If a person is unaware that there's such a thing as merit or content, to an argument, then, to that person, it's as if communication is by grunts, and those grunts can mean whatever he wants to interpret them as. I mention that in order to explain Don's ability to imagine victory by interpreting disagreement as a defensive sign that Don is right.Parenthetically, unawareness that there's such a thing as merit goes a long way toward explaining the merit of things that Don says, but that isn't what this P.S. is about. There's another consistent aspect to the victorious self-deception that I've talked about: Have you noticed, over the duration of this discussion, how often Don's victory fantasy is expressed in terms of metaphors of physical harm? For instance, in the most recent instance, it was that he'd stuck someone with an ice-pick. Well, this must enhance the imaginary feeling of victory where there is none. I'm not saying that Don always uses a violent metaphor. Sometimes it's just a chink in the armor, or something. But significantly often it's violent. Next installment will be mailed shortly. Mike --
