Dwain Northey (Gen X)

There is a difference between confidence and hubris. Confidence allows a leader to recognize mistakes, adjust course, and learn from history. Hubris convinces a person that history exists merely to validate them. In my opinion, Donald Trump falls firmly into the second category.

This is, of course, my opinion, but I believe Trump genuinely thinks his return to the White House was the result of the American people realizing they had made a terrible mistake by electing Joe Biden. That narrative seems to fit perfectly with the way he has always viewed himself: not as a politician competing in a democracy, but as a figure destined for greatness, a man who believes history inevitably bends toward his own vindication.

The problem with that worldview is that it requires every success to be attributed to genius and every failure to be blamed on someone else. It leaves no room for chance, circumstance, economic cycles, political trends, or the simple reality that voters often choose between imperfect options. Everything becomes a referendum on one man.

What has always struck me is how much of Trump’s political identity appears to be rooted in his hostility toward Barack Obama. Long before he entered politics, Trump spent years promoting the birther conspiracy, insisting that Obama was somehow illegitimate, that he was not really American, that his birth certificate was fraudulent, and that he had no right to occupy the Oval Office. Looking back, it is difficult for me to separate that campaign from the racial undertones that many Americans recognized at the time.

Nor was that an isolated incident. Trump’s history with accusations of discriminatory housing practices stretches back to the 1970s. Whether discussing housing, immigration, or his rhetoric about various communities, there is a long record that leads many people—including me—to conclude that race has often played a significant role in how he views the world.

Because of that fixation on Obama, it often seems that anything associated with Obama’s presidency automatically became unacceptable in Trump’s eyes. The Affordable Care Act was supposedly a disaster, yet years later there was never a fully developed replacement ready to take its place. The Iran nuclear agreement, the JCPOA, was described as the worst deal ever negotiated, yet subsequent attempts to address the same issue have often struggled to produce anything clearly superior. The objective details almost become secondary. If Obama supported it, Trump opposes it. If Obama built it, Trump wants his name removed from it.

That hostility then naturally extends to Joe Biden, who served as Obama’s vice president. In my view, Biden inherited much of the resentment that Trump originally directed toward Obama. The target changed, but the underlying impulse remained the same.

What concerns me most, however, is not Trump’s opinion of his political opponents. Politicians criticizing one another is hardly new. What concerns me is the apparent belief that he is destined for some uniquely grand place in history.

When Americans think of great leaders, they often think of figures such as Franklin Roosevelt, who guided the nation through depression and world war; Abraham Lincoln, who preserved the Union; George Washington, who willingly surrendered power; John Kennedy, who challenged Americans to look outward and forward; or Winston Churchill, who rallied a nation against fascism.

Trump’s public fascination has often seemed directed elsewhere. He has frequently spoken admiringly of strongmen and authoritarian rulers. He appears drawn to displays of personal power, loyalty, and domination. The leaders he seems to find most interesting are often those who concentrated authority in themselves rather than those who strengthened democratic institutions.

The irony is that many of those historical strongmen saw themselves exactly the same way. Napoleon believed he was destined to reshape Europe. Stalin saw himself as the architect of history. Mao believed he was remaking civilization itself. Every authoritarian ruler convinces himself that he alone understands what must be done and that future generations will thank him for it.

History rarely agrees.

What these men often leave behind is not glory but wreckage: weakened institutions, damaged economies, divided societies, and generations forced to clean up the mess left by leaders who confused personal ambition with national destiny.

Perhaps that is why the mythology of the “great man” is so dangerous. It encourages leaders to see themselves as the story rather than as temporary stewards of something larger than themselves. Democracies work precisely because no individual is supposed to be indispensable. The nation survives because institutions matter more than personalities.

In my opinion, Trump’s greatest flaw is not his policies, his rhetoric, or even his ego. It is the apparent conviction that history revolves around him. He seems to view himself as a larger-than-life figure destined to save America and secure a place among history’s giants.

The tragedy is that the people he appears most fascinated by were not saviors of the world. They were cautionary tales. They are remembered not because they elevated humanity, but because humanity spent decades recovering from the consequences of their ambitions.

History’s greatest leaders are often remembered for what they built. The leaders who see themselves as destined to dominate history are more often remembered for what they broke.