Debate Viewers Struggle With Concept of President Without Glaring Personality Disorder

By Andy Borowitz, The New Yorker

27 June 19

The article below is satire. Andy Borowitz is an American comedian and New York Times-bestselling author who satirizes the news for his column, "The Borowitz Report."

illions of viewers of a televised debate Wednesday night found themselves struggling with the notion of a President with no visible personality disorder.

In interviews across the country, viewers said that they were having difficulty imagining a President who does not display flagrant signs of malignant narcissism, impulse-control deficit, or rampant paranoia.

“I kept trying to picture whether any of these people would be capable of insulting another country on Twitter to compensate for his or her own pathological sense of inadequacy,” Harland Dorrinson, who lives in Akron, Ohio, said. “None of them showed me that they have what it takes to do that.”

“A President should be ready, at a moment’s notice, to ridicule another person’s face,” Carol Foyler, of Nashville, said. “I didn’t see one person on that stage who seemed up to that task.”

Tracy Klugian, who lives in San Diego, said he was taken aback by the candidates showing off their language proficiency. “Every one of them was fluent in English,” he said. “For a President, that would be jarring.”