It is a given that all Presidential candidates are narcissistic; I don't think there is any choice about this quality of personality, other than a question of degree. What concerns me is other personality variables, which are probably as good an explanation as any we have for patterns of belief, world view and consequently, behavioral tendencies. I am particularly wary of the histrionic type as a Presidential candidate. I will admit that I like to blame Ronald Reagan for most of the country's current problems, probably unfairly. In my view Reagan, while undeniably "The Great Communicator" was also "The Great Deceiver", leading us over the cliff named "Morning in America" like a nation of lemmings.

The current crisis in this country is only Reagan's chickens coming home to roost, from my perspective. I know it was nurtured  by Clinton, and certainly by Bush et al. However, it was Reagan, who effectively brainwashed most Americans in to buying the idea that unfettered capitalism is the solution to our national needs, while government can only be "the problem", something to be gotten rid of. That the way to prosperity is to concentrate capital at the top, and gut any government regulations or agencies that might get in the way--even as you started seeing homeless people on a large scale for the first time.

What made Reagan so dangerous, so effective as to be able to create a nation of free market capitalists, even as many of the people are victimized by such policies? Was it his vision? Yes, because this vision was incorporated into a histrionic personality style, which had been refined into an communication art during his career in movies, then television. A frequent complaint about movies is that they have nothing to do with real life; that is because the essential ingredient, the real value is drama, so accuracy and veracity is often sacrified to this end.

Histrionic types are all about drama and romance, as a substitute for a more nuanced view of reality. The Marlboro Man is an example of a histrionic type. This would be a little closer to John McCain than Reagan, who was more genial, but of course did star in Westerns. The histrionic type is entrapped within his personal sense of drama or melodrama and can relate to the world only in such terms.
 
A personality disorder is characterized by a rigidity of viewpoint and beliefs, which affects cognition, behavior impulse control and interpersonal relations, is inflexible and pervasive across various situations and enduring. The histrionic type will tend to construe the world according to his own inner drama, usually with himself as the protagonist. So he is "saving us from them", riding into Washington "to clean up the mess", given to displays of macho temper outbursts, compulsively seductive and philandering, revels in the role of "outsider". Maybe that is the key thing, reveling in the role, in the drama, rather than just "being a good statesman" or leader, or being emotionally driven by a genuine altruism, rather than the drama of being "populist leader". It is truly scary to think of the power a histrionic POTUS has to externalize his inner dramatic needs on to the entire country.

A job like POTUS will naturally attract narcissistic and histrionic types, since the drama and high profile is so unique as to be ultimate. Good politicians all have a histrionic flair, or they don't connect with people sufficiently. What we don't need is someone with a histrionic personality disorder again!