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WASHINGTON: In Greek mythology , Narcissus was a hunter known for his good looks, and so proud of it that when he was once drawn to his own reflection in a pool of water, he fell in love with it.

Socials scientists and shrinks are having to go all the way back to this ancient Greek tale to explain the ceaseless self-love and self-aggrandizement of the US’ 45th President. In meetings, speeches, and interviews, Donald Trump is now showing that the self-promotion and self-admiration during his campaign — one that led Newsweek to ask if he would be come America’s ‘Narcissist-in-Chief’ — was no flash in the pan. It’s a true reflection of his self.

In his first major interview after becoming President, Trump on Wednesday repeatedly bragged about the crowds at his inauguration, the great speeches he made, the standing ovations he got, while continuing to peddle fiction and falsehoods that the US media has finally got around to calling outright lies.

Describing the rambling, self-centered speech he made in front of the wall of heroes at the CIA headquarters last Saturday as a “home run”, Trump told a visibly gobsmacked interviewer on ABC News, “See what Fox (News) said. They said it was one of the great speeches. They showed the people applauding and screaming… I got a standing ovation. In fact, they said it was the biggest standing ovation since Peyton Manning had won the Super Bowl, and they said it was equal. I got a standing ovation. It lasted for a long period of time.”

“I know when I do good speeches. I know when I do bad speeches. That speech was a total home run. They loved it… People loved it. They loved it. They gave me a standing ovation for a long period of time. They never even sat down, most of them, during the speech. There was love in the room,” he added, accusing ABC and some other networks and cable channels of covering it “inaccurately”.

Trump also claimed to have attracted “the biggest crowd in the history of inaugural speeches” for his speech as he walked the interviewer past photographs showing a packed front end of the audience. That claim has been shown to be demonstrably false with evidence but Trump insisted on his version, using what one of his aides called “alternative facts”.

He also insisted that he would have won the popular vote in the presidential election (which he lost by three million votes to Hillary Clinton) if he had aimed for it. He didn’t, and besides, he has claimed in other statements that three to five million illegal immigrants voted against him, an allegation that he has never established, has been trashed by watchdogs, and one that undermines his own victory and that of the Republican Party.

