Donald Trump has framed his theme for the midterm elections. It has come to him as naturally and inevitably as staring into the mirror, beyond any logic or argument, his definitive answer to no specific issue, providing no understanding of any particular problem, but transcending all of them. His political theme is more primal than programmatic, more instinctive than analytical, a heartfelt expression to protect his greatest romantic attachment, his obsessive fixation, his idealized object: himself.

Trump’s campaign theme is unrequited love. Unlike the pollsters, media consultants and pundits, he alone has grasped the magnitude and the source of the existential crisis threatening his politics. He has identified the problem for the Republicans as the faltering measure of complete devotion to him. His demand has nothing to do with mutual affection. It is a ploy to reassert his slipping control, a manipulative test to prove loyalty to him, or else. There can be no absolute rule without an absolute ruler; no absolute ruler without absolute submission; no absolute submission without the expression of absolute love. His sadness at its fading gives way to anger, paranoia and greater acts of retribution. He equates the fear he instills as a form of love. Trump accepts subservience, from whatever motive, as affection or its closest equivalent. He cares nothing about sincerity, so it’s all in the show. The less love displayed, the more fear required. Yet there is no rebound, but only deeper rejection.

Trump is heading toward the floor for presidential unpopularity – Nixon during Watergate on the eve of his resignation, Truman late in his second term at the depth of the Korean war, and George W Bush at the 2008 financial crash. But Trump’s breakdown differs uniquely from theirs. His decline has come earlier in his term, been more sustained, and his disintegration has not stabilized but is accelerating. He is being crushed by the accumulation of catastrophic events of his own making to which his impulsive response is to double down in each and every area. Stalemated in his reckless Iran war, he has now launched a heedless trade war against Canada that will devastate Republican candidates in the northern tier of states. His latest vanity project is gestural retribution to rename Lake Ontario as “Lake America”, a watery ballroom. Admission of error for Trump would be the denial of self-love.

Trump began his campaign on his unrequited love theme on 16 August during a Fox News interview in which he discussed his press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, leaving her job after just having a baby. He had held her up as meeting his highest criterion in remarks........

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