). We are watching a driver out of control but not as onlookers but as passengers. It does not take a psychiatrist to tell us we are witnessing self-destructive behavior from our commander-in-chief. This is the pattern in my studies of a group I termed exiting “monarchs,” who will not leave office gracefully. Many entrepreneurs who hit a wall begin to destroy what their leadership created. Some wince at Trump’s reckless conduct saying he trips over his success through his temperament. Some say Trump’s angry tantrum style of leadership has only left a trail of destruction. Both Trump “true believers” see this as plainly as do Trump “haters,” but the consequences to our nation are considerable for all camps—and spiraling out of control.

It is ironic to see this pattern in our first CEO president as virtually any board of directors would have acted by now with an intervention and likely removal. Congress does not act as many Republicans see their fate tied to Trump and many Democrats, soon-to-return to power, do not want to be defined by impeachment—especially a possibly failed one. Robert Mueller’s report, if public, may make that necessary but this is unknown. Most business leaders are torn now fearing domestic political instability as the greatest threat to US financial markets.

Trump’s kaleidoscope of setbacks, despite the bravado to the contrary, have led him to increased isolation. The year 2018 closes with a frustrated President Trump hitting Congressional walls over erecting a wall, judicial reversals of his decrees, and with such erratic domestic and diplomatic tantrums that he already has set an historic record for cabinet and top staff exits losing over 25 top administration officials in just two years. All this is matched by a government shut down and the worst December on financial markets since the Great Depression.

Buoyed by a surge of forty new House members, Democratic party leaders have strengthened their outrage. Despite historically low unemployment, they are now preparing to attack failures of Trump tax reform, which led to enrichment of the top 1 percent of the electorate but did not to lead to the promised reinvestment in domestic industries or significant sustained wage gains and hurting middle class workers with the cutback on state and local tax deductions. The unrest has also been stoked by a series of massive layoffs at large manufacturers in part triggered by retaliation from trading partners due to confusing tariff penalties.

Top officials of wide ranging global allies from such nations as Germany, France, Pakistan, and Israel, reacted with alarm and confusion over Trump’s tweet announcing a surprise retreat of forces working with allies in Syrian conflict and in Afghanistan along with the subsequent resignation of revered Secretary of Defense General James Mattis.

Despite the initial public support of the business community, who rejoiced over tax reform and promised regulatory rollbacks, business leaders are now more openly critical. Industry leaders who were once fearful of White House reprisals for dissent from sequential hostile presidential tweets storms, are now more courageously speaking out. Last June 69 percent of major CEOs we at Yale surveyed reported that North Korean President Kim had gotten the best of President Trump in their much promoted summit meeting.  In December, this was reinforced in another Yale survey of 134 top business leaders who felt the same way about President Trump being outmaneuvered by Russian President Putin. Fully three quarters of them felt they had to apologize for his messaging to global business partners over Trump’s messages and that 87 percent believed Trumps negotiating style had cost the nation the trust of its allies.

Even once supportive top Congressional leaders within his own party once euphoric over judicial appointments now openly criticize Trump’s domestic and diplomatic moves. Republican Senator Bill Cassidy, lamenting Trump’s volatility complained: ‘You want to be able to draw a bead on where your leader is going to be in a week or two or three.” Republican Majority Leader Senator Mitch McConnell expressed “dismay” over Trump’s loss of Secretary of Defense James Mattis.

Trump’s responses to these critics has been to belittle them and insult them just as did Sunset Boulevard’s Norma Desmond when she shouted into the projection beam re-watching her old silent film hits “Oh, those idiot producers. Those imbeciles! Haven’t they got any eyes? Have they forgotten what a star looks like?” Desmond says. “I’ll show them. I’ll be up there again! So help me!”

Trump channels Desmond as a siege mentality has set in at the White House.  Inside reports indicate that when he often becomes impatient with advisers, he scowls while reclining in his chair with crossed arms, erupting with bellows of “Freaking idiots!” he calls his aides. Except he uses a more pungent word than “freaking. When Citizen Kane’s John Foster Kane’s political standing is derailed by a sex scandal, his aides ask what the American public will believe and Kane barks back “They will believe what I tell them to believe.” Kane’s public career was anchored on personal vilification over public policy—fashioning himself as an underdog, promising to have his political rivals convicted.

While Desmond and Kane retreat into fortresses protected by sycophantic aids, even those loyal aides are suspected of betrayal. Desmond’s former director and husband becomes dependent upon her in an abusive relationship as a servant who promotes the delusion of her sustained popularity. Her hired scriptwriter is shot when he dares to tell her the truth. Kane fires his own best friend and top editor for similar offenses and went on a rage when his second wife left him after puncturing the mythic image of their relationship.

It is not clear that Trump is drawn to these two favorite films as cautionary tales of megalomaniacs who become embittered, delusional, and alone when their hubris alienates friends and enemies alike. An insightful 2016 Buzzfeed commentary considered how Trump failed to learn the lessons of Citizen Kane—and won.

However, there may still be hope. Trump told me during a 2006 Apprentice-related public debate between us, he has watched those who fail and learned from it. He cited an unexpected meeting of once great residential home builder William Levitt sitting on a curb having been turned away from a party. Levitt looked up and yelled “hello” to a sympathetic Trump who did not recognize him at first. Trump told me “the man had bought back his company after selling it to ITT to become a billionaire. After personally securing the assets on the repurchase, he lost everything. You’ve got to know where to draw the line.  I don’t draw the line where other people do—to be noticed—but I really do have a line.”

Perhaps, with their delayed return to Xanadu (Mar-a-Lago) this week, Jared and Ivanka can help dad find that line again without them too being told “You’re fired!”  However even they cannot do it alone. His core leadership lever is to divide and conquer. A bipartisan Senate delegation must intervene quietly, as would a functional board of directors, and say this cannot continue.  Ad hoc counter public insults only antagonize him into further dangerous acts. He hates ridicule as much as failure but can listen to forceful quiet dissent.  As Ambassador Andrew Young advised recently, at our December 13 CEO Summit, “you do not call an alcoholic a ‘drunk’ and think you’ve fixed the problem.”

Jeffrey Sonnenfeld is author of The Hero’s Farewell (Oxford University Press)