I'D JUST HIT TOWN AND MY THROAT WAS DRY
Back in 1969, Richard Nixon’s Attorney General John Mitchell said “Watch what we do, not what we say.” His words took on an ironic connotation when he was convicted of perjury (as well as conspiracy and obstruction of justice) in the wake of the Watergate scandal.
It probably wasn’t the point John Mitchell was trying to make, but it’s smart to assume that all Republicans are liars. Except for Donald Trump. Trump is certainly a liar, but he’s also ignorant and cognitively impaired, so with him, it’s harder to pinpoint the exact reason he says things that are untrue.
If you haven’t read it, I urge you to take a look at Michael S. Schmidt’s interview with Donald Trump in the New York Times (first link below). Schmidt has taken some flak for not challenging Trump on the facts, and I can sympathize in theory. But Trump was in rare form, and interrupting him would have been like fact-checking Lewis Carroll because parts of Alice in Wonderland didn’t make sense.
This is such a revelatory interview. Trump is like a kid, obsessed with who likes him and who doesn’t. He repeats words and phrases over and over, circling back to the Russian collusion issue over a dozen times. He says things that are plain crazy – e.g. “Virtually every Democrat has said there is no collusion,” and “I know the details of taxes better than anybody. Better than the greatest C.P.A.”
The sheer volume of the crazy is surreal. Today’s insanity can overwhelm the memory of yesterday’s weirdness. But think back to early December, at the end of Trump’s announcement that he planned to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. He began to struggle with his words, seeming to lose the rhythm of his breath, and working his mouth oddly. At the very end, he was slurring his words. Check out the second link below if you haven’t seen it.
Initial speculation ranged from a minor stroke to a denture malfunction (though it’s not certain that Trump wears dentures). Other observers suggested that his symptoms are consistent with chronic stimulant abuse, noting Trump’s use of Tenuate Dospan in the 1980s.
The next day, the White House claimed that the problem was caused by a dry mouth. Trump had a similar moment on November 15 (third link below), so that explanation is at least plausible. But it seems odd that dry mouth syndrome suddenly keeps popping up. Trump may be a novice politician, but he’s a veteran public speaker. You’d think he’d have learned to recognize the early signs of dry mouth and take discreet sips of water during his speech before the problem got bad enough to make him garble his words.
Trump’s water breaks are anything but discreet (again, see the third link). He grabs his water bottle with both hands. It doesn’t look natural.
In the article at the fourth link below, a neurologist looks at the evidence and concludes that Trump is suffering from a progressive neurocognitive disease. He cites Trump’s speech patterns, which are “increasingly repetitive, fragmented, devoid of content, and restricted in vocabulary, [including] overuse of superlatives like tremendous, fantastic, and incredible [which] are filler words reflecting reduced verbal fluency.” He also notes a decline in Trump’s ability to interpret how others will respond to his words (e.g. using “Pocahontas” as an insult when honoring the Navajo Code Talkers). Add those symptoms to Trump’s lack of affect, his lack of inhibition, and his short attention span, and it’s hard to reach any conclusion other than cognitive decline.
The theory that Trump is suffering from mental deterioration isn’t new, of course, but it was helpful for me to see the symptoms outlined systematically by an expert, rather than as a collection of observations by a lay person like me. It’s also nice to see medical and psychology professionals speaking up when they recognize symptoms of a serious problem, rather than remaining silent in the face of evidence that everyone can plainly see.
So far, all our information about Trump’s health has come from his own camp. He’s scheduled to have his first official presidential physical exam on January 12, and it will be interesting to see what the Navy doctor at Walter Reed has to say. In fact, it will be interesting to see if Trump even goes through with the appointment.
Donald Trump’s mental deterioration will be the biggest wild card of 2018. Republican politicians can pretend not to notice, and MAGA fanatics may not know the difference, but it’s becoming increasingly obvious to everyone else. Trump is on a collision course with reality, and I’m betting on reality to win.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/28/us/politics/trump-interview-excerpts.html
http://www.cnn.com/2017/12/06/health/did-trump-slur-his-speech-bn/index.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=04XIy6Owk2M
https://www.statnews.com/2017/12/07/donald-trump-brain-specialist-disease/