Every adult in the world has some sense that he or she might be obliterated at any time by these weapons that we have created.

Every adult in the world has some sense that he or she might be obliterated at any time by these weapons that we have created.

While Donald Trump doesn't have any systematic ideology, he does have a narrative, and in that narrative, America was once a great country, it's been weakened by poor leadership, and only he can make it great again by taking over. And that's an image of himself as a strongman, a dictator. It isn't the clear ideology of being a fascist or some other clear-cut ideological figure. Rather, it's a narrative of himself as being unique and all-powerful. He believes it, though I'm sure he's got doubts about it.

It may sound terrible, but I often say that the military saved me from a conventional life in the United States and I've never really thanked them for it, because I haven't exactly been pro-military in my work.

There's an all-enveloping destructiveness in Donald Trump's character and in his psychological tendencies. But I've focused on what professionally I call solipsistic reality. Solipsistic reality means that the only reality he's capable of embracing has to do with his own self and the perception by and protection of his own self. And for a president to be so bound in this isolated solipsistic reality could not be more dangerous for the country and for the world. He's not psychotic, but I think ultimately this solipsistic reality will be the source of his removal from the presidency.

The one-sided exploitation of existential guilt is thought reform's trump card, and perhaps its most important source of emotional influence over its participants. Revolving around it are issues most decisive to thought reform's outcome.

With the nuclear threat we know that if sufficient weapons are used, human civilization - all of humankind - could be extinguished literally by "nuclear winter." So we have to see ourselves as part of the ultimate human group, just as we have to do with global warming.