Bill Maher’s Trump Derangement Syndrome

[Hillary] never said that Trump is an illigitimate president.

Bill Maher, Interview with Megyn Kelly, May 22, 2024

Hillary Clinton dismissed President Trump as an “illegitimate president” and suggested “he knows” he stole the 2016 presidential election …

Washington Post, Sept 26, 2019

Maher states that “The right wing is much more dangerous. They don’t believe in democracy and they threw  their lot in with a sociopath, Donald Trump.”  Although Maher says he is independent, he uncritically adopts, with his usual bored affectation of superiority, the main Democrat Party talking points. 

Maher has not, apparently, noticed that the Democrats, in multiple heavily Democrat jurisdictions (biased jury pools), in absurd cases criticized by top legal minds like Alan Dershowitz and Jonathan Turley, are attempting to bankrupt Trump and put him in prison.  Maher simply dismisses all that “banana republic” lock-up-one’s-political-opponent-behavior as unimportant.  Kelly brings up the fact that polls showed that had voters know about the Hunter Biden laptop story before the 2020 election, they would have voted differently.  Maher’s standard response for all these and other ponts.  They don’t count.

As for his accusation that Trump is a sociopath, the American Psychiatric Association forbids psychiatrists to diagnose a person unless they have personally examined them.   This is because it is extremely difficult to diagnose sociopathy, involving extended discussions with the person, their family members and romantic partners, and an evaluation of their medical condition for signs of other “conditions”, none of which Maher has done. Maher’s diagnosis of Trump’s sociopathy is politics, nothing more. 

When Kelly states she is going to vote for Trump Maher says:

I can’t even understand that. … Biden is deeply flawed but he does believe in our way of life.  I was saying from the beginning when everyone was laughing at me that Trump will never give up power and he didn’t.  He still hasn’t conceded the election. I don’t know what could possibly be more fundamental than  [that] you have to concede elections. … He plainly is not going to concede the next one.  … [We could] lose the system itself.

First, Megyn replies, “But we didn’t [lose the system].” Trump left office when required.  Maher simply dismisses that.  Further, Maher, consulting his crystal ball, divines that Trump will not leave office if he wins in 2024.  Precognition? 

Second, Maher appeals to abstractions, a standard tactic of the Left. i.e., Biden “believes in our way of life.”  But is our “way of life” threatened by inflation much higher than during the Trump years, or by Christopher Wray warning about the “whole other level” of terrorist threats as millions of unknown people flood across the border, or by homeless encampments springing up all over US cand Democrat mayors begging for federal help, or by backstabbing our main ally, Israel, in the Middle East, or by the Biden administration partnering with social media to censor critics, or by Democrat efforts to put their political opponent in prison or bar him off the ballot and talk about not certifing the next election results if Trump wins.  None of that counts because Biden “believes in our way of life.” 

Third, Maher manages to make the point about himself, “I was saying from the beginning when everyone was laughing at me …”.  Ironically, narcissism, believing everything is about oneself, is one of the characteristics of sociopathy.  One of Maher’s books is titled “The New New Rules: A Funny Look at How Everybody but Me Has Their Head Up Their Ass.”  A singular oracle!  Maher even claims metaphysical justification for his preference for black women, “I’m just into women who are real, and they happen to be black.”  Actually, “No.” There is nothing cosmic about your preference for women.  You just like those kinds of women.  “Reality” is not behind you.  In fact, there is empirical evidence that “stand-up” comedians display not only narcissism but “the most common DSM-IV Axis I disorders, personality characteristics and pathology, and malignant self-regard.”  Other studies indicate that comedians are “high on psychosis traits” including “antisocial and depressive traits.” 

Fourth, Maher’s critique of Trump’s alleged “election denialism” depends on a fallacy of equivocation between “Trump will never give up power” and “Trump still hasn’t conceded the election.”  When Kelly replies to Maher’s precognition that Trump will never leave power by pointing out that he did, Maher retreats to the weaker claim that Trump never conceded the 2020 election.   However, Democrats have repeatedly refused to concede elections, going back to Al Gore who, after conceding to Bush on election night, unconceded and went through months of legal attempts to overturn the Bush victory while Bin Laden was planning his attacks on the US (until the Supreme Court put an end to Gore’s attempt to overturn an election).  See also the farcical election denialism of Stacy Abrams, claiming that she never denied the election even though she is on tape doing precisely that!  When Kelly brings up Saint Hillary’s election denialism, things really get comical.  In order to paint Trump as a unique “threat to our democracy”, Maher states that Hillary never said that Trump “is an illegitimate president”.  Kelly points out she said precisely those words for 4 years.  We can’t wait for Maher to call Hillary a psychopath.

Fifth, when Maher brings up “the attack on the Capitol” which, in a transparent False Cause fallacy, he blames on Trump, not, apparently, knowing or caring that Trump told the crowd to “go peacefully” to the capitol to “make their voices heard” and that Capitol Police Chief Steve Sund verified that Trump had earlier requested National Guard to protect the capitol but  was turned down by Democrats).

Maher:  The rioters “knocked down doors and killed cops” 

Kelly: “They didn’t kill cops”.

Maher:  They of course did (high pitched voice).

Kelly:  No they didn’t. 

Maher:  They [the cops] died of natural causes that day?

Kelly:  Nobody died that day.

Maher.  Cops!

Kelly.  Not true.

Maher. (Laughs derisively).

Kelly:  Who?

Maher:  I don’t know the names.

Maher doesn’t know the names of the killed cops but knows they exist. Magic again?

Kelly points out that Brian Sicknick died days later and the coroner’s report did not say he was killed by rioters.  The Capitol Police report stated that Sicknick died of “natural causes”, precisely what Maher derisively dismissed.

Kelly is technically wrong about one thing though.  One person did die that day when a dimunitive unarmed woman, Ashley Babbit, was shot and killed by a Capitol policeman, not that the killer was punished or that the Democrats care.

It is astonishing that someone who regularly accuses Trump of election denialism and the Jan. 6^th “insurrection” has never bothered to verify the facts.  Facts not needed in Maher’s bubble.  It is equally astonishing that even though Maher is demonstrably wrong about  his key claims, that Hillary never said Trump is an “illegitimate president” and that the rioters killed cops on Jan. 6^th, he is unmoved by Kelly’s points.  Maher has his Democrat Party fairytale and is sticking with it.  That is, his beliefs are unfalsifiable, part of his comforting lay religion (or cult), precisely the kinds of conspiracy theories he derisively attributes to the “MAGA crowd”.

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