More than "intellectualism" or "scholarship," wisdom is required of our political leaders, if the nation is to thrive. The first words that come to mind when thinking of Washington, Hamilton, Lincoln, or the Roosevelts are probably not "intellectual" or "scholar," though all were highly intelligent and capable of synthesizing wise actions from a vast array of information.
28
The VP and cabinet members also swore an oath to support and defend the Constitution. They could use Section 4 of the 25th Amendment. Let's never forget the choice they're making: party over country, tax cuts over national security, personal gain over a duty to protect and defend the Constitution, the country, the world.
52
"As democracy is perfected, the office(of the President) represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. We move toward a lofty ideal. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron."
H.L. Menken
50
You is smart, you is kind, you is important. Except you 45!
18
The enablers and users of Trump are much worse than Trump himself.
They are evil.
They made their deal with the Devil.
I mean you, Ryan, and you, McConnell.
If Trump were not president, he would just be a little, nasty man.
The harm he could do would be much less.
47
Yeah and let's see that transcript too right after the tax returns.
25
I didn't think there was anyone as objectionable as the Current Oval Office Occupant ...
But if he is "like really smart" maybe we can have Really Smart examined for fitness
17
Every morning, I feel despair over the pathetic little hot air balloon this earth has become - there are always terribly serious fights and threatened conflict all over the globe, and sane, responsible governments doing as much as they can to tamp down the madness. But this country, as a result of this classless bunch of rich Republican sycophants, has changed so much, it is no longer one of those sane, responsible world citizens. The only thing we seem to do more of is build a military that's already too big. My sadness, dread and, yes, hatred, is so hard to bear, and so horrible to wake up to.
44
I really don't think we need another book on Trump's derangement and dysfunction as our POTUS or even a medical diagnosis that Trump has one or more certifiable mental disorders from the DSM.
He is a terrible executive and president who behaves in destructive and damaging ways on a daily/hourly basis. No major corporation would put up with such dreadful and harmful behavior in its top CEO. Why should our government?
Of course Mr. Blow is correct that the Republican leadership, in the employ of the worst of the 1%ers, is not going to do anything to remove Mr. Trump from office--as long as they can put bills in front of Trump to sign that cut taxes for the rich, rig the system, and further redistribute the nation's wealth upward.
In the public opinion sphere, nearly twice as many Americans disapprove of the job Trump is doing as president (58-60%) as those who approve of Trump's performance (32-35%).
Late night comedians are making careers out of describing and excoriating Trump as President. But where are the Democrats? This should be a cakewalk to make a case for dismissing Trump and voting Democrat to save the country from Trump and the GOP.
The DNC should be putting forth numerous smart and talented Democrats every day in the media to give the public reasons to vote Democratic. Where are they? Trump is not the only one coming off as lazy and clueless.
Time is long past due for the Democrats to get, "like really smart."
50
Trumps own issues are bad enough yet his hard core supporters, about 30% of our population, see absolutely nothing wrong with his behaviour and are insulted that anyone say such things. Lindsey Grahm has even jumped on the Trump bandwagon.
It seems like the GOP has decided to support Trump as they appear to not see any other way to move forward. Unless Mueller finds something on Trump and fast our country and maybe our world is heading off of a cliff.
22
Watching Trump's antics during his NY days certainly left me skeptical of his interest in and ability to serve anyone other than dear old Donald. He hasn't improved with age and is in the twilight of life in so many ways. As a fellow New Yorker, I can say that he wasn't very impressive in his heyday. Not very bright, a prevaricator, etc. A small man with enormous intellectual, social, and temperamental limitations and so glaringly uncomfortable in his own skin. These deficiencies are writ large now that he is out of his comfort zone and under a lot of stress, having discovered that he wasn't elected Emperor. It makes it all the more unfortunate for us.
As far as the GOP goes, I try to imagine what will happen when he completely decompensates, given that he seems headed in that direction. I just pray that when he does go completely over the edge, he does something relatively harmless like run nude across the south lawn versus starting a war. I keep envisioning Paul Ryan trying to explain it away by reminding us all that Donald is new to Washington.
It's going to take a change in the House and Senate before this gets meaningfully addressed. Go vote and until then, keep your fingers crossed.
44
Is there no Republican in Congress willing to repeat one of the most consequential questions in American history? Or should we be repeating it to them?
"At long last, have you left no sense of decency?"
30
It may seem obvious, but intelligent, articulate people don't say they're "like, smart" and don't have to proclaim they're a "stable genius. Remember--"Methinks thou doth protest too much!"
18
Personality disorder does not automatically equal DSM categorical mental illness in most analyses. It can, though.
Any labels can be devastating to the individual and those with whom he/she connects.
By electing Trump, realty is that voters expressed their own collective neuropsychological issues, desperation, and vulnerabilities, just as much as they accepted or overlooked the obvious, known, serious flaws of the person who received their votes.
14
Remember how Democrats had to take a zero-tolerance stance on sexual harassment and kick out Franken to keep the moral high ground in relation to Trump/Republicans? Just because Oprah's a good celebrity doesn't make unqualified presidents OK.
6
Perhaps I would take Mr. Blow's article more seriously if I didn't have to sit though years of Republican Presidents and candidates having their mental health challenged: Goldwater, Nixon, Reagan, GW Bush, Romney, McCain, etc. All have had their mental fitness questioned. You've cried wolf too often.
2
On those grounds, I won't listen to the weather forecast when they tell me a storm is coming because they've been wrong so often.
17
True, Dubya was just spectacularly naive, to the misfortune of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis who died as a result.
15
Hmm. Who challenged Romney so?
Who questioned McCain's mental health, apart from the Bush campaign in 2000?
14
Conditions inside the White House remind me of the Twilight Zone episode, "It's a Good Life." It's about a nine-year old who has absolute power over everyone and everything on earth. Bad things happen when he's crossed.
So now we're in a real-life Twilight episode...and you're in it too, Trump voters.
27
A conference of highly recognized psychiatric experts who came together at Yale University to warn the American people and the world about Trump's dangerous mental illness?
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/donald-trump-dangerous-...
Trump is always the winner. The best of everything is owed to him because he is so great. Any errors are always the fault of others and when criticized he strikes back with a vengeance. He doesn't need knowledge or experience because he has such a big brain. Trump cannot separate his presidential role from his personal business life. He has even brought his family on board for comfort. Trump is mentally disturbed without a doubt. But what excuse does the Republican leadership have for ignoring principles that are carved into the Constitution? We have a Tweeter as a pseudo-leader in the White House and a bunch of cowards running Congress. It is a world without rules only predictable, greedy and self-entitled behavior. It is world where Social Security and Medicare can be destroyed, people left to die without health care while Trump stands before a mirror asking who is the greatest leader of them all.
22
Dr John Gartner, a practicing psychotherapist who advised psychiatric residents at Johns Hopkins University Medical School until 2015, said: “We have an ethical responsibility to warn the public about Donald Trump's dangerous mental illness.”
14
"The question we have to put to the elected officials protecting this president, and indeed to all those being paid a taxpayer-funded salary and then concealing, distorting or denying the truth to make this man look competent, is: Don’t you have an obligation, either moral, ethical, patriotic or otherwise, to level with America that you, too, are concerned by Trump’s erratic behavior?"
Everybody, every-body! in America has this obligation.
There's a craving in politicians, and even in journalists, often being in close proximity to the top guy or his Administration: it's this intense, and sometimes unconscious compulsion to root senselessly for the leader, not to rock the boat, pretend to themselves that, by not mentioning in public their probably good-enough assessment of DJT's derangement, they are duly law-abiding and patriotic.
Naturally the GOP want to use DJT - what else is he good for, but to appease the oligarchs? - but it's also a genuine instinct to unconditionally surrender your will to a forceful alpha. And though DJT is actually a weak, fragile man, (so was Hitler) he does have that outward bullying style that fascistic-leaning people are attracted to.
Only the People will be able to turn this around; the GOP is so corrupt, so often racist and authoritarian-loving, they are content to let this country down to the point of treason.
Only the voters who won't allow a centuries old democracy to be destroyed can help now.
13
OK - but I rather liked Eugene Robinson's "Very Stable Genius" opinion piece in the Washington Post! Mr. Blow's reserve has it's funny side as well. For example, "some of the behaviors...line up with symptoms of personality disorders" Well! Like 9 out of 9 criteria for Narcissistic Personality Disorder, and like more than the minimum for diagnosis of Antisocial Personality Disorder from DSM-5. Those 2 together were proposed as "Malignant Personality Disorder" which never became an official diagnosis. Miller the spinner tried to point out that Donnie is brilliant enough to recite one paragraph coherently - but he was just reported telling farmers about his $5.5 Trillion tax cut. We must of course understand that this is true in the Alternative Reality of (surely not psychopathic) Stable Genius Land...I must confess that - wearing new glasses - I initially misread news that seemed to come from "The Daily Fury" - a fully credible title for a reality TV show. For that matter, a sane Trump would surely get out of DC ASAP, now that he has snagged a huge tax cut for himself. Who needs the hassle of dealing daily with OCD journalists who insist on bringing up things like history, statistics, and what the same (not the sane?) Trump said yesterday?
5
The key to the Wolff book and its never-denied Bannon quotes are in the reference to self-indulgence. Donald has no Delayed Gratification. Period. Gimme another burger. Similarly, no concentration or patience or ability to read. This is why he and the regime are walking menaces to the entire planet. I hope Newt the Enabler -- who invented the regime! -- gets his name erased from history books for this.
9
That Republicans now support him is beyond normal cognition. What a bunch of toadies. This makes them fully erratic and undemocratic. This man is bordering on fascistic. Please prove me wrong. Bueller??
4
Discussions of his mental stability are counterproductive. It's easy enough to tell if someone is crazy. Trump isn't crazy in any overt way that justifies that being a basis for his impeachment, or rebuke by Congress, etc. He's a terrible person, with a bunch of traits that make him an even worse leader of this country, and that would certainly warrant mention by the half of Congress that isn't already doing so. But that's different than being crazy, and we need to be less hyperbolic and more careful here, because every time we question his mental stability simply because we can't see a defensible reason for his positions or behavior, we are straining yet another important political norm. And, once that norm is removed, the same people whose flexible morals allow them to bend over backwards to cover for Trump are then going to use the "mental stability" attack on the next Democratic president.
Remember -- the problem with wrestling with a pig, is that the pig likes the mud.
7
"They have learned to praise him in order to steady him. His weakness is an unending need for affirmation. Anyone who provides it, he abides."
And anyone who provides it, he loathes. At the same time! He wants it, and then when he gets it, he hates those who gave it to him. Why? Because he knows they are sycophants and he hates that trait. He told us so himself when he described Hillary attending his wedding. He wanted her there because she was a "somebody". And he hated her for coming because he hated her.
4
the Man is claiming to be crazy, crazy smart. When a man has to say he is really smart, he perhaps does'nt believe it himself. Stable genius! What an oxymoron. If we believe this President, we are all nuts. Remember the date - Nov. 2018, people.
1
what we have now is an emperor with no clothes situation. his enablers, sycophants and supporters oooh and awww at his fine cloths and worse yet try to convince the rest of us of the same. but his opponents and more importantly the crowd at large can see he is buck naked. there is only one reality and it is to believe or own eyes and ears and like the little kid in the story never stop shouting The emperor has no clothes!!!
2
I'm not psychiatrist, not even a doctor or dentist, but please, it does not take an expert to see that this guy is nuts. Anyone who thinks differently is either kidding themselves, or nuts themselves. Let's just be honest here.
15
This president is so obtuse and arrogant that he actually believed that giving the author Wolff access to his early days in the White House would solidify what a brilliant man and great president he is. Instead, we are questioning his motives, intelligence and mental capacity.
9
That day has already come...
Look on the bright side. Trump has opened the door to a FORREST GUMP II.
What will it take? Democrats start impeachment proceedings! Republicans use the 25th amendment. Mueller, get to the Trump family indictments! Who cares if he's not clinically diagnosed as a raging lunatic, he's playing one on TV.
2
Mr. Ed, the talking horse of of 60's sitcom was a "Stable Genius".
DJT is neither stable, nor genius, and not nearly as endearing as Mr. Ed.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_PZPpWTRTU
6
Trump clings to the to the "Disruptor in Chief " behavior because, like a sociopath, he get's his kicks out of seeing the reaction it gets from it'ss victim's (us). This leads to more and more outlandish behavior..and that's part of his mental illness....He is on a roll and not likely to change any time soon. So, it's up to the rest of us to contain him until he goes away, dies , is impeached or dies.
3
The Emperor is wearing...a diaper.
The adults in the room who enable this to continue unchecked are CULPABLE.
I'm talking to you, GIP senators.
6
"And in so doing, they are moving dangerously close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican could be seen as being an unpatriotic American." - That day has long since passed. Stand against the Constitution and you are a traitor, plain, simple fact! Enable someone subjugating the Constitution and you are a traitor. Take advantage of the situation for your own personal gain at the expense of your constituents and you are a traitor. Mike Pence, Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell - you will pay for your sins against America.
4
We're doomed.
2
Trump is not normal. He is extraordinary. He became a billionaire, a tv star and the POTUS. The Soviet Union used to attack political opponents through psychiatric abuse. The mainstream media has their own take on this as evidenced by nonsense articles like this.......He's not a reader??? I guess Charlie know Donnie personally.
2
He himself has told people for 20 years he is not a reader. Why would he be now?
As for becoming a billionaire, he inherited millions, and turned them into less money than if he had done nothing.
The (reality l) TV star I grant you.
7
Lyin Ted.
Little Marco.
Low Energy Jeb.
Crooked Hillary.
Sloppy Steve.
Crazy Donald.
7
Trump seems to be heading the country in the right direction. Shouldn't we evaluate him on that? Also, isn't it time for those that were disappointed by the election loss to step up for the country?
2
The right direction: the endorsement of Nazis, tax reductions for the very rich and virtually nothing for anybody else, taking health insurance away from 9 million children, announcing that Medicare and Social Security are on the chopping block, attacking courts and judges as if they were meant to be play things of the president, attacking the press as unpatriotic, telling your supporters to attack protesters at your public events and running from responsibility, fostering hatred toward black people and Muslims and gay people, threatening and indeed instigating nuclear war, on and on and on.
It is time to tell the truth. Citizens who believe that is the right direction no longer want to be citizens of a democratic republic. They want to be the imprisoned people of a dictator. They should be celebrating. Republicans in Congress, traitorously and unblinkingly, are doing everything possible to grant that wish.
14
Does anyone remember Rod Serling's Twilight Zone episode "It's a Good Life"?
2
"From everything I have ever read about the man, he is not particularly smart. This is sometimes hard for people to understand. They equate financial gain with intellectual gifts, but the two are hardly synonymous."
Not to mention, he inherited a thriving NYC real estate business from his daddy. Trump is the classic example of someone born on third and thinking he hit a triple.
31
And he is now your president.
2
Yes he is. But he is not my dictator, as much as he wishes it to be so. We can criticize him as much as you support him. That’s America.
11
Very stable genius. Bigger button.
How old is he? 7, perhaps 8 years old? Seen from Europe, we know Trump is a sign USA is rotten. This is just a sign among so many.
29
too bad no one has asked him if he tells lies. Anytime someone begins their opinion with "believe me", I say to myself that I don't
14
Although President Trump has given more extreme examples of his personality than other Presidents, largely because he appears wedded to daily communications on social media, Mr. Blow's concerns could be repeated about every chief executive. To be sure, President Trump is often not as eloquent as we would like and shows little restraint in stating his unvarnished off the cuff views, which incidentally may be why many people voted for him . You could state that every President has an element of narcissism, and is oblivious at times to reason. In recent times, the Bay of Pigs, Vietnam Conflict, and Iran Contra Affair provide ample examples of Presidential hubris. The bottom line is the peccadilloes of Mr. Trump's personality, including his decision making skills and adversity to written briefings, were fully vetted by the electorate, which elected this man. Even the recent publication Fire and Fury largely is a compendium of stories with which most readers are already familiar. The unstated coda to Mr. Blow's piece is that the president is so unstable that he needs to be removed from office. In stating that premise, we walk a dangerous line towards rejecting our political traditions and evolving into a Banana republic where election results can be freely nullified if a persistent minority wishes to remove a leader.
1
So instead they must accept the misrule of a disturbed incompetent due to a persistent minority's wishes?
7
The problem occurred because "Have Brain, Will Travel" people were voting in primaries while a cartoon had their attention.
They used their brain to hear what they liked, and the Acme Corp Salesman made sure that their inner coyote was perpetually mad at the here-to-unstoppable roadrunner. He said "Believe me" and they forget about gravity.
Republican tax cuts will always benefit their big donors. Gravity. 'Wonderful' health care requires a greater share of the pie. Gravity. Many coyotes calculated wrong for themselves and didn't consider the security of portable, comprehensive insurance for their new economy children.
So much energy pent-up, to stop this roadrunner mythologized as a pest. Enough steam was created to escape "the establishment", to join a Tea Party, and to go "All In" with Freedom Caucus. But, that entire Acme Corporation is working together and they work with gravity.
The people travelled to the cartoon salesman and he delivered the Acme Safe .. on the edge of a cliff. Time for one last silent "uh oh" to our inner coyote before the whistling sound from above.
1
To anyone unversed in psychology, they would remark "The man is Crazy". How many times have you heard someone say that even though they are untrained? Sometimes it is just so obvious. With that said, my concern is not with his mental state. There are enough layers of government and military that would prevent him from committing acts of insanity and endangering the nation. I Hope!
I don't think that Trump's intellectual abilities are as much a concern as the fact that the many millions of our countrymen that voted for him. It shows a really scary lack of education and intelligence on their part and I blame Television for the greatest dumbing-down of a civilization to have ever occurred in history.
18
Yes, the voters are the scariest part of this mess.
No matter when or how we are finally rid of the current Occupant of the Oval Office, his supporters will still be with us...or against us, as the case may be...
8
You are unfortunately asking congressmen and congresswomen to go against the wishes of their constituents. As long as those Americans want Trump (and they apparently still do), he will remain untouchable. These Americans have to be convinced that they have done and are continuing to do something awful to our country. Trying to tell them that labels one a “snowflake,” so we’re going to have to watch this train wreck continue for some time.
3
Smart or not is hard to determine for another person. Why does everyone think that they can?
That is dumb.
Maybe you think The Donald does not say smart things.
That is a world of difference.
Somehow I doubt the phrase "Smart Like Trump" will ever become part of our modern day vernacular.
8
A "stable genius?" Well, clearly he is not an intellectual genius, given the level of ignorance and choppiness of thought. Emotional stability? Duh...
So he must mean he knows his way around horses.
11
You know that well read people like us would never be so anxious to read a book of this nature, unless we shared the intense dislike of its main character!
2
I'd like to see what Fox would say about him if he wasn't giving them a reach around.
3
He is an obvious danger to us all, we need another Obama, someone intelligent, eloquent, calm, thoughtful and who has political savvy. Lets face it there may be a swamp but if you're going to navigate through the crocodiles, you need someone who knows the waters. (And that is most definitely NOT Oprah).
6
I wonder if the House and Senate have considered impeachment of President Trump if for no other reason than holding the majority(ies) after 2018 midterms this November? Midterms will be very interesting not to mention political survival.
1
""and a very stable genius at that!”"
during the campaign he kept selling himself as very smart, went to elite schools, etc. etc.....and he's still doing this. many of those around him now didn't really know him that well and are struck by his incuriosity and other traits they consider make him "idiotic", "moronic", "stupid", etc.
his intelligence is "street smarts" and marketing ability not iq; he's clearly not stupid and not close to being a genius unless that means he has extraordinary political charisma and tv presence.
the staff who are disappointed in him were sold on his "very smart" pitch only to find out his ability is fairly narrow and focused.
Ok, let him prove it. Include a college transcript and blood test along with the release of his tax returns.
3
And then there's just the plain embarrassment for the people who voted for him and just cant admit they got what they wanted.
10
"And if I claim to be a wise man, it surely means that I don't know." Kansas, Carry on, wayward son.
3
Charles Lindbergh was the first world superstar. Now he is widely (and rightly) vilified. Breathless press coverage dies not equal moral fitness.
By their silence (or vocal support) of this incompetent administration, members of Congress and White House staff are abdicating responsibility and permanently trading their reputations in order to gain a little temporary power/money/fame.
Their names will live forever in the hall of shame.
6
For the Pubs in Congress Trump fulfills a number of things.
He can hold a pen
He brings the racists in
He acts as a distraction
He makes everyone around him look smart
They need him to maintain the status quo and take the blame when the time comes. It is a shame that we will never be able to hold the pubs feet to the fire for their complicity in the treasonous handling of our country. We can send them home but we probably never be able to punish them like they have punished the people.
5
Oh. please. Enough is enough. Trump is so erratic acting that he brings all this on himself. His ignorance is profound and his polices by tweet prove that. Trump is all about him, him, him. He gives lip service to opioid addiction and then works to take away the very health care that could help save these people including devastating cut backs in Medicaid? He's doing his best to wreck any environmental progress. He's against the public school's. He and his minions are taking Obama era rules that were put into place to help people. His irrational stances against anything Obama speaks to real mental illness.
The day has already arrived when I believe Trump and his sycophants are unpatriotic. Trump, Ryan, McConnell and all his cabinet members are not defending America from harm. They have theirs and the rest of us can scramble.
Trump hasn't any intellectual capacity.
14
That is very convincing.
How about a weekly satirical sitcom? NBC, ABC, FOX, COMEDY CENTRAL, anyone?
Twitter, twitter, Genghis Kahn,
Now’s the time to do harm…
You bet that some local politicians would depict Jesus as an illegal immigrant in Jerusalem, very soft on the Roman occupation and their terrorist acts, complete failure as a businessman, very poor, not paying enough taxes, not having the steady job, and not contributing plenty to the military budget…
Thus they fight very hard for our right to say “Marry Christmas”…
We were told - no, LECTURED repeatedly - that pretty, silver-tongued liar was the answer for the country. After a year, Donald Trump - basically DARED to run for the Presidency by Mr. Obama - has already had two quarters of stronger economic growth than Obama EVER achieved. EVER.
We were told that Obama would make the world love us. No, the world's tyrants loved to PLAY Obama and make a complete fool of him. Mr. Trump brings with him the return of adults to the White House.
Mr. Obama called for everyone who was angry with the U.S. to hop on his bandwagon, leaving everyone ELSE for Mr. Trump. You already know how that worked out.
4
The gop does nothing because they're using him to pass their suspect legislation. And The Stable Genius is too needy and dimwitted to see it. So much for putting the country first!
2
At a minimum- Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD)- and at a minimum that is terrifying and disqualifying. I am flabbergasted at the media's pussyfooting around, afraid to call a spade a spade. The most powerful person on earth threatens a nuclear state and calls himself a genius. This is not akin to diagnosing celiac disease! Ya think?
Trivia Challenge: Whose behavior most fits this description of NPD (from Psychology Today)?
"Hallmarks of NPD are grandiosity, a lack of empathy for other people, and a need for admiration. Arrogant, self-centered, manipulative, and demanding. They may also concentrate on grandiose fantasies (e.g. their own success, beauty, brilliance) and may be convinced that they deserve special treatment. These characteristics typically begin in early adulthood and must be consistently evident in multiple contexts, such as at work and in relationships.
People with NPD believe they are superior or special, and often try to associate with other people they believe are unique or gifted in some way. This association enhances their self-esteem, which is typically quite fragile underneath the surface. Individuals with NPD seek excessive admiration and attention in order to know that others think highly of them. Individuals with narcissistic personality disorder have difficulty tolerating criticism or defeat, and may be left feeling humiliated or empty when they experience an "injury" in the form of criticism or rejection.
4
“You can’t say that you love America and not take a stand to defend it from harm.”
The GOP in Congress can never call themselves patriots. They lovs money and power.
5
would someone buy him a cap that says "like...really smart"?
7
So what else is new? We already know all this. But Mike Pence is real scary too.
5
Right on Charles. Your article is right to the point and is well made. I believe we are well past the day when supporting trump is unpatriotic. Its most definitely a foolish endeavor at this point. As well, I believe McConnell has proven to be treasonous is his success to block Obama's SC nominee. It was most certainly unconstitutional by ignoring the constitutional responsibility to participate in the process. But, I have little faith that the citizenry of this country will bother themselves with expecting and enacting justice and oversight. For the past eight years and with every passing election cycle, the citizens of this country have habitually rewarded the Republicans with an ever larger majority in spite of their obvious obstruction and unpatriotic behavior. Trump with obvious signs of idiocy and stupidity still has support of an unpatriotic 30 percent! SAD
3
If one is really, really smart.....in fact a genius.....and one publicizes this over and over, that is an insecure person looking for adulation.
1
There is a current saying in law enforcement: See something, say something. This applies to run of the mill crime as well as to potential terrorism. Unfortunately, the Republicans in Congress refuse to take this simple advice to heart when discussing Trump. Instead, they subscribe to the more politically safe but completely cowardly phrase uttered by Sgt. Schultz of "Hogan's Heroes": I see nothing, I hear nothing! That is, until they have gotten everything they want from him: tax cuts to rich donors, deregulation of corporations at the expense of the health of American citizens, and cuts to every social program under the sun, including social security. Until they and Trump's hard-core supporters wake up from their self-deluded torpor, we are doomed to suffer a government run by an idiot.
2
And yet, when he endorsed an accused pedophile and called on the Republican National Committee to fund his campaign, they all simply fell in line. For all their sound and fury, Jeff Flake and Bob Corker rolled over on the worst tax scam in American history. He is a petty, narcissistic fool and they have simply no shame. Party above country, politics above policy. History will not absolve them.
7
Mr. Blow is correct of course: support for Trump is moving us "dangerously close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican could be seen as being an unpatriotic American." I would add, however, that being a Trump loyalist at this immediate point in time labels one as an unpatriotic American. The future is now.
6
Gee, whiz. one would have thought that verbally assaulting the President of the United States would cause one to be labeled as an unpatriotic American.
Charles Blow, this includes you at every turn.
Oh Dear... I'm recall someone teaching me (perhaps in 4th grade?) that you should never have to state or defend that you are intelligent/smart. If you are truly intelligent or smart (the 2 aren't necessarily the same), others will know and respect that. The smartest person in the room never needs to be reminded of such.
I am also certain that I learned (although later in life than 4th grade) that if you are tweeting that I am "like, really smart" and "a stable genius", that you have simply "lost the news cycle".
Whether Pres. Trump likes it or not, long after most of us are gone, historians will judge his legacy by his words. Needless to say, this is NOT a good look.
8
Did you not learn in 4th grade that you might need to respond to attacks, verbal or physical? That is all Trump is doing, in the face of almost overwhelming assaults by Democrats.
As usual, gemli, an excellent and spot-on comment. Except, I think, for one thing. His supporters and base do not fail to discern his despicable quality and character. No, they revel in it, like those revelers of two days ago. He gives voice to what they want to say, but that society generally has prevented them from doing so. He says it for them, and generally with impunity, at least to this point. He is a deplorable and speaks for the 25-30% of our populace that are are among that number. I'll light a candle for them at St. Odo of Cluny.
3
My favourite part!
'He is also not a reader. That is not to say that he can’t read, but rather that, given his druthers, he won’t.'
Very funny
4
perhaps Trump reads books with pictures in them
1
What I dont understand, is how solid Trump's supporters are behind him- no matter what. The virulence of defense and seemingly complete lack of discernment by them must be based on an emotional frame of mind. I compare it to the mind set of white "separate but equal" southerners in the 50's. Very angry at the government for intervening at the state level, rabidly opposed to integration and completely refusing to budge an inch. No amount of logic, rational discussion, political analysis or discourse could sway them- becuase of the emotional basis of their racism. I see this mindset in trump supporters
7
I'm beginning to think more and more, especially with the recent attempts to undermine the investigation, that the Republicans aren't just protecting Trump for his pen signing abilities. I wouldn't be surprised if Mueller has evidence that Priebus, Ryan and McConnell and the whole sorry lot of them knew of Trump's collusion with the Russians and Russia's interference during the election- yet said nothing to the FBI or CIA. The net is widening and more than a few Republicans will get caught up in it. They're not being unpatriotic, they are traitors that sold us out for selfish gains.
8
In a "NUT" shell:
There were many facts, figures, and stories that were uncovered by the folks that Trump flimflammed and swindled during (and long after) he was building his wealth as a "successful" President/businessman. And, yet I believe he was rarely called to make amends for his behavior.
So why should we have faith now? His unfit behaviors worked for him in the past, and he continues to believe that he will successfully run this country as he did the businesses?
Hope is not usually a strategy; ergo, lets band together and figure something concrete out.
19
.... And in so doing, they are moving dangerously close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican could be seen as being an unpatriotic American.
They are not moving dangerously close to being an unpatriotic American, they already are. They enable a monster who would do away with all poor people if he could, if only through not-so-benign neglect. They take active part in the war against the poor, and they are guilty of homicide when a person dies because of inadequate health care. The Republicans are the new Nazis.
8
".... And in so doing, they are moving dangerously close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican could be seen as being an unpatriotic American."
And that THE WHOLE POINT of the Democrat's and the NYTimes's propaganda. It is their sickening attempt, using the old USSR playbook,
to get rid of their enemy by claiming he is mad.
It make you, Mr. Blow and you, the NYTimes editorial board, look really bad.
Get over it. He won the election and is doing exactly what he promised,
which is MAGA.
Who types "like really zmart?"
2
The Conservatives are the new Vichy Americans
6
Let's be real honest here - at this point, we could all say the man is just plain crackers.
10
I think Blow is obsessed with Trump. Trump is living rent free in Blow's head. Talk about mental disorders...
4
Okay
Or a person who cares about our citizens and is not constrained to complain to his people, not to mention a lot of lies.
The book may show "some kind of mental instability." The reality is, whether you agree with them or not, he is putting his policies into place. He is creating a regulatory environment like that which existed before Teddy Roosevelt. He has passed a tax bill which reward plutocrats, including himself, while saddling us with more debt that will sink our society in the long run. He has appointed the kind of right-wing judges that Republicans love. And he is moving in lockstep with the Republican leadership across this country to return us the glory days of the 19th century.
7
Letting people keep more of their earned money is not putting us into debt. Congress regulates the spending. Trump has just saved American workers/taxpayers $1 trillion over 10 years.
McConnell and Ryan and their minions are playing the long game with Trump as the perfect distraction as they dismantle democracy and functional governance.
"impetuous, fragile, hostile, irrational, intentionally uninformed, information-averse and semiliterate." This description applies to so many who are in positions of power under the influence of corporate cash and who are awaiting to cash out into lucrative futures. None of this is a mystery.
3
Respect and humility are the 2 character traits I look for in others: he demonstrates neither.
10
Well if he is such a self-admitted "genius", why doesn't he offer some hard prove of it by asking the University of Pennsylvania to release to the public domain his transcripts for the years of his attendance there. Or will it be the same answer as his refusal to release his tax returns? ?
10
Our former president refused to release any college transcripts and thereby set a precedent.
1
So why did Obama block release of all of his transcripts? BTW, Ivy league students are usually in the top 5% of the country's college students. So a "C," by that reasoning, means you are only in the 97th percentile, if the old curve distribution grading were applied.
I see. Trump has complete disdain for any precedent (see: Not releasing taxes, hiring family members, etc). Why should he choose that single one to follow?
This piece is consistent with the work of Bandy Lee, MD, "The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump." She is Assistant Clinical Professor in Law and Psychiatry at Yale School of Medicine. She lays out the important and clear distinction between assessing dangerousness and the Goldwater Rule. Many in her field are sounding the alarm regarding the dangerous behavior and what it can portend for the country.
Link below is to her recent article in another important news source, The Guardian.
https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/ja...
5
I am a bit weary of the shirking away of a diagnosis for this man for wont of couch time in an office. Most psychiatrists get their man on the couch for 45 minutes per week and listen to fabrications with no way to proof-test them. With Trump, we get a tsunami of information on videotape and in the press, where every issue is examined from a dozen different angles. We have never known more about any individual on the face of the earth than we do with Trump. Teams of psychiatrists have looked at him, vetting each other and honing their opinions. And the outcome is that he is that he is a danger to the nation. But the show goes on, and we watch the Stockholm Syndrome in action, a Republican Party sympathizing with its abductor and opposing potential rescuers. Perhaps that entire Party needs a shrink.
7
Mr. Blow:
This is a comprehensive diagnosis, but does not suggest corrective measures (" therapy"). You are right to exclude impeachment as a solution. Maybe apply the 25th Amendment? Could your next column be about why the 25th Amendment can't be followed?? "Inability or unwillingness to perform the duties of the offfice" shouldn't be difficult to establish. But, given the pusillanimity of those "officials" who would have to be the ones to make the case, this is also an unlikely option. .
3
If Trump is so bright, shouldn't he have Tweeted about the books he's reading, the speeches he's written, the articles he's published, or even the grades he got at Wharton?
Where are the professors who could tell us what a great intellect he exhibited in their classrooms? Where are the publishers who could tell us his drafts arrived ready to publish?
Trump offered none of those things to counter his critics in Fire and Fury. He seems to be truly a television president, in that TV is his major -- perhaps only -- source of information.
Maybe Trump and his secretary of state should skip the IQ test and compete to see who's a better reader . . .
3
Millions of people are certainly out to get Trump (and for good reason - before he gets them). Many are also after him for unjust reasons - i.e. political reasons, as Obama experienced.
But Trump cannot separate the two and neither can his Trumpsters. Pathological rationalization consistently replaces high probability hard facts with low probability semi-facts. This is an internalization of that well documented Republican dysfunction; false equivalence.
As an example, Republicans elevate the 3% of scientists that doubt global warming and downgrade the other 97%. This denies our best model of reality, science, and qualifies as crazy.
Trump and his Trumpsters then point to each other as third-party validation to further rationalize their Tulip mania. That their delusion is a minority viewpoint makes them feel especially smart and perceptive.
The Republicans are addicted to dangerous drug, an ideology, that lights up their pleasure centers and has pushed aside judgment and reality. They're feeling second born and are awaiting either the Rapture or the Apocalypse, whichever comes first.
The problem is that their delusion may become real and take us with them.
4
Thank you, Charles Blow. Well said, especially this:
"The question we have to put to the elected officials protecting this president, and indeed to all those being paid a taxpayer-funded salary and then concealing, distorting or denying the truth to make this man look competent, is: Don’t you have an obligation, either moral, ethical, patriotic or otherwise, to level with America that you, too, are concerned by Trump’s erratic behavior?
At the very least, don’t the members of the House and Senate, who swore an oath to support and defend the Constitution, have an obligation to rebuke this president for his attacks on the press and free speech, both protected by the First Amendment of the Constitution?
These elected officials in particular are not only obsequiously placating a man nursing a god complex, they are displaying a staggering lack of national fealty.
You can’t say that you love America and not take a stand to defend it from harm."
3
It is stunning that we are far more prone to implementing the technical innovations that our brains or human nature are not yet fully accustomed to but are reluctant to embrace the social steps that would finally eradicate the chronic wars and bloodsheds.
I truly believed that the multi-decade-long conflicts from the medieval European past would never be repeated, only to be stunned by the 75-year long conflict in “the Holy Land” or the 14-century-long atrocities between the Sunnis and the Shiites that I wasn’t aware of at all due to my euro-centric social upbringing.
What is the faith good for if it cannot stop the endless cycle of violence? Do we correctly understand the faith at all in that case? What kind of “the Holy Land” would be selected for the first known genocide, completely opposite to the original Ten Commandments?
The most notorious false idols might be the clergy that equated self with the faith and kept pushing the folks into the endless mutual bloodsheds due to the wrong understanding of the basic and principles of the true faith.
The true faith spreads the peace, not the endless conflicts!
The Mayo Clinic has a long list of symptoms associated with Narcissistic Personality Disorder: https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/narcissistic-personality-...
This list reads like a biography of Trump.
22
thank you Dr. Joyce. Are planning on charging us a consulting fee for your insights?
Remember the Wizard of Oz? What we have in Donald Trump is a very bad man, but a very good wizard.
5
The Wizard of Oz preferred to be anonymous.
Looking for a standout democratic leader? Looks like Oprah Winfrey may be entering the fray. My knee-jerk inner dialogue is probably similar to others', but the next thought is "Why not?" If the current president (or Ronald Reagan) can be president, why not Ms. Winfrey? Do candidates need to be from the "patriarchal white men with political experience" pool?
The big read from the last election was that Americans were fed up with the status quo. Politics-as-usual is taking a break.
Who doesn't like Oprah? She's smart, funny, inspiring, generous, and richer than god. Maybe she's just the tonic this country needs.
10
PLEASE!!!!!
Not another TV "personality"!!!!
Seriously, what are her qualifications except having survived the selection of successfully playing to the same unsophisticated audience as Trump and getting insanely rich in the process?
You really expect us to be better off with her?
She may have a more agreeable character and personality, but she is not qualified in any way to lead us through the complexities of the real world in the 21st century. We need professionals and scientists to do that who are capable of serving the public and not their own personal benefit.
2
As a PhD clinical psychologist and a fully trained psychoanalyst certified by a national professional organization [not mentioned here to avoid any comments addressed to that entity] I can say with great emphasis, forget trying to diagnose Trump. Pay attention instead to his function for the Republicans and their ultra wealthy campaign contributors. Under the cover of flack created by his horrific character flaws easily tagged as antisocial and profoundly narcissistic as well as his compromised brain based deficits, the Republicans are eviscerating our democracy crafted to protect us all. Health care, retirement benefits, environmental protections, functional governmental agencies providing essential services for the well being of our Nation are being marginalized, decimated and understaffed to kill their benign impact sheltering us from all those who would plunder rather than protect and serve us all. Trump must be removed from office aw well as all members of the Republican party for betraying democracy and its benign principles and functions. We are amidst a revolution that is destroying all that FDR and his followers did to transform our Nation into a participatory democracy for ALL, not just the patricians. Vote those bums out in 2018 every single one of them.I am a democrat, a small 'd' democrat, willing to spend his life pursuing the restoration of our representative governance without special interests served because of the fatal Supreme Court citizens united ruling.
55
The fact that the election of the only public official in the US with a national constituency is counted according to the methods of the Electoral College doesn't even pass a laugh test. The US is still structured for optional slavery.
1
I am reading the book and am even more horrified than I was before. This man is not fit to be in any public office - ever.
24
The Emperor has no clothes. Period.
13
they couldn't have picked a better TV star.. (very little s)
3
So - the so-called (self referenced) "Stable Genius" is going to REFUSE any "stable genius" or mental acuity testing! Or to publish those results of his proof thereof! Hahahaha ...of course an unstable idiot thinks his statements alone ARE the PROOF! What a PUTZ!
14
It’s already so, that being a Trump supporter equates to being an unpatriotic American. He’s not in bed with Lichtenstein...he’s in bed with RUSSIA. If you’re for Trump, then you’re against America.
18
Blow would be, like, really smart if he started writing about topics other than trashing Trump (which he has been doing for more than two years now) and started writing about something more positive, like what he is for. Trashing Trump did not get Hillary elected, and trashing Trump won't get the next Democrat elected. Blow's got to be for something, not just against Trump.
3
I'd be curious to see whether Blow can write about anything else. His mind seems to have a very limited orbit, and it is shrinking further and further. Unlike other columnists, whose work is varied enough in subject matter and therefore ends up collected in books, Blow writes pieces with early expiration dates. He writes for the present, vanishing moment. Without Trump, will Blow be able to sustain a career? He seems to need Trump more than Trump's supporters need Trump.
"... they are moving dangerously close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican could be seen as being an unpatriotic American."
We're already there, Mr. Blow.
14
To Mr. Blow and all of those that insist that the president lacks smarts. Go to the library - especially a really first rate library. Look around at the wealth of information at your fingertips. Now consider how much any of us can say that we really know - even in the most superficial way. Show some humility. Show some common sense. You may hate this president and you may hate the way that he communicates, but please understand that we are all poorly informed by any real measure.
2
So you are saying that since none of has complete knowledge we are all equally stupid? Then next time you need surgery go to a high school dropout. One of the most important attributes any of us can have is to understand what we don't know and what we do, and to consult experts when a deciscion requires knowledge we don't have. As far as I can tell Trump lacks this in spades.
2
Speak for yourself, please: We are NOT all poorly informed.
By every measure one can think of, on the other hand, it's pretty obvious that DJ Trump is poorly informed. And that's an understatement if there ever was one.
4
Agreed. Although in a president you want someone with the bandwidth to come up to speed on issues and understand how they are interconnected to the extent they can.
Trump doesn’t even seem to understand details of his own administration’s proposals. He seems to be getting his briefings from Fox & Friends rather than from intelligence agencies or career diplomats who have spent their careers serving the country. Television may be in a format that will sink in for him.
We may all be ignorant about much of the knowledge in the world, but we should expect our president hat the attention span to understand issues other than what he sees on a morning entertainment show.
3
Imagine for a second that the black guy had done 1/10th of the shenanigans 45 is doing on a daily basis... he would have been kicked out immediately (impeached for some ludicrous reasons etc by the GOPers). So, why aren't the Dems more vocal about his behavior (with the exception of 2 or 3, Warren, Sanders etc)?
13
Not for one minute would a Democratic President displaying this type of behavior be allowed to remain in office with a Republican majority House of Representatives. The double standard here is astonishing. Clearly Republicans are more concerned with achieving their agenda rather than the good of the nation.
27
Whatever Republicans do is blessed by God and forgiven by the death of Jesus.
1
Only in Pence World
Let’s analyze the truly serious global problems.
We have witnessed what Donald Trump is capable of doing, saying and implementing.
But, what if this is not the first historic instance of somebody like him being promoted to the ultimate power?
Let’s go several millenniums in the human past.
Let’s imagine that Moses just died after saving the Jews from slavery in Egypt and leading them for a couple of decades through the Middle Eastern deserts.
Is it possible that somebody like Trump rose to the power at that very moment, declared that he just spoke to the Almighty and that God allegedly directed him to eradicate all the original inhabitants of the Holy Land for being utterly dishonest and crooked?
That would be an equivalent to the modern Fake News verdict.
Maybe the entire humanity will be able to finally find the universal peace after realizing that the ancient leaders were perfectly capable of lying and deceiving as the contemporary ones…
To me, the problem is the American public. They have wanted to elect people that they find relatable. That in a nutshell is how we as a nation elected both George W. Bush, Barack Obama, and now Donald Trump. What really passes for someone who has spent time in Washington for a long time, and has been elected to other positions, is a person of accomplishments, is both a thinker, and a doer, like John Kasich, Bill Richardson, those types do not appeal to the average American. In other words, boring, often means, both smart and restrained, even someone like Bill Gates, and Warren Buffet come to mind, even MIchael Bloomberg come to mind. Until the American public evolves to a place of wanting to face reality, by the kind of people who can and have made smart decisions, are very intelligent and accomplished people, would know what good domestic and foreign policy look like, our country will not be in the place it needs to be, nor will we be able to help the rest of the world. The last 17 years have seen millions killed, millions of refugees, more civil war and unrest, in both Africa, and the middle east, than at any time in recent history.
5
Today, though, there is a new current of anti-Americanism rising as well, different from the usual continental grumblings. It believes that America has overstayed its welcome on the world stage, that it still insists on dominating both culturally and politically. It believes that American culture is superficial and phony, that Americans are hypocritical and uneducated. “What good has ever come from the United States of America?” a reader in Berlin wrote to me recently in response to an editorial.
The roots of this new anti-Americanism go deeper than Mr. Trump. Germans point to George W. Bush’s invasion of Iraq and war on terrorism, and to Barack Obama’s tendency to overpromise American action on foreign policy while furthering many of his predecessor’s worst policies. But finally, in Donald Trump, we have a cartoon bad guy, the essence of every anti-American prejudice: a rude, uneducated bully who drinks giant amounts of Diet Coke.
27
"And in so doing, they are moving dangerously close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican could be seen as being an unpatriotic American."
That day has come and gone. It is beyond clear to everyone paying attention that Trump enablers have put greed and ideology above country. They should all be ashamed of themselves, but they show no capacity for shame. A toxic bunch, all of them.
9
On a purely existential basis, he is the cock of the walk, having hooked up a suction hose from Mar-A-Lago, et al, directly to the treasury. 50+ visits to HIS properties during his first year in office? Give me a break! I bet if he makes it through the next three years without suffering a perp walk his indebtedness will have vanished. Then he'll let us see his tax returns...
7
Really folks, has the United States ever had anything but the illusion of democracy?
Trump and the almost all of those on Capitol Hill are the current stooges for the powers that be.
Trump may be sui generis but there is no doubt about who he represents.
I guarantee that if Trump was not pleasing the powerful he would be on his way out right now.
Let's not kid ourselves that the United States is a functional democracy.
6
dangerously close to the day. . . I think that Professor Krugman would say that they are already there.
Ted Bundy was like, really smart.
11
Joe Biden appears to be the de facto leader of the Democratic Party. Despite his age and because he is healthy, he could run with a younger partner like one of the Castro brothers or Gillebrand who could step into the presidency should Biden die.
4
Raul would be a better president than Trump. Hands down!
No person can get by with really terrible behavior without enablers. The enablers need to stop taking America for granted. When an oath to support and defend the Constitution becomes just empty words we're in big trouble. Well said, Mr. Blow.
5
I usually disagree with most everything Mr. Blow writes but I do agree that Trump probably has some personality disorders and is not very smart. I don't think he is qualified to be the proverbial dog catcher never mind president.
But, that's not everything. If you have read Caro's books on LBJ, he seemed to also have had similar personality issues. I'm not sure how "smart" he was either, although certainly cagey. People, however, found him a good or bad president based not upon his personality or intelligence, but on what they thought of his policies. In reality, most people judge all presidents this way. I doubt very much Mr. Blow would feel about Trump the way he does if he was a liberal, regardless of his other problems.
Obama, imo, seems not to have personality disorders and is intelligent. Nevertheless, though I disagreed with most of his policies. I was not for impeachment even if he committed some impeachable offenses. That's b/c he won and it is not good for the country to be so divisive.
What concerns me more than Trump and his oddities or lack of great intelligence is what is often called the "resistance." It is much more of a concern than "white nationalists," who have so little support. The resistance, backed by the media, is popular, often highly irrational and at times violent. It is worse for the country than even Trump, and that's saying a lot. And the answer is not for the Ds to run Oprah.
We need rational and moderate politicians. Few are for that.
We have to turn out as many voters as possible; see Virginia. We have to run competent thoughtful candidates who have integrity; see Alabama. But in case there is a big meltdown before the elections happen we also have to be prepared and agree to stand in the streets to preserve and protect our country. The Nazis took power because the German non-Jews thought they were going to be more prosperous under Hitler. By the time they figured it out their country and millions of people that they considered "other" were killed, as were many of their own family members. Be ware! And start calling the Press and the Congress to account! Ask if they believe in freedom of the press as much as in gun rights, and what are they doing to protect it? Did they take an oath to defend the Constitution? Do they believe in 3 co-equal branches? Where are his tax returns? What work is he actually doing? Are Hope Hicks and Steven Miller really his top advisors? Why did LIndsay Graham flip? What in God's name is going on???
9
"And in so doing, they are moving dangerously close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican could be seen as being an unpatriotic American."
Sadly, we are LONG past that day, Mr. Blow.
6
Too many people slapping their hand on, usually, a Bible and vowing to uphold the Constution while not meaning a word they're saying.
2
Never mind political expediency, self-interest and moral casuistry, we should hold Congress responsible for abdicating their responsibilities simply in order to keep their seats. Under the laws that apply to the rest of us, being involved in the commission of a crime and doing nothing to prevent it makes you just as guilty as the man who commits it. For enabling the damage Trump has done to our country’s stature in the eyes of the world — for this alone — they should all be sacked for dereliction of duty, period. Congress doesn’t seem to value our honor any more than our President understands the meaning of the word.
5
It is not enough to theoretically solve the problems. It’s far more important to practically implement the solutions.
Even the most important humans in the history of this world like Jesus Christ, Leonardo de Vinci or Nikola Tesla were doomed to wait for centuries in order for their proposals and measures to be embraced and incorporated into our daily lives.
When you are so much ahead of your time you are sentenced on the protracted waiting on the rest of humanity to catch up…
President Trump's definitions of "genius" and "stable" are different than mine.
4
"These politicians are taking the politically expedient track for political gain or political survival"
That means as long as Trump gets the GOP Congress tax cuts for their billionaire donors and corporations, deregulation no matter who it poisons, and personally takes the heat for the racist voter pool he tapped to get elected and push through their agenda - they're as happy as pigs in slop. Interesting, though, that the farmers aren't happy- with all those immigrants Trump wants to kick out, farmers gonna have a hard time. So much for the little guy.
4
This presidency challenges my concept of personal sanity daily as I try to comprehend it's progress. But, in my endless analysis and questioning of how anybody can condone the man's behavior while ignoring his obvious emotional disorders, I sadly conclude that his supporters (where are we today, at 37%?) don't acknowledge his unfitness because many of them have probably never even considered the existence of mental illness by critically examining human behavior. They probably have no need for psychological science nor the need to understand behavior because they have never considered their own behavior or, worse, considered it necessary to. They condone this man as normal while ignorantly and blissfully praising his instability as "tearing down the elite system".
These are maddening times indeed, as I drive myself insane trying to fit the man's every turn into a discernible pattern or plan where none exists- my mind demands this yet there is no reconciling this fact as rampant chaos rules the day.
6
President Trump's recent cry for help in the name of his deceased mentor, "Where's my Roy Cohn?", is incredibly telling. As Mr. Cohn's disciple he learned that all that matters is keeping your name in the news, no matter how callous, irresponsible, indifferent and/or unethical your conduct may be. Birds of a feather.
6
Blow is totally correct in his assessment of Trump's mental state. Any clear-thinking person will come to the same conclusion just by observing his behavior and tweets. The problem for a stronger public consensus on this issue is the bearer of the news. Book authors and columnists are part of the purported "fake news" that Trump supporters abhor. Credible sources of information have been so denigrated that great untruths "very sane genius" may stand. We see the Emperor wearing no cloths, but many see him fully clothed.
1
That is it I am discontinuing my HBO service. Goodbye VEEP this administration is more funny.
1
How utterly [almost comically] ironic it is that conservatives are carrying the torch of a president proven to be a Womanizer, Business Cheat, Liar, Bully, and Xenophobe. Yes, conservatives -- the same people who are constantly blowing their horns about extolling the best of human qualities: family values, honesty, frugality, and so forth.
On his show today, the Bombast of all conservative bombasts, Rush Limbaugh, lamented that more of our political leaders don't seek interviews at the "conservative media." (In his remark, Limbaugh was referring to centrists and liberals.)
Now, then, el Rushbo, why would any true leader waste his/her time cultivating an audience from among hyper-partisan, narrow-minded oafs like you?
Here's your answer: Because any true leader is too fair, sensible, and sound-minded to do so.
6
Finally decided that Pence would be better.
The people can not be all, & always, well informed. If they remain quiet under such misconceptions it is a lethargy, the forerunner of death to the public liberty. What country before ever existed a century & half without a rebellion? & what country can preserve it’s liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? let them take arms. the remedy is to set them right as to facts, pardon & pacify them. what signify a few lives lost in a century or two? the tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots & tyrants. it is it’s natural manure.
If Congress fails to uphold it's sacred oath to "preserve, protect and defend the constitution", it falls to us, the citizens to do it. This means it's time to start seriously thinking about what has, until now been unthinkable, namely the A word. Perhaps the only way to get Congress to uphold its sacred oath is to make it very clear to them that failure to do so makes resort to the A word inevitable. The best way to avoid such a scenario is to shout from every rooftop that it is inevitable unless Congress remembers its oath and acts to uphold it.
2
"they are moving dangerously close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican could be seen as being an unpatriotic American."
A little late for this observation, isn't it?
1
It's a sad day when supporting the President of the United States becomes unpatriotic, but that's where we are. This occurs because the interests of DJT are not necessarily those of America - when his ego dwarfs what's good for the country. Normally, the interests of the president and the country are the same, but these are not normal times. The president is driven relentlessly to feed his own ego at the expense of everyone and everything else, and what satisfies DJT's ego is not often what's good for America.
See:
RevolutionOfReason.com
TheRogueRevolutionist.com
1
Well, Trump is a billionaire and managed to get elected President, winning over ten Republican candidates and over one smart but evil Democrat.
"And in so doing, they are moving dangerously close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican could be seen as being an unpatriotic American."
The Democratic and Blow playbook - when argument fails, call your opposition "deplorable", "unpatriotic" or "traitor".
He's sly, but not smart.
4
It is not enough to theoretically solve the problems. It’s far more important to practically implement the solutions.
Even the most important humans in the history of this world like Jesus Christ and Leonardo de Vinci were doomed to wait for centuries in order for their measures to be embraced and incorporated into our daily lives.
When you are so much ahead of your time you are doomed on the protracted waiting on the rest of humanity to catch up…
Too late. I already view Republicans as morally and politically bankrupt. It would be lovely to impeach Trump. However, our best bet is to vote out those who prop up the man. His fall WILL come once we do that.
8
The smartest people I have known have never said they "were very very smart". That is what my grandson said.......when he was 1.
5
McConnell, Ryan and the other GOP enablers don't care about the intellectual failings of the current Oval Office occupant. To them he's simply a chimpanzee that knows how to sign his name to whatever hard-right legislation they shove in front of him. Just as long as the simian-in-chief gets his Mickey D's dinner by 6:30 p.m. so he can head upstairs to watch his favorite TV propaganda, the GOP will continue to look the other way.
4
"Being gifted at exploitation is not the same as intellectualism. It is a skill, but one separate from scholarship."
Mr. Blow, as much as critic as you seem to be, you've also tasted the Kool-Aid. Trump is not gifted in making money. In fact, he is pathetic at it, a loser in the arena actually. It is well-documented how much of a massive inheritance he received when his father died. If he simply took that money and put it in a passive stock account that reflects the S&P500 (these are called index mutual funds today), he would have nearly $40 billion today compared to the $3 billion Forbes estimates he has (Trump claims $8 Billion, which is still far worse). Really good businessman like Warren Buffett and George Soros outperformed the S&P500 over decades. Entrepreneurs like Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, and Jeff Bezos killed the S&P500 for their early investors. Trump has always been a terrible businessman who has gone bankrupt and only makes his pathetic returns on investment by ripping people off (ask any contractor who's worked for him). Even his "amazing" victory in the presidential race is now clearly tainted by a massive effort by the Russians to elect them. Now the Russian effort, that was genius.
5
Charles Blow: 'Like, really dumb'.
This is awesome to watch. Everyone on this site, heck, everyone on the left has now "weaponized" armchair psychiatry from afar. All because you disagree with Trump, then everything is ON the table. Impeachment, 25th Amendment, the whole works.
Some on this site are now going so far as to disparage an Ivy League Penn education and diploma because his first two years were spent a Fordham. O the horror.
Here is the thing... all of us who voted from Trump chuckle at how effectively, might I say brilliantly, Trump is playing you guys. Seriously, you fell for the "like, really smart" line? An obvious troll.
My biggest problem with Blow and most of the people in this discussion is that YOU ARE TRYING TO OVERTURN A NATIONAL PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION. Such elections are the beating heart of a democracy. Harken back to the time before the election when Hillary was saying that Trump and everyone on his side simply MUST recognize and accept the results of the election. Now that the shoe is on the other foot, then kick the bum out!!! By any means necessary.
BTW: how does it feel to be on the side of the smartest woman in the world, with the entire media behind her, and STILL lose to this "moron"? Ouch, that has to hurt.
A little advice, nah, forget it. You guys are all so much smarter than me, a flyover idiot, there is no way you would take it. Good luck with: collusion, the 25th, Impeachment, mid terms (after the tax cuts kick in), and all the rest.
Well Blow you seem to have lost your memory. You already settled this issue (ad nauseum) in endless previous tirades. The "enablers" in Congress who give Trump a pass are a bunch of racists remember? Trump is a racist so everyone who voted for him is a racist and everyone in Congress who stands by is a racist. So is everyone that stays at a Trump Hotel, plays golf at a Trump course, gambles at a Trump Casino..... they are all racists too and that explains everything. Remember?
1
First, on patriotism, Dixiecrats are not patriotic Americans--the opposite, that's the whole point of those (still) opposed to the Voting Rights Act and Brown vs the Board of Education. And they have gotten around it with FEC vs United, the money by in large going to elect white nationalists and their starve the beast policies, including the new tax bill, so that blacks and other minorities will not receive basic services and equal opportunity.
Second Republicans in Congress are not interested in protecting free speech. Look at the EPA censorship, repeated lies about just about everything, and even telling Kamala Harris and Elizabeth Warren to shut up. There have even been attempts to censor what doctors tell their patients in their offices.
8
There is nothing new in this OP-ED. Too little, too late. Why didn't you write this a year ago?
2
He got one thing right, President Obama is a genius, a double genius. He was elected twice.
14
Thank you Charles Blow for once more clarifying the real meaning of what it means to be a real intellectual, and what public service should be about.
7
America has had other lying deceitful megalomaniac presidents before. Event Raegan was believed to be deme ting in his last few years of office, but unlike any of these men, this 'Ugly American' has no 'Venere of awe' that inspired other nations and many Americans to believe in American exceptionalism.
3
America must now endure an administration and a political party whose brand is ignorance combined with fraud, unashamedly and with widespread public support. They include those who until recently dared not speak their name in polite society: your local friendly white supremacist and/or misogynist, overt and covert. Dogs respond to whistles. Fine people though. Trump is lifelong con with a criminal knack of manipulating the legal process for personal gain, learned at the knee of that paragon of sleaze Roy Cohn. Now, as Liar in Chief he has brought American politics into the realm of fiction and global infamy. Dr. Mabuse, criminal mastermind (also fictional), once said the ultimate goal of crime is to establish its unlimited rule, an empire of crime; enter Putin’s boy from Queens and his love affair with Jim Crow GOP. The susceptibility of their willing victims (read base) is that of the man who can’t see what he thinks getting paid requires him not to see - Trump stinks, but he smells like money, maybe. That’s all it takes for some people. And so the Arch-parasite settles in to suck 'em dry, his hosts unable to resist his sweet denial of fact, his warm affirmation of their worst prejudices, his thrilling stimulation of their darkest fantasies. They will carry on stripping the commonwealth until they can no longer keep reality at bay and their crimes are revealed. By then will we have the capacity to bring them to justice?
2
Mr. Blow, I think a better Looney Tune avatar for trump is Foghorn Leghorn.
2
I already consider Trump Republicans to be unpatriotic Americans, not to mention stupid and selfish Americans.
7
Charles Blow 2020. Please.
1
Can we agree that anyone who says they are "like, really smart" is like really stupid?
11
"I'm a stable genius." So declared the narcissist-in-chief. There is an old saying I heard 30 years ago, perhaps told to me by a psychologist buddy, that goes something like this: "There is one person talking and two people listening." This suggested that the person doing the bragging, or mea culpa, is in the process of convincing him/herself, as well as the listener, of what they are saying.
Trump has been on the defense all his life, until he has been caught in a lie or, in so many cased, fraudulent business dealings, and sexual predation, he then goes on offense by taking someone to court, or counter-suing to fight off the charges against him.
Donald Trump has lived in the swamp he created. He has been the swamp-keeper his entire life. He has left a ring on the tub, as it were, everywhere he has been.
As an autocrat-wanna-be, this guy should be the easiest, biggest bowling pin in the ally to knock down. His demeanor, facial expressions and body language mirror every photograph of Hitler's Italian henchman, Mussolini. The snarl, the arms crossed in defensive mode ...
According to Senators Bob Corker and Jeff Flake, "everyone" in the Senate knows Trump is off his proverbial rocker. They know Trump is the worst president in American history and yet, it suits their ultra-conservative agenda to keep him around, at least for now.
For Dems in November, this should be like shooting fish in a barrel. But without a focused message, their backs are against the wall.
11
Yet another angry anti-Trump column from Charles Blow. It never seems to end. DJT is living rent-free in your head and in the heads of many of your readers. You don't see how he's managing to make you run in circles?
So the collusion thing isn't working out and Mueller and team seem unable to dig up anything of to tie the president to nefarious actions. So I guess that it's time to move on to a lack of smarts or a mental illness. It has been said by many pundits on both the left and the right that assessments like these are inappropriate by anyone who is not a psychiatrist. And even if one is a trained professional we all know (or should know) that one would have to know the person and perform a series of examinations or assessments. Anything else is reckless and irrelevant. Please feel free to rant away as it is meaningless.
As for DJT's smarts? Consider this - DJT is president of the United States. Charles Blow and 99% of the political left spent the autumn of 2016 laughing about his candidacy and telling everyone he is unelectable. How smart was that in retrospect? DJT is POTUS and Charles Blow is an angry ep-ed writer.
One more thing - all of the sudden there seems to be a lot of interest in what Steve Bannon has to say. Are you Trump haters cheering Bannon on now - or was that yesterday? Where do you stand on Steve Bannon today? Where will you stand tomorrow?
1
There are different kinds of intelligence and Donald Trump clearly had some ability to understand the anger in his base and tell them what they want to hear. Beyond that I am not impressed.
To some people, the fact that he is a billionaire makes him smart. He worked his way to the top of a family business that his father built. After 5 or so bankruptcies nobody in the US was willing to loan him money. How much of a genius is that? Any CEO who actually worked their way up in a corporation through leadership, vision and hard work would have been gone long before the 5th bankruptcy.
I remember after a portion of a tax return came out showing an almost $1 billion write-off that would allow him not to pay taxes for years and Rudy Giuliani said it showed how much of a genius he was. Do you buy that? How many business geniuses would have almost $1 billion in losses over a year to write off.
To me it seems like he has spent his life with the single focus on making money and will say or do anything to achieve that unencumbered by any moral or ethical code. Beyond that, I don’t see the capacity, vision, morality or leadership that I would want to see in my president. In these areas he if far from genius.
Also, the fact that Mueller hasn’t proven a case for collusion in the court of public opinion yet doesn’t mean he doesn’t have anything. I expect at the least, some of Trump’s past money making schemes will come back to bite him.
5
You beat up Charles Blow. Next time use a laser pointer.
Tax Returns.
Subpoena the tax returns!
Let's see the tax returns!
Let Mueller's people have the tax returns!!
2
In almost eighty years I've never met someone really smart announce that to me or anyone I've known. Saying something so stupid indicates the precise opposite. Case in point: The Idiot-In-Chief who sits in the White House.
DD
Manhattan
21
Trump claims to be a stable genius. In fact Trump is an unstable moron, an ignorant man who is poisonous to the world and earth. He's an Einstein only in his own warped mind.
13
Mr. Blow. He's President. You're not. So, yes, he's smart, and definitely smarter than you.
4
If being smart is equated with being President, then we're really in trouble.
Of course, they say Ignorance is Bliss, don't they? Trump seems very happy….
2
I hope Barack Obama becomes the head coach for Team America. The "sidelines" are a place to take the lead.
3
Or Michelle! Heck, how about a team effort by both?
1
People like dt are incapable of realizing that they might suffer from some sort of personality disorder, which is actually part of the disorder, very similar to the dunning kruger effect. "Stupid people don't know they are stupid".
13
Just like he thinks he has a really, really good head of hair, and a really good hairstyle.
Fat chance, Humpty Trumpty.
6
There's no more need to wonder and obsess about Mad King Donnie. Wolff confirms what has been hiding in plain site: the POTUS is a mad, semi-literate with the emotional intelligence and moral framework of a spoiled 8 year-old. The question for late 2018 and early 2019 is whether the Republican House and Senate will continue to aid and abet the traitorous Mad King's high crimes and misdemeanors once the Mueller Report is issued and Facts destroy Spin.
8
I have a different take on why the GOP is not reacting in horror at The Donald's lack of acumen. He is to the GOP, much as he is to The Kremlin, a useful idiot.
No real commander in Chief would stand by while the Koch's, Adelson's, et al are re-writing our tax codes, social morals, environmental codes and foreign policy.
The GOP regressives have a perfect vehicle for their drive to send the USA back to 1955 - they have The Donald - he is a natural target for all. No matter how the GOP House and Senate seek to destroy the progress in America, they know that Donald will be blamed and will unwittingly fight their fight because he is just that ignorant and specious.
This is not an evil man - this is an empty man.
12
Agreed. The GOP will support him against almost anything as long as they feel he is willing to sign anything that comes across his desk. And so far he has been.
2
To me Trump seems like the classical case of one being too stupid to realize he is stupid.
10
"This is the problem we face: We have a person occupying the presidency who is impetuous, fragile, hostile, irrational, intentionally uninformed, information-averse and semiliterate.
The real problem we face is that tens of millions of Americans -just as sick and ignorant as him -couldn't be happier!
And "an idiot is a genius to another idiot"
8
Trump thinks that being handed the keys to the " bully pulpit" was permission for him to simply be the biggest bully in theand.
6
Is he evil or stupid? I say he is both.
It seems to me that everything he does or says is designed to hurt someone, somewhere; whether he knows them or not; whether it is prudent or not; whether it may hurt many or all of US or not.
It is pardonable to think that a rich man needs some kind of a brain to get that way. It is a reasonable opinion. I was quickly disabused of that notion the first time I met a Texas oil man.
It is especially justified to believe that if that rich man/woman has inherited all his/her wealth the trait of intelligence might not have mattered.
For as long as I have been watching this so called man in the headlines and gossip columns I have wondered why media people were so entranced by him. To my thinking he was always a buffoon and a lout. "Stupid is as stupid does." Forrest Gump (or something like that.)
6
If Congress would just pass a set of enabling laws, Trump could put this whole thing behind him. Simply nullify that pesky constitution, put those fake news media people in a reeducation "centers", remove the powers from the Reichstag, oops I mean Congress and we could move forward making America great again with a really, really smart stable guy.
2
Is it a personality disorder to obsess with a president or anyone from faraway?
1
Using the word "like" in that manner defines one as a moron.
11
No one who is a "stable qualified genius" would ever use the phrase "being, like, really smart". That's like, you know, totally tubular, as if, whatev.
13
I hate to think about his behavior if he becomes unstable...
Trump is a dunce. He has the poses of Benito Mussolini but the intellect of Dan Quayle.
6
OK, if Donald Trump is a genius, how do you qualified Albert Einstein?
2
Joe Biden. C'mon Joe!
4
Why are Times commentators so often as naive as if this were 1952? All of what the recent Wolff book claims was apparent over a year ago and simply became more apparent since then. I keep wondering why Obama did next to nothing in the last election. It seems to me-and I thought this in 2008-that Obama was an inexperienced and raw kid, who needed another 10 years in government before he was ready to run for the Presidency. His basic idea seemed to be that surely everyone will agree with me because I am a reasonable guy and I am not a radical and it worked at Harvard. Indeed, in many ways, Mr. Obama was right of Bill CLinton and once the basketball teams in the WH formed, Obama was sucked into a testosterone fueled tough guy group of mostly white and illiberal people. Too many Americans never took the possibility of Trump as a president seriously and figured he would turn into a golf playing tabby cat, like Eisenhower. In fact, no one knew or investigated Trump nor have any newspaper writers attempted to uncover how he made it through his Military School and how he managed to obtain a diploma from a college on the East coast.
Aside from all that, it needs to be remembered that other then Trump's cruel and thoughtless war on foreign workers in the US, he is not a lot different from G. Bush who opened 2 wars-almost clones of Vietnam-alienated and insulted our important allies, all while having a Vice President more scary then himself. He cannot safely leave the US now.
1
I agree with Blow's call for "legitimate, nonpartisan, nonpolitical concern about Trump's stability." So you'll have to admit one thing at least: he may be an anti-intellectual, unbalanced idiot-savant expert at exploitation, but he did correctly use commas in his "being, like, really smart" tweet.
2
This is a plea to those more powerful and more able....do not laugh at trump's obvious lies about "fake news". There are people believing him!!!! Hitler would be proud. We are in dangerous times. Dangerous to our environment, dangerous to the future of our youth, dangerous to intelligent discourse and civilized behavior, dangerous to our relationships with other nations, dangerous to our multicultural heritage, dangerous to the fabric of our nation. A man who does not read and does not learn and does not listen to others or admit to errors is not a genius. He is a would be demagogue.
16
From Blow's writings, he demonstrates that he is not in Trump's league primarily because he has no grasp on reality. His writings are those of a delusional individual who tries to sound intelligent but whose logic is seriously flawed. He and other NYT writers are mentally unfit for anything having Trump derangement syndrome bordering on treason.
1
A classic Argumentum ad lapidem. Try again.
5
The Krupp family made a fortune riding on the back of Adolf Hitler, another political genius. Consider that, if you will.
15
As usual Charles, you write what I am thinking -- only much more coherently.
6
Perhaps all progs are incoherent at this point...
I’m not a psychologist but for seven years I was the supervising probation officer of a California county’s Mental Health Unit. I also spent 43 years working in the state and federal court systems.
Just as we don’t need to be a meteorologist to know if it’s raining outside, it is routinely and immediately obvious to even a layperson that certain persons are profoundly disturbed.
Our current president has all of the characteristics I saw in the narcissistic sociopaths we supervised. Many of them were sexual predators. Even more of them were con artists. A steady percentage were both.
You don’t need to be someone with my experience to recognize that we have an unstable and incompetent and dangerous man in the White House.
19
trump perfectly fits your description of a narcissistic sociopath...sexual predator and con artist. Add to that, his mental limitations and we are in deep doggy doo.
1
I am reminded of Norma Desmond: "Mr Trump it's time for your close-up now", with everyone surrounding him aiding and abetting in the destruction of America - and the earth itself.
The GOP cannot possibly be either that naive or that stupid - so they must be unamerican; traitor.
1
"And it is not only you and I worried about the president’s mental stability."
Please, please, please. I implore you and all readers. Stop improperly using the subjective pronoun 'I' where the objective is 'me.' It doesn't make you sound smart, cultural (read American score: 1- 'nil'), or at all convincing. It is a stupid and useless waste of the beautiful English language!
1
When correcting,it's important to be correct. When a pronoun follows "is" it should be in the subject case, so "it is...you and I" is correct.
2
His syntax shows that he is not really smart. It shows he is like really smart, as portrayed on reality TV, itself a complete oxymoron, which is why Trump shines in that milieu.
7
Of course the Republicans are unpatriotic, they’re craven politicians who see a chance to carry out their worst disastrous policies behind the smokescreen of their leader’s fireworks. We’ve had a week’s worth of media hysteria over a tasty tell-all from a Hollywood Reporter, meanwhile, massive expanses of land and water will be open to rape by the energy companies ( we don’t need more fossil fuels, there’s a glut on the market), our tax dollars in education are being directed to failed Christian charter and private schools through voucher programs, the ACA mandate is revoked, the CDC is prevented from doing necessary research or even talking about it in some cases, and the great Explicator in Chief doesn’t understand the basic differences between climate change and global warming but lack of accurate knowledge doesn’t stop him from flapping his ignorant lips. And now, this morning, more media hysteria hyping another Hollywood celebrity as the next opposition candidate to run against him in 2020. Really? We want another person (as intelligent and wealthy as she is) who knows nothing about running a democracy (or what will be left of it after four years of DJT and his vicious cohort) to be at the helm? Sorry, Oprah, as much as I respect you, you’re no leader of a government.
11
I agree with the assessment of Trump, but strongly disagree with the assessment of the Republican leadership. The Republican establishment is getting exactly what it wants, and all it has to do to ensure Trump's compliance is flatter Trump. For instance, the Republican leadership devised a conventional conservative tax-cutting bill. The bill did not include tariffs, or eliminate carried interest, or enact any of the other populist measures that Trump ran on. The Republican establishment is running the show, while Trump spends his time tweeting, golfing and watching TV. Trump is little more than a figurehead.
3
By losing the primaries to Trump, the Republican party has proven that it cannot lead this country. He is not a conservative by any stretch. And when they lose in the midterms, they will see just where that kind of lack of leadership leaves them. Now we all look to the Democrats to show us how it's done. But it doesn't look like there's too many on that side willing to lead either. Interesting times.
3
Anyone who says they are a "stable genius" is neither.
7
The Congress and especially the Republican leadership, White House advisors and other heads of departments, as well as the handlers of the President, such as Kelly have painted themselves into a corner.
For a year they have condoned and supported the President and his preference for minority big business versus the democracy of the people.
The policies amass show this bias.
They cannot now claim that the President is ill or has been for that would begin a tailspin of epic proportion to the democracy and view of the USA by the rest of the world.
How does one then remove the President? How does one put a "new leader" in who hid the truth from the world?
The stock market would nosedive and take other economies with it.
Every order he signed would come under question. Were they actually his policies or those of say the people he put in charge and they put their policies forth and convinced the President those were his ideas? He does change his mind on a dime. Small words-grand policies?
CIA Pompeo said the President was fine for otherwise our security of having no leadership in office would make the USA an easy target.
Prime Minister May cited also that the President was fine for to do otherwise would confirm a risk which their intel has worse case tested.
To say the USA lacked an actual sound leader and all others around who swore oaths to put country first did not would be a weapon of mass destruction. We lose all credibility politically & would truly become isolated.
.
We can study the rise of French Premier Macron, which came out of a widespread disgust with the incumbent parties and the status quo.
We need someone with impeccable credentials, think a Bill Gates, to step in and create a third party.
The two parties we have have run completely out of gas, with old leadership, tired arguments, petty egoism, and a 'Sad' level of blatant self-interest.
New broom, please.
2
Donald Trump and his Republican squad of bobble-headed yes-men and women, led by chief bobble-head Mike Pence, will until the very end inside a figurative Berlin bunker of their own making proclaim that they stood for Americans and were the true patriots here.
Mr. Blow is correct in pointing out that being financially successful and intelligent don't necessarily go hand in hand, but then we seem to be living in a time where intelligence is frowned upon and viewed as anti-populist for some strange reason, whereas being financially successful qualifies as enough said. That Americans signed off on all this last November and that the Republican elected acquiesce is hard to swallow.
1
The American people putting this person in this office was an act of insanity at the least, but more likely deliberate self-sabotage. You could even call it a suicide attempt. It's unclear yet whether the attempt was successful.
2
“The question we have to put to the elected officials [...] is: Don’t you have an obligation, either moral, ethical, patriotic or otherwise, to level with America that you, too, are concerned by Trump’s erratic behavior?”
Of course, the GOP Congress has this obligation. However, rather than asking them whether they recognize their duty (to which their actions say “No!”), we should ask ourselves why they aren’t interested in these obligations?
It isn’t that their supposed ideology drives them against serving their country. Nor is it a mistake in thinking that what they are doing is right and proper.
No. The reason for dereliction is that they are bought and paid for - no need to think. Just do what you’re told. Then the bonkers blinkered billionaires will pay for your re-election: smears, distractions, media blitz, disinformation, arousal of dark subterranean reptile brains, whatever’s needed.
A well-monied campaign can bury any opponent, regardless of what distasteful, nay dusgusting, damage you have done.
5
Are the chances of getting this man to take an adolescent IQ test, an SAT, a GRE or an LSAT greater or lesser than getting him to reveal his tax returns. Or are we asking him to perform something like landing in the rough and then moving his ball to the fairway?
Many asks how the Pretend King Trump's supporters (Trumpistas) keep backing him, always at his rallies. One should ask, would you stop supporting someone if all you saw of that person was hope not his character or ego or mental state? Trumpistas cannot see the emperor naked because they cannot admit they are naked. They cannot stop hoping he is their "savior". This is what happens to people who have lost their way mentally and emotionally. In any abuse case there is a bully and an insecure person who submits to the bully. Trumpistas inability to stop this bully is evident by labeling liberals, intellectuals, corporations, and progressives as the bullies. No matter what this bully does, Trumpistas can relate to his speeches not to the man. Words are powerful. Show the Pretend King Trump as not a Trumpista but as one of the bullies that they define.
3
OK. I laughed out loud at this line because it's along the lines of what I've been thinking when I read some of this Tweets and heard about the book: "Whatever you say, Wile E. Coyote."
He is a buffoon. At best.
2
"But can I also have legitimate, nonpartisan, nonpolitical concern about Trump’s stability, fitness and basic intellectual capacity? Of course I can, and so should everyone else..." Are you kidding? You think you can objectively evaluate Trump mental condition when you yourself are suffering "Trump Delusional Syndrome"? Give me a break! You have no credibility anymore given your extreme, "hair on Fire", name calling attacks on Trump. Sorry "Doctor" Blow, you're not qualify to evaluate anyone's sanity.
Let's examine. If you can't control the temptation to call daily in his columns the president of the USA names like racist, sexist, homophobic, Islamophobic, neo Nazi, mentally unfit, etc., is that a normal behavior? If the President calls that person some nick names, is that a serious mental problem? To me, Trump is behaving normally, but the Pundits with Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS) is the one behaving not normally. If Trump hadn't hit back through his tweets, fake news and pundits with TDS would have already destroyed Trump presidency by alienating his base with false propaganda. Trump presidency is the product of the time, and it is following the universal rule, every action has equal and opposite reaction.
1
"As long as everyone around's perpetually obsequious,
I am a very, very, very, very, VERY stable geek, see? Wuss?
But if you point a finger that dwarfs any of mine,
my genius (is) swept down the drain in instant, steep decline."
So, bring him cheesy stuff and freshly washed bathrobes,
and bring him fake news pudding and a silver spoon to probe.
The lobe that's lauded jives with happy dopamine.
Don't expose it to reality. Y'all are sooo, so mean!
"They suppressed the vote of millions and in the key swing states
machines were hacked. That is how I won in spades.
And as ye gullible allowed to so be taken on a ride,
obsequious describes how bad you do abide.
Thusly, gerrymandered, your Congress too gets packed
with puppets for the oligarchs till everything is wrecked.
With immigration down we still pretend we need a Wall.
It's down since years, but hey: our hate and fear are on a roll!
We redistribute upward the trillions like hot air.
Till trickle will reward y'all, because we're very fair!
We put you in a prison of costs and debts and dares,
and then we end your benefits, clean air, and Medicare.
To get y'all distracted we're blaming Hillury.
And keep showing our stability in a frenzied drill fury.
Don't mind the sploding warming or the oil spills, mind our spoils!
They'll be coming down a-trickling. Yo, believe me, fools, now fold!
While we deport, we're golfing, yachting, hanging out in Paradise
of untaxed profits, absent rules to heed, and easy going import brides."
5
Progs are ridiculous with their name calling. How many who have commented negatively about President Trump's mental acuity have any credentials that make your opinion anything more than more partisan bitterness.
Anyone who doubts that Trump is a Grade-A whack job is unable to discern basic reality - which makes them a Whacko.
All well and good but when do the forensic accountants get to work on those tax returns? All it takes is a subpoena or a patriotic 'insider' and we can get to the bottom of this mess….
Tax returns, tax returns, tax returns!! Top of Mind!!!
4
[t]rump's "Like, really smart" assertion (hardly his needy, needy first) was accompanied by a statement that he went to the best colleges .... one for 2 years (the estimable Fordham U. where I received a J.D. [trump has nothing but a Bachelor's degree] another for 2 more -- Wharton, where a Masters in Bus. Admin is worthwhile, but an undergraduate degree... Well...that's just business .... Nothing personal -- but everyone his and my age knows that undergraduate business studies are for the intellectually challenged and weak of mind.
.
P.S. In any case, I'd bet daddy paid the "dues" that opened both Fordham's and Wharton's doors (and that their ain't no "laude" or honors of any sort on his 'paper.')
4
Republicans have just passed a vaguely written tax law that cuts back desperately needed social programs to further diminish the low to nonexistent taxes of the ultra-rich. Otherwise, Republican majorities in both houses have rendered the United States Congress virtually dysfunctional.
At the federal level, there is no longer any good reason to vote for any Republican candidate.
The editorial Board of the New York Times should read through all the negative comments on this latest column by Charles Blow -- some 1,600 by 1 PM today, most of them with hundreds of approvals -- and decide whether Blow should continue praising the Republican Party twice a week in America’s most influential newspaper.
3
First and foremost, Wolfe’s book is the epitome of truthiness https://nyti.ms/2kDdKmQ . Reference / sourcing to it by any creditable journalist undermines their credibility, either they cannot discern it is truthiness, or they don’t care it is truthiness. The most charitable description of this tome is “a kind of art”
45 has endured an unending barrage of ad hominem attacks, based in truthiness, from the Russian Dossier (aka oppo), to Wolfe’s tome. The press has reported ad nauseam on the details; talking heads, pundits, prognosticators, etc.
Writers even occasionally acknowledge their personal bias, like Mr. Blow does in this article, but all too often they write with an agenda and assert they are balanced and fact-based, when they are not
But what does this all mean ahead of the 2018 / 2020 elections? Why publish a campaign of truthiness, red meat for ‘journalists,” which they cannot wait to write about? Let Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D), House Minority Leader, explain: https://www.youtube.com/embed/GMBeUORJWj4?start=23&end=55
This article is simply Mr. Blow doing his part in “The Wrap-up Smear.”
I am overstating perhaps? Lest you think the power of truthiness is not real, consider the truthiness of “Hands up, don’t shoot!” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hands_up,_don%27t_shoot and the truth [SEE ‘Hands up, don’t shoot’ was built on a lie, Jonathan Capehart]
Feeling it true does not make it true.
Isn’t that how a lynch mob works, they know whats right and what has to be done?
Who is the bigger fool: The fool or the fool that follows him?
Based on that premise, Trump is indeed smarter than the voters who continue to support him.
3
And to think that 60 million voted for him. You should care about the dumb public in America as well. They cannot be impeached.
3
It's not just that he isn't very smart. He's actually very stupid. He doesn't read, he has the attention span of a goldfish, he blithely ignores facts and evidence--indeed, he makes up the facts he needs. He can't speak in complete sentences; he can't keep on track for a full interview; his vocabulary is that of a fifth grader (his vocabulary, and his syntax, were much better when he was in his thirties); he doesn't listen to anybody, a sure sign of a dumb person. As David Brooks suggested sometime back, Mr. Trump is an excellent example of the Dunning-Kruger effect: he's not just stupid, but too stupid to know how stupid he is, as we can see from the absurd comment that he's a very stable genius.
2
I suppose, Blow, that you think Obama was near genius. My dog Puck can compare results between the two and it's no contest. Trump, warts and all, is very significant for America. After one year he's gotten more good work done in government than his previous four predecessors, of which Obama was worst. Thankfully Obama's record is nearly erased except for the economic wasteland he fostered. That repair will take a while but it is well under way. If I live to be one hundred years old I will still not understand how most elite. All I can figure is that you elites know in your limbic brains that you are incompetent and incapable in a capitalist democracy. Consequently you: 1- assume most of the rest of us are incompetent and incapable as well; and 2- lust for a government to shelter us all from risk of an unknown capitalist future that surely must be run by the ruthless few. Covers all the bases including your need to feel singularly virtuous... especially when compared to the great unwashed (irredeemable deplorable in the current argot).
Let's see Charles. Trump went to the University of Pennsylvania. You, who exploit your preferences to the max, went to Grambling. Nuff said
1
As Trump gets his buttons pushed, he every day gets more absurd and surreal, Columnists just double down with their personality drama oriented columns. They avoid issues pro/con which would inject realism into our crazy politics. They should be discussing what the Democrats should do.
What policies would serve the interests of the mass of citizens, so that dangerous Trump-types don't become president of the US?
NYT----How about devoting columns into 3 sections: 1st the Trump craziness of the week. Then some history on how the US got to this point. Then what policies the Dems must support to break the GOP’s hold on our 3 branches of govt.
Without issue discussion, in terms voters can relate to their lives, voters get more polarized and vulnerable to propaganda. Each side digs in to defend.
We need at least 1 column comparing various ways to finance affordable health care for all, as mosts other modern nations have achieved in the 20th C. Is that reality beyond our NYT op ed columnists?
Now this book, and Trump's absurd reactions give the columnists more business as usual.
Michael Wolff is a provocateur and publicity hound. See articles on him in NYT --- Michael Wolff, From Local Media Scourge to National Newsmaker. Also W. Post. His TV interviews show he’s untrustworthy. Better books exposing Trump and his gang will come out later.
2
I agree with everything you say Charles, and I'm also tired of you writing the exact same article over and over again.
Everyone that agrees with you will continue to agree with you. Everyone that does not will not be swayed by your words.
We have to find another way of talking about things that don't fit into conveniently dismissible ruts. Liberal moral outrage and reasoned assessments of Trump and all the danger he represents continue to feel like harsh language at a knife fight. I don't know where to go next, but this doesn't feel like it.
PS. the last time I 'criticized' Charles Blow like this, my comment wasn't posted. Honestly, is what I'm saying that disrespectful or contentious?
1
Dear Charles, Sing this with me. "The minute he got elected, I knew he was a man of distinction, a real big spender, such a genius so sublime, I knew he was a cheeseburger kind of guy."...Cheeseburger, cheeseburger, coke,coke. Make up your own verses America and sing the praises of "The Donald" and you to can be a member of his inner circle. RAW
Write me something I don't know.
Mr. Blow,
I completely agree with your assessment!
1
It is shameful that Mr. Blow would call 45 semiliterate https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/semiliterate based on what he read about him. That is, however, how truthiness works.
Thanks, Charles, for elaborating on what has been my concern since the inauguration of Mr Trump. I persist in thinking that the other institutions of this country will help it survive his administration, but it would really help if the Republicans in Congress would start working for the whole country rather than so obviously just for the Kochs, the Mercers, and others who are funding their campaigns.
2
They're all of the same narcissistic cult that attributes extreme wealth to divine blessing.
What a terrible photo!!! He looks terrible in that too big hat.
I've noticed a phtograph pattern with the images accompanying Blow's op-eds. Is there an intention to choose the most unflattering ones? Or is it just coincidence?
1
Mr. Ed was a stable genius.
Trump doesn't rise to that level.
44
"they are moving dangerously close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican could be seen as being an unpatriotic American"
We are already there.
5
It's American democracy that's like, abnormal. We're now a warning to the world of what can happen even with a revered constitution and bill of rights.
A radical rw party dominates our 3 branches, with a mad Tsar and his crazy courtiers. And for any new leader to topple the mad Tsar, they need to find huge campaign financing from the richest corporations, who will expect return on investment. Could Mr. Blow interest himself in that aspect of our crazy politics, sometime?
The problem is that we the people don’t pay for our leaders to run for elections, instead the economic elites and corporations finance and pick the field of nominees we then have to choose from. Policy has to stay within limits for their gain. We are lower priority.
The Dems must compete with Gop for big money. Our system can’t translate the people's will into political action. Polls show on most issues from jobs to taxes, h/c to gun safety, voter majorities disagree with the mega donors to elections who set policy.
We're the only modern nation without universal health care , and even our admired Obama couldn't get it. Our politicians and media never explain the various ways dozens of nations finance their h/c for generations--- 20th C entury health care 101.
We can’t do it in 21st century. Our media neglects it. What does that tell you?
Does this interest Mr. Blow, or only the craziness of Trump to show his moral outrage?
6
Wile E. Coyote: a cartoon character defeated at every turn -- by a bird.
Other vividly apt characters also came to mind, like Fredo Corleone insisting, "I'm smart! I can do things!" and Albert Einstein saying, "“I have no special talents. I am only passionately curious.”
And that's the difference between the Fredos and Einsteins of the world. Anyone who has to tell you that they're smart is a Fredo. Truly smart people, like Einstein, are self-aware enough to know that they don't know everything, and that's okay, because that is precisely what compels them toward greatness rather than petulance and self-delusion.
4
Genius and intelligence are not the same thing. Trump has a genius for flim flammery. He used it to convince over 60 million people that he was preferable to someone who probably's has an I.Q. that is double Tweedle Don's. Those 60 million plus people are responsible for the situation we now find ourselves in. None of his behavior is new, it was all on display throughout the year long campaign.
So long as Trump lets the GOP congress raid the cookie jar of American wealth and pass it on to the already wealthy there will be no change.
You can take it to the bank.
2
President Trump could resolve this issue if he had the courage and grace of a true president. All he would have to do is take a one hour open interview with Rachel Maddow. She is the most informed woman in the news and she has exhibited the grace needed to interview even the most ardent Trump supporter.
I double-dog-dare Trump to do it . . . I promise our yellow stained president ain't gonna to do it. Trump says he's a stable genius. Good. Rachel is a Rhodes Scholar who love political science. They should have a chat and let us listen in.
What could go wrong?
3
Think of the opportunity that Republicans are squandering by their failure to take the lead in removing Trump from office, not through impeachment, but under the clause for a president unable to discharge his duties. Were they to do so, all Americans would salute them for putting country above party. It could save them from a debacle in November.
Unfortunately, Donald Trump was right about one thing: he was “smart enough to know how to persuade enough voters to win the Republican nomination and the Presidency. Now we are in trouble.
2
Even if I had never heard of Donald Trump I would be suspicious of anyone who said he was 'like really smart.' I am even less interested in having a president who says he is a very intelligent person who uses himself as an adviser. Even the greatest minds in history have extensively read the works of others. Mr. Trump's actions to drive out scientists who have done work on climate change and his purge of the foreign service are particularly damaging. I have satisfied myself that the scientific evidence in favor of climate change is so overwhelming as to make it almost a certainty. Yet I would never fire a scientist solely on the basis of being a climate change denier. As president, I would want a few qualified scientific deniers to challenge my conclusions. Mr. Trump's arrogance and pomposity are a threat to our country.
2
We have all grown up in a country in which our government is determined by law not by individuals who are rulers. The principles of a legalistic government require that elected representatives respect the needs as well as the wants of their constituents, and that they consider the long term consequences of their efforts with which all will have to live, including themselves. But achieving high office and achieving the objectives sought makes elected officials have to deal with the stark and amoral ways of acquiring and maintaining power. The so-called craft of power is not nice and it is not moral nor ethical. With Trump, we are seeing what a person who is seeking power but has no appreciation of our system of government is inclined to behave, like one of the pagan emperors of ancient Rome. The Republicans like Graham are hep and are playing the power game in order to assure that what they want comes to pass. There are no percentages for Graham et al to denounce Trump when they can get legislation signed and executive orders signed which advance their own agendas, nor where their constituents are smitten with the nonsense that Trump spouts to criticism is lack of sound reasoning. Both journalists and voters need to understand that what they are witnessing is not a bunch of crazies in Washington, they are seeing a reprise of ancient Rome in Washington. This is not some strange aberration that will pass, it's actually a breakdown of our liberal democratic institutions.
4
Thank you for pointing out that the Republicans are at the root of all this craziness because they are not doing the job they were elected to do. Yes, to uphold our Constitution. Every column you write should be on this theme. Trump is a distraction from this bigger failure, and the Republicans know and are relying on that.
1
What would Trump be without Twitter? What would Trump be without Fox News and what would Trump be without television in general? He probably wouldn't be president, but that's not the point. Our elected officials are placating a man nursing a god complex and they won't do anything about it. Good article.
2
Trump has been quoted as saying he isn't any different now than he was at the age of 6. Everyday he strives to prove it, though in fact I've known plenty of way more mature 6 year olds.
3
Bravo, well-said. And the irony of it all. Being a Trump supporter, especially a continue supporter of said character is as unpatriotic and un-American as one can be. This MAGA touting man has America neither in his heart nor on his mind--he only cares about how to exploit America to the advantage of him and his own. The sooner we get rid of him and his, the lesser the damage.
2
Anyone who has witness the early signs of dementia, repeating the same story, with the same intonation over and over as if thebtjoughts just occurred to the them, is an early sign of dementia.
Now Trump, is being described this way according to the Wolff book, and now Joe Scarborough, who says he has known Trump for years, and tried unsuccessfully, to include in columns he wrote for the Washington Post, his observation of this decline.
If this is true, and others in the GOP are aware of his condition, and are not only shielding him, but heaping obsequious praise upon him as if he is stable and accomplished, each and every one of them should be voted out of office.
They seem to have deluded themselves into believing that they were elected to serve Trumps whims and needs , and not the citizens who. Elected them.
The fealty that Trump demands, and their eager response, is sickening and alarming.
7
I fully agree with the article. I don’t need the book by Wolfe, I only need to read Trumps tweets or his other statements or speeches to recognize that this is a disturbed, extremely narcissistic and unqualified person.
3
Hillary Clinton has founded Onward Together and is both speaking out against Trump and his abuses and raising money for the Democratic Party. Even if you don't think she should run again for president (I do), she's clearly a leader. Take off your misogynist glasses, folks!
9
Trump is "like" demented or a truly ignorant, greedy and evil person. When will the Republicans wake up and realize that their support for him will bring down their entire political party and that they will deserve the loss.
3
Far be it from me to become one of DJT's apologists; for there are many whose rhetorical weapons far exceed my meager armament.
However, Charles Blow's latest anti-DJT screed gives me pause to remind him of the corn-husker state's late Senator Roman Hruska's notable if not notorious quip concerning the nomination to the SCOTUS of Harold Carswell.
When Carswell's judicial creds came under withering fire from you-know-who and were branded "mediocre" at best, Nebraska's senatorial knight of the rueful countenance sallied forth in defense of the beleaguered judge, admonishing his critics that,
"Even if he is mediocre, there are a lot of mediocre judges and people and lawyers. They are entitled to a little representation, aren't they, and a little chance?"
Perhaps Mr. Blow might take time to reflect on Sen. Hruska's counsel, and endeavor to give DJT "a little chance," however small it may be.
By now all this should be a given -- the guy's a nut job. In the words of the late great Leonard Cohen, "Everybody knows." So yes, as you point out, the focus now should be on the Republican Party supporting him.
But they are not going to be shamed into doing the patriotic thing. They serve a different master.
5
Their notion of "patriotism" is only to kiss up the pecking order to the phony closest to God.
of course this man is mentally ill. This is obvious to anyone observing his erratic behavior . You don`t have to be a physician to say that someone who claims that the Martians are after him is mad . You may not be able to say that probably that man suffers from schizophrenia . But you know that hypothetical man is not well . In the same manner , a man that says that the FBI taped him , or that his inauguration crow was bigger that Obama`s , or that Obama was not born in the USA , or that he is a very stable genius , is not well . Possible diagnosis include narcissistic personality disorder , anti- social personality disorder , hypomania , early dementia attention deficit disorder , or delusional disorder , or any combination there of . But that is not the point . The point is that Trump is mentally ill , incapable to do his job as President , and a danger to our Country and the World .
8
Do you think Trump has good enough reasons to believe people are unjustly out to get him to absolve him of paranoia?
Day by dreadful day the man who sits in the White House becomes more and more of a danger to our country in addition to being a total and utter disgrace to the office. What is to be done about him greater minds than mine will have to decide, but sooner rather than later something has to be done to save us all.
I doubt he will resign so I can only hope the Mueller investigation results in
him being impeached. Never have I been so fearful for my country.
6
Like, really smart.
Yeah, smart like a con artist.
It is my hope that as I type, someone or the entire Mueller team is checking out the entire Trump family's finances.
More than anything else this country needed to repair its infrastructure.
But the first thing the GOP did was to make tax breaks available to the rich, which included themselves.
I'd bet that everything Congress has initiated, that stupid Wall, the selling of our natural resources, even their logic toward climate change, there is money to be made somewhere that will benefit them.
We are being played like a top and all Trump supporters see is, is, WHAT?
5
Billionaires don't need infrastructure. They have helicopters to flit between their compounds.
2018 needs to be a time of reckoning. Each and every Republican -- senator or representative -- should be voted out of office as complicit with the trumpian undermining of our democrarcy. Those who have spoken out and challenged him should be supported for their courage and unwillingness to compromise their principles or to fawn over this man.
4
They are all Trumpublicans now.
We will remind them of that.
5
In The Godfather Freddo Corleone tried uncessfully to convince his brother Michael that he was 'like, smart, very smart.' Now Freddo Covfefe tries to convince the world that he not just,like, smart but even 'a stable genius' provoking the laughter and ridicule of the entire world. Now the 25th Amendment is needed more tan ever. Most likely, Mueller will get him for obstruction of justice.
3
Mueller can't really do anything because it is all up to Congress. So all he is really doing is stalling for more time for people to acquiesce to Trump.
If you have to keep reminding people how rich or smart or strong or sensitive, etc. you are then...Every hear a really intelligent person say "you know I'm really smart"?
3
Never, absolutely never.
So six bankruptcies and rebuilding a gambling empire by laundering Russian money proves to some people that he's smart? Those are pretty low standards.
9
Many people see the photos of Trump's golden living room and think, "Now there's a successful human being".
What does “LOVE” truly mean? What is the original true meaning of this word?
It must be the optimism and “bona fide” or “good will” toward the people around us.
Today’s interpretation is completely distorted and irrational.
Now it implies an unconditional support and unwillingness to critically analyze the people we are supposed to love.
By acting in such a way we actually harm the people around us.
We are unwilling to pay any attention to the obvious sins, mistakes and failures of our “loved ones”, thus we are incapable of intervening early and helping them return on the right course.
This is absolutely correct statement regarding the many parents oblivious to their children slipping into alcohol and drug abuse, excessive eating and spending habits, confrontational behavior or egocentric pattern full of hubris and self-adoration.
On the country level, it means an unconditional support for our allies engaged in the endless conflicts with their neighbors.
For those reasons we have the largest military budgets in the world history and have been unable to forge the peace accords to end the Korean war, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict or the bloodsheds in Afghanistan and Iraq.
What kind of the global superpower are if all of us were incapable of pacifying the Middle East since 1948?
The permanent peace is a natural human condition. Every conflict is an enormous risk of being killed and maimed. We should carefully examine our leadership over such a protracted period…
2
The bullying grifter-in-chief is clearly no intellect, but he's been shrewd at stirring the pot and deflecting the public attention away while he steals the silverware. What interesting times we are living in...makes me think I should be reading more history about the fall of the Roman Republic. The rest of the world is slack-jawed with astonishment that such an obviously inferior person sits in the Oval Office.
I don't need to read "Fire and Fury" to know that Trump is dumber than a sack of hammers and completely unfit to lead, I can hear it for myself whenever he opens his mouth and endlessly repeats phrases, like someone in the early stages of dementia. Perhaps his cheeseburger and Lays potato chip diet is pushing him towards Alzheimer's at a much faster clip than his father.
4
POLL: Does hearing your Commander-in-Chief describe himself as a "very stable genius" make you feel like you are in good hands?
3
When your president frightens you on a daily basis, when you are always waiting for yet another safety regulation to fall, when you are truly frightened for your future because of the negative unpredictability of your government, you may conclude that your president is a domestic threat to you and to your country.
4
There's no way to know if President Trump has a mental disorder without a psychiatrist actually doing a face to face examination of him.
But there are certain things we can be clear about. Trump has lied over and over from the very beginning. He needs the validation of others. He has engaged in corrupt business dealings. He has a hair-trigger temper. He has autocratic tendencies. He doesn't like to play by the rules.
To me, all of this sounds more like the qualities of a career criminal.
3
'Like, Really Smart' -- Isn't that what Fredo said?
3
"You can’t say that you love America and not take a stand to defend it from harm."
Once again, the politicians prove Mr. Blow to be wrong.
1
Wile E. Coyote! I haven't thought about him for a long time! Is he available for the job?
2
I repeat.....As a long retired Licensed Family Therapist, I venture our "President" as a blatant Sociopathic Personality Disorder, with Chronic Lying at the top of his Public Symptoms. Please forgive the Capitalization, but we, the People, are in dire need of Therapy, since being under his 24/7
Twitter domination.....another abiding symptom. Meanwhile, he is thoroughly Enjoying the Public Attention.
3
Any public official who uses the term “like” improperly is nothing more than a Kardashian to me.
4
Once again we're reminded of The Twilight Zone's 1961 black and white episode “It’s A Good Life,” starring Billy Mumy as Little Anthony Fremont!
The adults fear him. No one's quite sure what he's going to do, or whom he'll turn against next. He's tyrannical, and could banish you to the cornfield forever. Don't sing. He completely hates singing. Do his bidding, or else.
So they fawn over Little Anthony constantly, telling him how great he is. How wonderful he is. They let him do what he wants. No matter how awful or wrong.
Today, Republicans fear Donald Trump's wrath, as do his staffers--every day-- so they falsely praise him and fawn all over him. His cabinet had to sit around the table and tell him how great he is, how smart and wonderful he is.
He sat there like a king, with his arms crossed, looking angered, and tough.
To get his angry tweet could destroy anyone of them. He might even give a mean nickname that would stick forever.
And, now--- we see and hear the very same with McConnell's Senate and Ryan's House of Representatives. They praise him with the best words ever.
It's pitiful. Weeks ago they talked about wanting to curb him from the nuclear launch codes.
None will speak out the truth as previously--not Bob Corker, Jeff Flake, or Lindsay Graham --or any of them. The comparison to Twilight Zone is spot on.
2
I thought this would go over well. I also thought the president would be viewed as mentally unstable and a month from now incapacitated.
If he is so rich, why isn’t he smart?
2
The enablers are just as complicit and should be held to account. Why do we have a 25 th amendment?
1
Mr. Blow wrote,
I will be the first to admit that everything in politics has a political component.
---
It's good to know where this admission first originated, but it's hard to forget Mr. Blow's reference to Mitt Romney's "magic underwear" in an attempt to plumb that candidate's psyche back in 2012.
The partisan playbook is that Republican presidents have been either lazy, crazy or stupid at least since Dwight Eisenhower.
Is someone finally crying "wolf?"
Disregarding his suitability for the office which he clearly isn't and Republicans know it there is his embrace of Russia in the face of ongoing hostile acts against the United States. It's not just unpatriotic to take Trump's side on this issue it is treasonous. I expect that is why they need to end the investigation because once it is all out there they will look as guilty as men with panty hose on their heads.
2
At this point, given the general behavior and backpedalling by critics in his own party, I believe that most (all?) of the republican congress and major players in the administration, etc. are basically being blackmailed by the Mercers. Stick by him, or you lose all of your financial support.
Their careers will end soon, even with the financial support, and history will not be kind.
3
"don’t the members of the House and Senate, who swore an oath to support and defend the Constitution, have an obligation to rebuke this president for his attacks on the press and free speech, both protected by the First Amendment of the Constitution?"
but by your own logic Trump is just too stupid to know this is what he is doing. does that make it more or less dangerous? i'm not sure.
The question to ask isn't about Trump's smarts, but about ours.
How smart can we be, electing a greedy, ignorant fool who'll probably fold the first time we get into real trouble?
And we did elect him. We assumed, we were amused, we blew off the warnings, we squabbled, we yelled at Hillary, we didn't show up, we voted for Stein, we huffed endlessly about St. Bernie...you know the drill.
And now, a lot of us are preparing our alibis for not showing up or for voting idiotically AGAIN: then we'll wail about gerrymandering, about discrimination, about Pelosi, about blahblahblah...
So how smart can we be?
Most of what was reveled in Michael Steele's book has been common knowledge for a long time, they were emphasized during the election. His fatal flaws have been evident ever since Donald Trump injected himself into the public eye. All it takes is common sense to see him realistically and not get caught up in his self promoted vision of himself. Calling someone stupid never works and people misconstrue ignorance for stupidity. He is incredibly ignorant about the job he was elected to fulfill but he is also shown a lack of intelligence and understanding in that he refuses to study the job or surround himself with experienced people or take any advice from previous Presidents. Winning only means that you won, that's it. Fake it until you make it only works if you work hard at learning the job. Narcissism disorder and Trump"s ego prevent him from humbling himself to the knowledge he needs to be successful. Unfortunately, the country will have to wait for someone who takes the job seriously, is committed to the job and serves the people and not themselves.
Without a strong Democratic leader the cancer will continue to spread.
3
Trump is the lede - all the time, every time. I am sick to death of him and the elephant he rode in on.
meanwhile, he diverts attention from so many of the nightmares being perpetrated by his Republican cohorts, crimes against Americans tht shous be in the brightest possible spotlight.
so, is distraction his function? Is the GOP, with control of Congress and a heavy thumb on the scales of justice, running he country like a carnival sideshow... or are they really just as craven as they appear?
3
It is time to channel Edvard Munch: "aaahhh!!
We do not have to use pop psychology, read a poorly written gossip book,or listen to a gaggle of babbling cable news heads to see the plain facts that have existed about Trump for decades: he is an egomaniacal narcissist, pathological liar and sociopathic manipulator. All of those behaviors have been exhibited by Trump throughout his career.
At this time the press is covering the DACA/so called immigration reform "negotiations " . Will there be a government shutdown ? Will there be bipartisanship? Will there be a wall ?
Wall, schmall ! There is only one issue. Trump is using the lives and livelihoods of 800,000 productive human beings as a bargaining chip to satisfy his shark like killer instinct for a "win" . He has no coherent immigration policy; only campaign slogans: build a wall, chained migration is evil,he lottery is dangerous. Never mind that in fact we need to increase legal migration, Trump plans to halve it merely to satisfy his xenophobic pandering.
Years ago, in order to force a settlement of a contest of his father's will, he cut his nephew's family off of health coverage while their infant fought for survival on life support. Who would jeopardize human life for pecuniary gain? Our sociopathic self obsessed President.
Make no mistake, this is what he is doing to the Dreamers, many of whom served in the military or otherwise contribute to our society.
Trump is not incompetent. He is driven to satiate his greed.
2
The problem is not that Trump does not (and perhaps cannot) read, it is that Trump does not use other means of informing himself about the array of subjects that a president needs to be well-informed on. There are many high achieving individuals who run organizations, large and small, who are dyslexic or have limited vision or other impairments that make it difficult for them to read accurately and quickly, but who compensate by having assistants who provide them with needed information and analysis. Any president of the United States is better situated to obtain such assistance than virtually anyone else on the planet. But Trump lacks any curiosity or desire to become well-informed. His failure to read is a symptom of a much more serious problem.
4
Good response. I was a special ed teacher, working with folks who had problems with reading, but had the ability to learn and the desire to do so. There have been many people who have had reading problems, but were high achievers; Nelson Rockefeller was one of them. Trump lacks curiosity about the world and a fear of the other. He appears ignorant, both in his lack of knowledge and how to behave in his chosen role. Whether his problems are the result of planning or due to emotional/personality problems, they affect the world, not just his circle. His disregard for the welfare of people other than himself is on display every day. Unfortunately, this has enabled those in Congress who have an agenda of disregard for the welfare of others to further their own fortunes. We who are concerned about Congress, for example, should be working on that and what is being planned or what is being done by the agencies of government to harm all of us (for example, allowing pollution and the destruction of our resources, like the Great Lakes).
"Polymath" is the last term that would come to my mind to describe the most puffed up jerk in the USA.
I'm a physician and have met many highly intelligent people in practice, at conferences, etc. over the last four decades - and NONE would ever say they're 'like, really smart'. In fact, quite the opposite.
I suspect if you'd ask anyone of Trump's base persuasion what they'd think of someone in their cohort saying that you'd get the same response - they're nuts. With Trump there's selective deafness.
11
The person most similar to Donald Trump (in my opinion) is the man who was born very wealthy, became well-known in the entertainment industry, was a germophobe, had highly publicized romantic relations, and was successful in another, non-entertainment industry, and went progressively nuttier and nuttier as he aged, finally dying as a recluse.
Yes, The Aviator. Howard Hughes. Another entitled rich boy who just had to exceed his father's accomplishment.
3
I just hope that failure to take responsibility for this lost administration does irrepairable damage to the Republican party.
If you read the book Trump isn’t
going to read the book.
2
don't care about Trump's mental condition, neurological condition, or any other back story issue, my only concern is that Trump increases the chance the chance of nuclear war and international instability. He needs to be out of office, the regular predatory, cynical monsters that will replace him are far preferable in this regard.
1
The Trump presidency has abrogated our rule as a world leader and has opened wide the door for China's rise. I guess it's time to invest in Chinese stocks.
3
Someone needs to tell Trump that having no conscience, no standards, no empathy, no loyalty, no executive skills whatsoever and a sick penchant for keeping drama and instability at a high level does not equal being, "Like, really smart".
Unfortunately, having sociopathic qualities gives some people an unfair advantage because it's a level of behavior most people don't have at their disposal do to actually having a conscience. They also couldn't care less what the end result is, other than they personally "win". It's time our society in general, and Democrats, specifically, start figuring out how to deal with these people because claiming the moral high ground isn't working and it's not winning elections.
Trump's mental impairment has been a question long before he was elected, and it is about time that the main stream media looked at this issue seriously. For too long it has been the ignored elephant in the room, for the same reasons that the media helped give this election to Trump. They were afraid of criticism and wanted to appear unbiased. However in doing so they did a great disservice to the nation, and became complicit in the election of an unqualified simpleton to our highest office. The focus must now be maintained for the long term, not just this week's news cycle. However there is another issue that also deserves intense media attention, and that is Mr. Blow's summation: "And in so doing, they are moving dangerously close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican could be seen as being an unpatriotic American." The fact that these people continue to support Trump despite his obvious involvement with Russia, despite his vicious attacks on the FBI, and despite all his delusions of dictatorship brings into question who we are as Americans. These same people now look favorably on Vladimir Putin. Trump is not alone in his treason to our country.
3
I for one cannot wait until the November mid-term elections! Haven't had this kind of excited anticipation since I was a kid in the run-up to Christmas - if Congressional Republicans can't lock on to that energy permeating the air right now and this early in an election year, then they are even dumber than Trump is. It's a bit hard to comprehend - just what are they thinking?
I think Mr. Blow is now beating a dead horse. It isn't just our perception - >1,900 lies in his 1st year is hard data indicating that anything he says or tweets cannot be trusted as real. Time to go after Congress for not being the "check" it has an obligation to be against an executive branch solely existing for the obsessively vindictive destruction of anything Obama.
1
This man managed to writhe to the highest office in the world with 0 functional political experience. He understood (and understands) our system, and our collective psychology FAR better than most would like to admit (or has at least surrounded himself with people who do, admirable in it's own right). I cannot stand the man and look forward to the impeachment, but as a people and as a country, addressing the major mental health issues should start by looking in the mirror.
2
Mr. Blow.
Trump reflects who we have become as a country - willingly. All your characterizations of him are appropriate descriptors of American voters as well.
Center and left American voters, the intelligentsia, west and east coast elites, the academic brass, Hollywood-entertainment complex must take responsibility for fostering an environment in which half of Americans eligible to vote are so angry, hateful, distrustful, out-dated, that they would sooner slash and burn everything down to dust, at any price, just to prevent a Hillary (both literally and figuratively). We must own this fully.
In post 1945 Germany, entire institutions (including education) were changed so that people could examine, analyze, discuss openly, evaluate the socio political ills not just a few, but nearly the entire people had perpetuated to disastrous consequences.
We are producing disastrous consequences; even if they are not equivalent to those produced by Germany during 1934-45. We have implicitly colluded in the rise of the religious right, white identity movements, growing disconnection and precipitous dependence on debt, drugs, opiates, and government handouts (100 million government checks each month. We did this.
How we made this all happen, is a question we need to now address. We cannot convert the white christian tribes, nor collaborate with the current mix of republican leaders, but we can stop creating conditions in which they thrive and multiply.
Kalidan
5
Three questions:
1. Is it realistically plausible that the Republican Congress may too be using "kompromat" material against the President?
2. Is it realistically plausible that the members of the Republican Congress are being threatened with the release of damaging/embarrassing material, given that the RNC was also hacked?
3. Can members of the Republican Congress too face removal from office (outside of an election) for knowing about all of the misconduct, unethical and possibly illegal activities involving the President, yet not act to protect the country?
6
As a chemistry teacher, I'm compelled to think that there's an element of the law of entropy at work here...that systems naturally tend to disorder. It takes an input of (the scientific definition of) work in order to bring a system toward order. That is what we are lacking at this point, by either party.
1
I disagree. I don't think the president CAN read.
Sure, he can get through a few sentences- but reading requires quite a bit more than that. I don't think he reads at the level of a first year law student. I don't even think he reads at the level of an average undergrad, or precocious high school student. My guess would be a below average middle-schooler. Reading, like thinking, like conversation, is something you can only do well if you are in practice. And a lifetime non-reader, now at age 72, asked to process enormous amounts of some of the most serious and complex writing that exists on subjects hitherto completely unknown to him? C'mon. Who's kidding whom here.
4
Being a loyal Trump Republican IS putting party above nation. The GOP is all about grabbing power for the wealthy and keeping it there, and that's Trump's #1 goal too. If they need Russia to help (on top of the voter suppression, gerrymandering, fear-mongering, etc.), they'll "love" the help. That's who they are.
3
Charles, I feel that you've understated matters: "The truth is that it appears that most of the conservative architecture in this country-members of the administration, members of Congress, Fox News, the Republican National Committee, and Trump’s die-hard base-are all engaged in an exercise to defend, excuse, protect and absolve a man and his behaviors, which may well do irreparable damage to the country." Unfortunately, Trump and the Republicans have already done irreparable harm. Republicans are not just defending Trump, the problem is the entire Republican Party. How else to explain the horrific tax bill giving all American wealth the billionaires while deliberately creating a national bankruptcy so that everything average Americans own can be sold in a fire sale? Bush's PayGo legislation requires automatic cuts to essential programs. Republicans have exploded the national debt, now children will be homeless, so will 40 percent of women over 65 as Social Security and Medicare are their sole means of financial support. This was work and corruption of Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell, and the Republicans, conning everyone for decades about how concerned they were about the debt. When Trump said he was a super "Genius" I thought how that line was always followed by Wile E. Coyote blowing himself up or catapulting himself off a cliff. Trump is unstable and dangerous, but the Republicans aren't simply defending him, they made him, and they are sending all of us over a cliff with him.
2
Thank you Mr. Blow. Thank you for helping me to articulate all that I am feeling. I can't even imagine what this country will look like after Trump is done. I hope and pray we get through this.
sincerely,
Karla
2
Yes, the world is full of like, really smart people who spend all day watching TV, tweeting and eating fast food.
This is simply the first time one of them was elected president. Judge the results for yourself.
4
We don't have to be a doctor to know who we want to be around us and who we run from. People who voted for Trump make great claims about how he wasn't a politician as if he functions with the angels and not the swamp people who encircle him, This is America not the Soviet Union, the voters next time around better remember that this administration cares nothing for the American people unless they can further enrich themselves off of us. was. Since when did we become a country to accept corruption 24 hours a day, I don't have to be a doctor to realize that this administration is not good for the American people and never will be. Even Republicans who are not rich want health care and this group will have people dying on the streets.
2
Trump's boast that he was elected on his "first try" is incorrect. He had an ill fated attempt in the 2000 election year.
1
You mean he lied. We need to get comfortable saying that the president lied. The Base doesn’t read either, so repetition will be the only way the label sticks.
It doesn't take a medical degree to see that Donald Trump is a disturbed man to put it mildly. If he was still doing a TV show or handling his own company his handlers could probably hide this from the world but as President of the United States he cannot be hidden from the world and his secret is out. The Republicans that surround him know this and are trying to keep him propped up as long as they can so they can get their agenda through and make as much off of this situation before it blows up in their faces. If they can get enough of it gets through we will have been pushed so far to the right it will take decades to undo the damage.
2
The Congressional Republicans seem most concerned about keeping Trump focused on their conservative agenda and not wandering off to make populist deals with Chuck and Nancy. That's the payoff for Lindsay Graham mortgaging his dignity, etc. They have figured out what they need to do to keep him useful to their agenda and, since they are pros, they are just taking a deep breath and doing it.
I wonder if there isn't also some implicit deal-making so that he doesn't go too far on Mueller, rule-of-law stuff, etc. I.e. he gets to act out a bit as long as he doesn't actually do anything destablilizing. That's pure speculation of course and he may actually end up being too crazy to honor such a deal.
Still, it's kind of pathetic that we're in this situation, and that the R's are collaborating even to the extent that they may be.
Here is the Wile E. Coyote reference:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIPr23xyoZg
Trump is a great at marketing. Humility not so much.
Rather than thinking that Trump is the problem, we should look in the mirror and realize that we are the problem. When we cross the line and begin thinking that a person who is attractive or famous or simply has access to a big megaphone is a reasonable choice to serve in high office ... well, it's obvious Trump is nuts, but we are nuts. If you're a Democrat and you're thinking, "Well, I didn't vote for him!", just look at who you did vote for. If you're a Republican and think, "Well, I only voted for him because the alternative was worse," then what is WRONG with you? How about if we all just be still for a while and do a little introspection?
2
A blender. A lime-green Pontiac GTO. A large boulder. Anything but Trump.
3
Well said. The Republicans are putting our country in harm's way. The recent tax bill is an example of creating a deep chasm between rich, middle and poor Americans. Their basic policy is not to strengthen the economy, as they argue, but to add wealth to the already wealthy individuals and corporations who financially back them in politics. Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell are horrible human beings who have no empathy for the people of this country. It also appears that we cannot trust VP Pence to do the right things for people who are in need. And Trump is the worst president ever...who is taking advantage of all taxpayers. This group will be recorded in history as being the demise, or hopefully, potential demise, of the United States. I obviously hope they do not succeed
1
How does Trump differ from every boss everywhere ever, who wants the job done yesterday? Whether he’s a manager of a company, a coach of a sports club, or the commanding officer of a unit, he knows that he is only as good as his personnel and plans accordingly. The best plan in the world isn’t the best plan if your people can’t execute it. The best plan is the one that gets done—and that makes them the best team ever.
2
Trump went broke six times, left his contractors holding the bag, did not add anything to the fortune he inherited, never did anything for the common good, twiiters stupidities and lies, is insulting and crass. Whatever he got done didn't serve anyone but himself. He has no people but himself because he doesn't even grasp the concept of teamwork. If his people worked well together, he'd be suspicious they were plotting against him and he'd disband the team.
2
Bosses like Trump never attract first rate talent.
2
There is a huge difference between running a company and running a country, which is "one of the many" issues dt is ignorant of.
1
Yes, he is all these things, impetuous, fragile, hostile, irrational, intentionally uninformed, information-averse and semiliterate, but that does not make him mentally ill, unfortunately. And the American people, through our Fourth Estate, the free press, had every opportunity to grasp this, could have known, and should have known. In fact, a majority knew, and he was elected anyway.
But the 25th Amendment does not require, specifically, mental illness or physical illness at all. The Cabinet must say he is "unable" to do the job, period. It does not matter what causes the inability, emotional or temperamental instability is sufficient.
8
Unfortunately the vast majority of the Republican base don’t possess the ethical and moral standard of that exhibited by Meg Whitman who was the first big name Republican to openly denounce Trump in the general election. She also went far further than just denouncing him, she expressed belief that he, if elected, might be the beginning of the end for the democracy practiced in this country for 230 years. The vast majority of her fellow Republicans simply could not care less about the sexist, racist and homophobic policies/statements emanating from Trump in any given moment via any tweet - they just want his wrongheaded policy to be enacted to law. The modern-day Republican Party’s lack of commitment to country over Party will indeed beacon the end of democracy as we’ve known it. And based on the November 8, 2016 election results...we deserve whatever we get.
16
The enablers around Trump see themselves as successful but it is obvious that they know nothing about raising children or puppies. You start by refusing to reward bad behaviour.
The conman begins with a head start, knowing that the common decency will leave most people at a disadvantage, being unwilling to be as rude, ruthless and heedless of others' needs or their right to fair treatment. This is the operating paradigm that eventually has left Trump lost in his own self-referenced orb.
8
"And in so doing, they are moving dangerously close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican could be seen as being an unpatriotic American."
That day came and went a long time ago.
19
But he's not going anywhere. This is the most disturbing thing about his presidency. He's still in the oval office (when he's not on "executive time"). And we're helpless. We're on the outside howling (as Rosalind says in "As You Like It") like Irish wolves at the moon.
6
You have to access mental acuity to what it produces. In the USA and most of the world being smart means achieving financial success. Many religions also believe that wealth is tied to Godliness. Now Bill Clinton who was a Rhodes Scholar and also avoided the Vietnam era draft showed that the US presidency was the path to riches as he parlayed his 8 years into mega-wealth. This lesson was not lost on Trump. Dealing with the mob to get Trump Tower built with quick dry cement, paying off the union head so there would be no strikes during construction, paying off politicians in NY State to keep casino gambling illegal to keep his Atlantic City casino cash cow flowing, declaring bankruptcy numerous times and taking a 1 billion dollar tax write off as a developer without putting up any of that money, if that business acumen is not genius what is? He learned it all from another genius Roy Cohen. Is his genius working for the interests of The United States of America, well the polls Charles Blow displays says a majority do not think so. But you do not need a majority to get elected, Trump saw that too as George W Bush lost the popular vote.
So if you do not abide by Trump, which I don't, face up to the fact. You are dealing with a smart, cunning extremely difficult foe and it will take an uprising similar to the one that stopped the Vietnam War to stop him.
4
If the Clintons are so megawealthy, why do they live in a house that wouldn't get them a decent 2-bedroom in Manhattan?
Oh, stop. Dr. No this guy ain't.
What he calls into question is our smarts; he's a dope, with some talent for real estate and for sucking up taxpayer money.
The US has an exceptionally stupid and self-destructive electorate, and a very rotten scheme for counting votes. Trump is just there for it.
There is no denying that some "like, really smart" people have succeeded in the vocations of their choice. Al Capone must have been "really smart" to have literally gotten away with murder for years before being thrown in the hoosegow - for tax evasion. Bernie Madoff - genius at hiding his Ponzi scheme from his 4,800 clients, "earning" a fat $64.8 billion for his trouble. Frank Abagnale began impersonating some pretty impressive professionals - airline pilot, doctor, lawyer, etc - at a very young age, and made - he was like, really smart.
But one thing these, and other con men have common is that they all got caught. Trump's day will come, and all his braggadocio will sound even more pathetic than it already does.
13
Why is his mental state still in question? Because the modern republican party has sold the country out and will do nothing that might diminish their hold on power. Trump can be allowed to be Trump in the private sector but, as president, he's running my country (into a ditch as I see it) and the "go along to get along republican party" must be made to pay for it.
5
Rothman's criticisms are accurate. The fact overlooked is that many if not most of the DJT, Republicans, Libertarians, Conservatives voters/supporters will fall prey to the policies created by that anti-worker group & find themselves dead or voiceless. The DJT, etc., group have no qualms conning a new group born out of Facebook right wing conspiracy theories, Fox News & its ilk. Someone must make Americans understand what they lose daily as this ilk erodes what the USA created to level the playing field. Is the playing field level all the time, no, but most of the time it is relatively level. The DJT group tilts the field to favor the wealthy while it considers other groups unworthy American citizenship protections.
Folks who follow anything that moves, mistakenly believe that women aren't entitled to healthcare secondary the DJT ilk's 'pro-choice' stance & religious freedom. There is separation of church & state which renders that argument moot. The DJT ilk group have conflated, confused & merged an anti-American stance with religion, anti-choice, failing public schools, fear of foreigners & blatant lies. I.e., Democrats, tax & spend, a bigly lie. The truth is that the DJT group, spends more tax money & passes costs formerly covered by the government on to working people & passes saved dollars to corporations & the wealthy. Its the tip of the iceberg. Whose crazy? The majority of the American people who have failed to remove the DJT group from power.
3
"Moving dangerously close"? That point has long since passed.
4
you're right not to try an amateur diagnosis from afar.
meanwhile, Trump has been in the public eye for decades, a visibility he clearly relishes.
you don't have to be any kind of doctor to see he's a selfish louse.
beyond that, it's nobody's business outside his family what his personal conditions may be.
it's not what he is, it's what he does that affects all the rest of us.
3
Instead of blathering about being unqualified to discuss mental illness, thus obscuring the flashing lights that are now appearing all around this topic, why don't the usual pundits get out of their own way and simply refer to the book edited by Bandy Lee entitled: "The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump"
In it, 27 leading psychiatrists and mental health experts assess the president as a "malignant narcissist" and conclude that he poses an extremely grave danger to the country. They have written the book out of a duty to warn all Americans.
6
Now, could it be considered as an act of "factual patriotism" if someone at Wharton were to leak a certain person's transcript from that institution, and fast?
8
Why bother. It would be deemed “fake”.
No. That would be stooping to his dumb, unethical shenanigans level.
He is not only really, really good looking but also really, really smart. We know it to be true as he has told us many times how smart he is..
Please do not mention Bernie and Oprah.. we need real leadership with real experience. Bernie was part of the problem we got stuck with what we have today. Oprah?? She is smart and successful but seriously...
6
While I almost always agree with your opinions, Mr. Blow, I sometimes think your passion dilutes the effectiveness of your message. This column, in my opinion, is the most reasoned, even-handed analysis of Donald Trump you've written to date. It's therefore the most effective--and scary. More, please.
6
Excellent, but I would say that being a loyal Trump Republican already IS un-American. I’d venture a guess that the majority of Americans feel this way.
10
I've always wondered how our "genius" president was admitted to Wharton -- perhaps his father made a substantial financial "gift" to open the door a little wider.
6
Granted.
But isn't the bigger question how he got through to graduation once the door was opened and he was enrolled?
How could he pass any course? Zero attention span. Does not read. Can't retain facts. Probably can't write well since he can't form a full coherent sentence.
It's hard to believe.
1
The Republicans are doomed if they apply Article 25 and get rid of him that way and I am not saying that for the sake of our elected legislators but also for the registered Republicans that are regular people. I, for example, am a registered republican who will immediately change to democrat and I will vote that way. I am ashamed to be a republican. The party of no shame, no integrity, and ignoring their constituents needs.
The Republicans are also doomed if they keep him in office. His last remark of “I am, like a stable genius” was the last straw. This statement proved he is the exact opposite and has already done our country great damage with the mandate, he believes, that he was voted in by the majority of our country.
The “Tax Cuts” will hurt the greater percentage of our citizens. The Republicans think they passed a great deal when in fact it undercuts most us. I implore you to consider changing to democrat to save us all.
4
"They are moving dangerously close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican could be seen as being an unpatriotic American." Attention please, the day has long arrived. Let's call it as it is.
6
Trump's brand is all that matters to the Trump family and Trump himself. Trump being elected President was his biggest scam of all. Republicans, who get up every day and put their tiny flag pins on their jackets only care about their brand as well. They care about keeping their seats, making money on insider trading, taking Russian money for political action committees and gaslighting their base. Of course they aren't going to step up and do the right thing even if it takes the country down in the process.
4
If, as the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle once suggested, “We are what we repeatedly do,” what does that finally make the scurrilous and scheming sycophants who, for the sake of holding an office, repeatedly “conceal, distort and deny the truth” in efforts to make our president look competent?
Like, really smart?
4
Outside of money Trump inherited from his father, there is not much evidence that he is actually good as a businessman through exploitation or otherwise. We will probably never see those tax returns, but we do know he lost almost a billion dollars in one year. His ability as a real estate developer is mediocre at best compared to others in New York and the US. Basically the money he has made on his own seems to be from being a con artist and a reality television star. So unless you hold those things in high value there is not much to the man in regard to financial expertise. Quite clearly he is a dunce and same goes for his children. His wife and ex-wives seem to fall in the same category. He does have an educated, accomplished, and intelligent sister. Stable genius--not!
6
In the movie "The American President," Annette Bening, playing the President's girlfriend, says of another character, "How can you say you love America but hate Americans?" (thank you Aaron Sorkin, the screenwriter). This summarizes the Republican party. I am so sad and angry that Republicans do not care about this country. They should be ashamed and, even better, voted out of office.
6
The biggest concern about Trump's tweeting is the number of times he is up one the wee hours the morning to spew his take on any given subject. My dad had dementia and he would awaken in the night often. When he did so, he would be processing whatever had gone on during the day, almost like on a delay, he would be concerned with things that had happened hours ago. Others dealing with Alzheimer's have told me the same thing.
The interview with the Times was gibberish from a man who claims not to drink. If he truly doesn't drink then his incoherence coupled with his pre-dawn tweets may certainly be signals for concern.
8
Trump won the election, because of his entertainment value and because he managed to kindle the visceral and shackled emotions of a minority of highly motivated and frustrated voters.. He continues to be president, because of his entertainment value and because he continues to fan the flames of the visceral and shackled emotions of a minority of highly motivated and frustrated voters.
The Democrats lost, because they went so far to the left that they left the majority of the country behind and a sizeable portion no longer in good conscience could vote for their excesses and misguided priorities. The Democrats continue to shoot themselves in the head because the majority of the country can no longer in good conscience support the Democrats because they continue with their excesses and misguided priorities. Those voters fear that with the Democratic party back in power the same folly train will just start rolling again.
As long as those fears remain justified, Trump will remain in the White House.
There may be a lesson in there somewhere the Democrats may want to consider. But their moderate wing is demoralized, in tatters or has been chased out of the Senate.
3
Kara Ben Nemsi On the Orient Express
Then how do you explain the Democratic candidate won the popular vote by approx. 2.8 million votes
1
At this point, I don’t understand why the Republicans continue to support him. They got their tax bill signed. Is there something else that they don’t think they can get from Pence? I guess they worry that a Pence would then be tarnished by any impeachment or censure and would be crushed in 2020, which is going to happen anyway. What a mess.
3
I'm not sure what they're waiting for either. Pence is their dream come true and, as you've already pointed out, they've gotten their tax bill signed. I'm not sure it's tarnishing via impeachment that they're worried about either; after all, look what's happened in the past year. Trump and everyone around him is going down in flames, yet Pence somehow remains as pure as the new-fallen snow. No matter what happens to this shambles of an administration, Pence is probably going to be the last man standing. Given all of that, I really don't know what the Republicans are waiting on in terms of kicking Trump to the curb. It is truly a mess indeed.
“Dangerously close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican could be seen as an unpatriotic American”?
They are already there.
3
People that say they are 'like, really smart' almost never are.
4
There are two women with high qualifications for the Presidency. One is white, the other black. Both can and will restore the damage done by Trump and the Republican Congress. Both are young enough to carry out their duties and smart enough to surround themselves with persons of quality, intelligence, transparency and honesty.
Their names are Elizabeth Warren, and Kamala Harris.
2
Most shocking is the position taken by the GOP. We put the entire planet in peril with the removal of environmental safeguards. We don't own the entire planet. We have no right to exploit the planet for the gain of a few while threatening the very life of all else on earth. How can the GOP toddle along behind these policies? Close behind that are the policies that discriminate, the white supremacist stances, the racism, the anti-Semitism, the sexism and misogyny. What possesses these Republicans to believe this is beneficial to anyone? And the attacks on our healthcare and societal support systems, which is exactly what government should be doing, supporting the people who put it in place, not abusing them. Trump is the face of these people. They are hiding behind him while they take a wrecking ball not just to our country and our democracy, but our very life. You can't kill off the bees, for example, and continue to have food. They are essential to our ecosystem. So while Donald Trump is clearly wrong (intellectually, mentally, physically, socially) for this job and is using it as a platform for his vendetta (against Obama? against a long list of perceived slights?), he remains in place because the GOP will not act as human beings with integrity, empathy, compassion, or even intelligence. They support an agenda that is life-defeating in every way.
3
It’s great to have a column like Mr. Blow’s to make sure the normalization of Trump never happens. The biggest fear is that Trump continues to rant and rave, and patriotic Americans become inured to it. We must keep the spotlight on Trump’s failures each and every day until he and his minions are out of office and no longer a threat to our great country.
2
Daffy Donald, a really smart businessman: six bankruptcies.
1
We have already arrived at that day, where "loyal" Republicans in Congress are acting in ways that are antithetical to the welfare and security of this country. That is not only unpatriotic, it is very close to treasonous.
1
Enough of the armchair attempts at diagnosing this man. . Read about personality disorders here: https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/hide-and-seek/201205/the-10-persona... many have said before, we the people must promote the vote in 2018, and make it CLEAR that electing Trump was an anomaly. Efforts to ensure accessible and fair voting practices should be paramount.
Eisenhower was the Everyman; Stevenson was the egghead. The egghead lost. Reagan was the Everyman; Carter was the engineer. The engineer lost. Bush was the Everyman; Gore was the pointy-headed climate change scare monger. The science based arguments that Gore presented to the nation was a losing strategy. Most incredibly, Trump was the billionaire Everyman, bankruptcies notwithstanding.
The dumber candidate tends to win in America: President Obama was the exception, maybe because Obama's opponents did not pointedly reject intelligence as a presidential attribute.
1
It is also interesting to watch his defenders trotted out on the Sunday political shows and across other media to complain about the personal nature of the revelations. First, and most important, they are personal because they relate to his behavior, erratic and outside the norm, at best, and, more accurately, disturbing and dangerous, if not worse. But these complaints are particularly rich in defense of a man whose only shtick entails personally attacking others for far less troubling behaviors or traits — lyin’ Ted, sloppy Steve, crooked Hillary. And on and on. That his supporters and defenders have the audacity to raise concern about the personal nature of the observations would be comical if it were not so pathetic. And as the clown in chief pretends that the Bible is his favorite “book”, perhaps he’ll recognize one of its recurring themes. You reap what you sow.
4
Thank you for this UNTIMELY op ed.
This could also have been written in April 2015 when Trump announced that he was running for President. But then's when you, like most of the investigative reporters of the Times, were far more concerned with Hillary Clinton using a private email server. Sad.
1
My husband (who is a conservative) and I (liberal Democrat) both find trump's behavior abhorrent. My husband is so appalled at trump and his GOP enablers/protectors that he has eexpressed his hope that this ends the Republican party forever.
And that's saying something for him.
We are so frustrated we can't vote until November. I'm doing the Women's March on January 20th and I consistently write letters to Senators and Reps in DC.
What else is there to do? The GOP is willfully blind to his behavior. What's going to work to get them to do something?
39
Religion. That is the hidden reason why Republicans aren’t calling out Trump.
We are all missing the central cause. Many Republican members of Congress believe they are on a God-sanctioned crusade to transform the United States into a Christian nation to receive the return of Christ.
Although different denominations are held by key Republican leaders (i.e. Orrin Hatch – Mormon; Mitch McConnell – Southeast Christian Church; Paul Ryan – Catholic; Lindsay Graham – Southern Baptist), these leaders all believe that the nation needs to be taken to an era when conservative, bible-based values define political and community life.
Trump has opened a pathway for these Christian conservative politicians, so they have decided that any person who enables the work of God can’t be all bad, and thus they are going to tolerate Trump even when it’s clear that Trump himself is no God-fearing Christian.
The Christian conservatives’ ability to believe that “God works in mysterious ways” makes it easier for them to put up with the mysterious contradiction of Christ’s work being enabled by a cruel conman.
This is not the first time that the helpless side of unquestioning religious faith has enabled an authoritarian leader. We are all complicit in our reluctance to discuss the role that religion is playing in American politics; we consider it poor taste to talk about faith. Because of that, we are allowing a Christian Taliban (or Jeeziban as I call them) to come to power.
11
The wisest single phrase in the whole US Constitution is "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion". Failure to enforce this explicit prohibition of faith-based legislation on that infantile body has made it an attractive nuisance for the worst con artists of all: religious fanatics.
There was an article in The Guardian today written by on of the authors of " The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump: 27 Psychiatrists and Mental Health Experts Assess a President."
The author takes this from the point of view of public safety and is worth a read.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/jan/07/donald-trump-dange...
Mr. Blow is of course correct, as are all the other pundits who have been writing similar things for over 18 months now. Perhaps it is time to stop re-iterating the obvious, and for those pundits and editorial boards to help their readers coalesce in positive action, not just venting on comment boards.
I would like to know something about the history of those, I can't say, long serving, perhaps long-term members is better, of congress who are aiding and abetting this travesty. How much money do they stand to gain by the tax bill? How will the attacks on the ACA and the tax bill effect their constituents? What sort of action would they likely respond to? Who are their donors? What are the special interests they protect?
As the mid-terms come closer, I think it is time to turn over the rocks, and show the nation what comes slithering out.
I would like to see some articles about what is called 'The Resistance'. Who are they? What are their specific foci? How do people contact them?
3
Not reading Mr. Blow's required reading list does not make Trump a non-reader. Succeeding "big league" in three separate areas of endeavor, real estate, television and getting elected President of the United States on his first attempt at a public office while being hugely outspent by an opponent favored by 95% of the MSM does not speak to Trump's inability to deal with reality , indeed it speaks to his ability to master and bend reality to his purposes.
21
Reading your post doesn't help me understand what makes Trump not a non-reader. Mr. Blow makes the point that Trump is capable of manipulation, as you suggest.
11
I take issue with your characterization of Trump's "big league successes". He has filed for bankruptcy protection 3 times, stiffed contractors, associates and employees, ran a fraudulent " university", discriminated against minorities, been accused, persuasively, of assaulting numerous women, has disparaged women, minorities, the handicapped, and he is a pathological liar.
I never had the desire to tune in to anything he did on television. It sounded nasty and inferior to other more worthwhile programming.
He won the popular vote by 3 million votes. Only through gerrymandering was he able to win the presidency.
I don't think the cheap shot about Mr Blow's reading list is helpful. It is pretty commonly known that Mr. Trump is not a reader.
13
Trump definitely succeeded in real estate - by cheating his subcontractors, lenders and investors. No US bank will do business with him any more.
Trump definitely succeed with his TV show - but so did the producers of "Housewives of New Jersey."
As for his success in getting elected, you can thank the Russians whose hundreds of millions of Facebook and Twitter hits turned a few tens of thousands of votes in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin. Clinton won the popular vote.
15
Amid this continued cuckoo fest, I think I've extracted a silver lining: Anyone else basking in the schadenfreude of a man in a position of power having the need to protest how really smart he is, rather than having his position and results speak for themselves? Many successful women in positions of power have had to BE very smart and often smarter and more effective to justify their seat at the table. Maybe Trump is unwittingly helping further level that playing field!
1
I have a very hard time being unbiased. You have included a litany of transgressions and I agree with most of them. But how do you assess how things are going when they all go against what you believe to be true? I have spent some time trying to understand the thinking of the Republican and Conservative viewpoint and it is not 100% wrong. I have then been forced to rethink my liberal democratic viewpoint and have learned that there are trade-offs for each position. A sufficiently large minority of voters put Trump in office, so for the Democrats there has to be soul-searching. Republicans have control of congress, state houses and now the Supreme Court. Where do Democrats go wrong and what is the actual will of the people? Trump, McConnell and Ryan are trying to change what 51% of the people don't want changed, saying that it will be good for us, but Obama did the same thing with health care reform. This is not how we should run our country. We need mutual respect and compromise.
Trump is fully at fault for not doing the job of being a leader for all of us. He may have been a good president if he didn't want to be outrageous. He could have bridged the gap, and Clinton never could have. The Republicans have all enabled Trump who is now ruining parts of our comity. So Ryan and McConnell have sold their souls, and I don't quite get why, I'm still working on it.
1
I've seen elderly and ill relatives and friends decline mentally: Always making excuses and always defensive; saying over and over again how intelligent and put-together they are; showing hostility toward anyone who doesn't agree with them; and arguing loudly over very minor issues. There is no question in my mind that I'm seeing the same decline here.
10
and your credentials are???
Donald Trump does not care about the Republicans or the Democrats or America or the men in uniforms.
He will sacrifice the endless number of the servicemen in order to prove he is the ultimate winner, regardless of the cost to the troops or our country.
He only cares about the people thinking he is the greatest leader because he desperately needs all of them since he is addicted to the adoration and idolization.
Everything else is extremely volatile and everybody else is perishable, from our traditional allies to the personal appointees to the Trump Administration.
So many people serving this country were thrown under a bus the very moment they showed any sign of the independent thinking.
So many of his early backers were instantly discarded if they cared what in the best interest of America is.
We are not talking here about the liberal but the truly conservative victims…
1
You have left out any discussion of the fact that his supporters are all beneficiaries of the same right wing political financing machine that props up the Trump administration. Their silence has been bought and paid for.
4
Now I want to see Trump’s transcripts. Along with his tax returns documents need to show just what his donors bought for America.
1
"You can’t say that you love America and not take a stand to defend it from harm."
One of the problems is that the same folks expected to take a stand to defend this country as the same individuals who voted Donald Trump in. With the exception of 3 or 4 Republicans in office, the remaining lot campaigned, voted and continues to vote and support the actions and policies of Trump. Most of them don't disagree with him at all - they are believers and will not back down. And then there's that majority of the country who feel and believe the same way.
How does one go about defending this country against harm when half of the country and 99% of the GOP believe in Trump and believe he is doing a great job? They honestly don't think he is acting irrational but rather, they support and love his blunt and crass behavior.
1
A person like Mr. Trump would have been less critical 200 years ago, when the impact of a folly was restricted to a cpmparably small territory and few people. But the modern PotUS is relevant for the whole planet and his decisions are likely to affect all humans. The times of splendid isolation are over.
The US electorate can no longer escape a responsibility which is much wider than just national issues. This has be taken into consideration by every US citizen.
2
The book by Lee Iaccoca called Where Have all the Leader Gone has a list of the 9 C's of leadership. Edited for space
1. Curiosity
A leader needs to be curious, to step out of his comfort zone and to listen others' different, possibly challenging ideas.
2. Creativity
Leaders need to be willing to try something new,
3. Communication
Effective leaders confront realities. They communicate the truth, suggest strategies to move forward, inviting others to share their ideas and become involved as part of the solution.
4. Character
Character means knowing the difference between right and wrong, it is about our moral and ethical strength.
5. Courage
A leader must have courage. The courage to sit down at the table and talk, to defend what is right even when it might be unpopular.
6. Conviction
A leader should passionately believe in their goals and be determined to achieve them.
7. Charisma
Charisma is the quality that inspires, that makes others trust you, follow you and believe that they have a valid role to play as part of the vision.
8. Competency
A leader needs to be competent and to surround themselves with people who know what they are doing as competent problem solvers.
9. Common Sense
2
"They would rather defend a compromised Republican president than have to live in the wake of a deposed one. They would like to try to manage the damage Trump may do, rather than prevent that damage from occurring.
And in so doing, they are moving dangerously close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican could be seen as being an unpatriotic American."
And there you have it. When does the press simply admit this, then call the Republicans to account?
3
Donald Trump has truly tested the political writers for the past year. Not only are most of them liberal thinkers, but they are also sore losers. However that is a minor problem when reading Charles Blow. He has made his case over and over again. He is 180 degrees opposite Trump in his approach to communication style and 180 degrees opposite nearly half of America in political thought. Mr Blow, and other TIMES writers, have found the golden pen in this period. Call the president crazy over and over and over, and sooner or later people will accept it as truth. Germany in the 30's is case proof of that approach. Yet Mr Blow fails us in the most important aspect of proving his case. HE FAILS TO OFFER ANY EVIDENCE OF FAILURE AS A POLITICAL LEADER IN TERMS OF POLICY. Differing with Blow on policy doesn't make it wrong. Noting that 52% of folks feel less secure doesn't take into account the growth of North Korea as an agent of war and destruction. A really good writer would explain that and not use it as evidence.
Mr Blow is worried about how the president does his job. He ought to be
less worried about that and more supportive of the actual outcomes of his leadership.
Eventually, so me crisis will occur that will test the President and his administration. No amount of explaining will serve to cover his inability with the crisis. And all of his supporters, especially those in congress will be exposed for not supporting and defending the Constitution of the United States as they had sworn to do. Then their current expediency to push their agenda will be their downfall and will define their mark on history.
2
To constantly pick on Trump is the easy way out. It is the country as a whole that has lost it. To only have Hillary Clinton and Trump as presidential runners, then ending with a roughly 50/50 final score shows a lack of choice and a lack of judgment and a lack of candidates. America as a whole has lost it - a quick example is the Golden Globe entertainment just last night: Three hours of boring jokes, non-stop advertising, and finding a new religion by the name of Oprah Wimpfry says it all.
Although in any other celebrity, or political figure, this behavior might be cause for concern. Here I do not believe it is even the slightest bit out of place, aberrant or unwarranted. The potential negative effects of the outrageous media coverage of this issue on the efficacy of the administration, both nationally and internationally, are enormous and REQUIRE some sort of strong defensive response.
In fact, in consideration of how significant this attack actually is, I find his responses to be quite mature and understated.
It's telling that in this culture we struggle to explain the difference between intellectual ability and the ability to make money.
2
There is one additional group that must its share of the blame: Trump's base. Many GOP elected leaders keep quiet about Trump because they are afraid of his base and of being primaried if they speak out. These American citizens are also betrayers of the country.
1
I think the size of the Democratic wave in the 2018 midterm elections will depend to a large degree on the number of Republican voters who backed Trump in 2016 because they thought he would grow into the job or change.
If they are now horrified that nothing has changed, but become worse...they may either vote democrat for a check on his power or not vote at all.
If this becomes the case the Republican defeat will be epic.
2
While we endlessly discuss the president’s leadership and intellectual capacity, the members of Congress, Scott Pruitt and Jeff Sessions are working hard on a agenda which will pick our pockets, destroy our environment and infrastructures, privatize any safety net like Social Security and Medicare, and impose laws which don’t address root problems, but punish people for standing up and voting their conscience. We are in trouble from the top down, but we’re only focused on the noisy top because that’s the way they want it in order to make their transformation of this country complete. The hate and distain this administration has for the people of this country is a sad legacy to the former character of our nation, and the glee which his base celebrates it is possibly the scariest part. The top may not be truly stable, but the con he’s running is first rate genius.
1
Indeed, the main question now is whether we call passionate defense of obvious foibles in 45 partisan to the point of being unpatriotic. For our Republic to survive, country and constitution must have priority over party loyalty to a president. Thank you, Charles Blow, for saying what so many of us are thinking and feeling: we the people are being undermined.
2
Wolff's book yet again emphasizes that the sole focus of Trump's interest is in public approval. He'll do anything -- exactly that -- anything to gain approval from anyone and everyone. With that as his only interest, he has honed a skill -- genius, possibly -- at discerning what any audience wants to hear and he tells them that. Barring a clear read on an audience, like his CIA address or to the Boy Scouts -- he launches into a rant of praise for himself.
That being said, there is NOTHING else there! No plans, no organizational skills, no strategy, no greater policy goals or political goals for the country. Did he want to be President -- no or yes -- he wanted to win and strut before the accolades of the people and the media. Did he want to do the job? No. Is he competent to do the job? No. Has he deluded 25% of the populace into believing he is talking to them? Yes. Will he provide what he promises to them? He has no clue what that is or how to provide it.
Do I agree with Mr. Blow? Yes, sort of. But he complicates the picture. Trump has one skill, as described above, and it is NOT being President.
1
Charles wrote:
"They [Congress] are moving dangerously close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican could be seen as being an unpatriotic American."
Um, they crossed the line into being unpatriotic more than 10 years ago, i.e. which they refused to accept the legitimacy of Pres Obama, and obstructed him in every possible way.
Oh, and don't forget about Merrick Garland.
1
Paul Krugman explained last week why Republicans can't and won't divorce themselves from Trump. Simply put, it would acknowledge that their policies of the last 30 years were a fraud, if not an outright lie. "Tax Reform" = tax cuts to the richest. "Entitlement Reform" = cuts to social programs: privatization of Social Security and the gutting of Medicare and Medicaid.
They have no choice. Trump is not a tar baby; he is coated with super glue.
2
So, someone being a genius is only a matter of a self-proclamation? How would this individual, with such a long list of characteristics unsuited be being president, have any credibility beyond his own narcissistic mirror? Okay, we know the answer to this.
Trump is not a genius or anything in that vicinity, like simply being smart. He may or may not be mentally ill, but he absolutely has obvious indicators of someone unqualified for any leadership role in which intellectual honesty, stable temperament and attention to detail are critical.
Trump is an apprentice president. He needs to be fired...for his sake and ours.
Eclectic Pragmatism — http://eclectic-pragmatist.tumblr.com/
Eclectic Pragmatist — https://medium.com/eclectic-pragmatism
1
I am a retired mental health professional and I would not diagnose Mr. Trump without a personal examination.
In the grand scheme of things, it really doesn't matter if Mr. Trump has a personality disorder, a bad collection of character traits, or some other disorder such as early dementia. What matters is that he is harming this country and his Republican colleagues are not doing anything to stop him.
Every day we see a new edict that is harsh and cruel. Today it is the end of TPS for Salvadorans. A week or two ago, it was Haitians. Last month it was DACA. There is no route for these people to take to become citizens, even though they are here legally. Republicans in Congress are not addressing the problems these mass deportations will cause if they allowed to occur.
Meanwhile, I see totally heartless and cruel comments in the NY Times from readers who don't seem to have any compassion for the people who have been here a decade or more and whose lives will be forever affected by harsh action without real justification.
Typically, they say that TPS was not "forever." But the people in this program by and large are contributing to our country economically and socially. The best response is not mass deportation but mass citizenship for these people.
328
Maybe not 'mass citizenship', but certainly permanent residency with a path toward citizenship. Along the same orderly way every other legal immigrant needs to proceed. They need to demonstrate that they contribute in a positive manner to the country, are loyal to the Constitution and have not committed any crimes. Those would be my key requirements. I think we can safely assume that the majority of the affected individuals - but not all - will be able to satisfy these criteria.
1
Great of you not to violate your ethics, but what you think is harming I view as both improving and keeping his promises. We elected him to do what he promised not to do something else.
Horrors! They might becomes citizens and register as Democrats! We can't have that!
I read an article about a "genius" scientist exploring and creating at the age of the quantum "weirdness" that Einstein referred to.. Three things stood out in the interview.
1. Crediting his student day mentors, naming them, and essentially saying, without them, I couldn't have achieved what I have achieved.
2. Amalgamating a team of scientists, focussing on finding colleagues "wired creatively, but differently", because breakthroughs come from collaboration.
3. Humility, roundedness, getting as much enjoyment from parenting, working out, etc..
The dumbing down gets serious when TV shows see barely pubescent youth outsmarting the adult doltish characters, or performing operations in hospitals, or being President of the USA. What a distortion of reality, what a denial that hard work matters; what a gloomy future a country will face with these realities.
9
To call the President of the US. a "mentally unstable simpleton" is to demean the person who says it and those who repeat it. Denial is not jut a river in Egypt.. If a graduate of Wharton, builder of hotels, golf courses around the world, t.v. star and president of the US is not a genius, then who is?Described in this way, writer shows a lack of respect for the Office of President and c-in-c himself. Wolffe's book is based on hearsay, just as Ed Klein's books against the Clintons raised problems of credibility. You should endeavor to be more analytical, and suggest you broaden your horizons by reading FIRST MEDITATIONS by the father of Cartesian analysis, Rene Descartes himself, and if possible, peruse it in the original French. Apparent that you resent the notion of Trump in the WH, but 61 million of us voted him in. I disapprove of bigotry of any kind, and suggest that anyone who would disrespect someone whose ideas he disliked is guilty of the same intolerance.I believe in fair play, Mr. Blow, and so should you.
2
The Democrat outpaced President-elect Donald Trump by almost 2.9 million votes, with 65,844,954 (48.2%) to his 62,979,879 (46.1%), according to revised and certified final election results from all 50 states and the District of Columbia.
Clinton's 2.1% margin ranks third among defeated candidates, according to statistics from US Elections Atlas.
3
And 70M voted against him. Nothing fair about that. Respect should not ever be presumed, but must be earned. So ironic to accuse those who reject this president as lacking respect for the office when his every word and move demean it deeply.
3
this is unintentionally hilarious
1
"Stupidity, outrage, vanity, cruelty, iniquity, bad faith, falsehood - we fail to see the whole array when it is facing in the same direction as we.
One must either take an interest in the human situation or else parade before the void."
--- Jean Rostand (1894-1977), a French biologist, scientist, philosopher, researcher and pacifist
11
One: I don not believe that DT is all that different from his long tenure in the real estate and hotel business--working the phones, using bluster, charm, grandiosity, fictionalizing etc; maybe a few signs of stress added in. Two: if he was to be so deranged, people here would not just follow him blindly, as if he was Mad King Ludwig. Three: it seems redundant to keep pointing out that the man is a narcissist--no kidding! Obvious. Four: I do not think that DT, in a ny state of mind, is the big problem here--we have a corporate--religious Right--Koch--ultraconservative axis of power, he serves their agenda, and if he goes, so what?
2
That is the question isn't it? Given the self-evident nature of the man, why are folks continuing to follow him blindly?
2
Point #2 is obviously wrong. People saw the vulgarity, the craziness, and rolled the dice with the country anyway. No doubt the corporatists - including religious ones - are colluders, but he is singularly unfit in every way. His business history is riddled with failure as well. As he himself noted, he was the debt king, funded in recent years by Russians. Don't confuse corruption with success.
1
Very well said. Republican support of a destructive force (vulgar Trump) of a fragile democracy may be akin to treason from within, and certainly making it an easier target to pierce it's security by foreign malicious intent. Trump is a 'genius liar' (he does it so naturally it is a marvel in it's effectiveness, witness a pliable highly misinformed and prejudiced 'base' supporting his every move, however stupid and/or dangerous). And Trump is highly competent in distracting us from his malfeasance, finding scapegoats right and left, Hillary's e-mails being a favorite 'constant', irrespective of it's irrelevance a year after stealing the presidency. We are currently living an institutionalized violence, an abuse of power we haven't seen in a long time, not that dissimilar from the crooked autocrats in third world countries, China and Russia, and Iran, included. Now, however much I would like to see justice work it's ways, and get Trump ousted before he destroys us all, can we really expect better from a deluded mind, expressed in this vulgar bully's behavior, and give us what he lacks, decency?
1
Mr. Blow, as of now I have yet to meet a Republican Trump Supporter, with perhaps the exception of Mr. Otter who is a decade older than Trump. There may be another, but I did not hear from his spouse at Christmas, and I fear there may be some health problems.
Mr. Otter is at home glued to 'Fox News', and he knows that I am 'velcro' to the New York Times, which apparently is a commie newspaper. He thinks that everybody has problems, and that we should stop clocking Trump on the head. I try to cheer him up by telling him that Trump will probably be the only president remembered fifty years from now by his grandchildren.
There is an element of cruelty, laced with despair, watching Trump go down like a bull. We have to leave him behind and move on. If I were a member of his family, and based on experience of how fortunes can be reversed, I would be stashing my acorns, making sure the exit door remained open for a swift departure.
The Republican Party, as a whole, probably started unraveling with the 9/11 attack on America. It is possible that it can be saved, but right now we need to rebuild and restore our Country on all fronts. This does not involve taking our Country back from Neverland, or having a Civil War.
Reading these lines earlier were of comfort:
"'We' ought to be explorers...
We must be still and still moving
Into another intensity
For a further union, a deeper communication
Through the dark cold...' (T.S. Eliot)
Feeling fortunate to be an American.
4
Thank you for your comment. Charming.
1
Trump is the smartest moron President we ever had.
5
Trump is a pompous blowhard, but I doubt he will do any more damage to the nation than Mr. Blow, whose motives in writing columns on Trump such as this are no more noble than Trump's motives in defending himself against the left's concerted effort to overthrow the last election and get rid of him.
If the avalanche of vicious attacks on Trump--some justified, others based on fake news and led led by Democrats embarrassed by Hillary's defeat, along with their media lapdogs, were to succeed in 2019 after Democrats regained control of the House and Senate. What then? Nneither Trump nor his supporters would go peacefully. They would not allow progressive to overturn their election victory.
How would Trump & Co. prevent impeachment conviction from ousting him from office? He wouldn't recognize it as legitimate under the always malleable rule of law. A political coup by the left, even one seemingly by "constitutional" means, might not be sufficient to get rid of Trump if he decides to stay. By the misuse of the nation's police powers in the past, particularly under the Obama administration, the banana-republic nature of the United States has been revealed. I'm sure that fact didn't escape Trump, with his ego-maniac, little Napoleon complex. Indeed, it may have been the crucial factor in motivating him to run.
Or, suppose Trump is ousted. Pence becomes President. He appoints Trump as his Chief of Staff. Trump continues to rule America. Way to go, Blow.
The last thing Pence would do after Trump is ousted is appoint him Chief of Staff. First, no work would get done, second, the GOP is frantically searching for a way of getting rid of Trump and installing Pence as President that they can blame on the Democrats, so they are protected from the fury of Trump's base.
Trump is imposing unfathomable damage on the country, unless you are not counting losing our hard-won influence as the de facto world leader and ceding that role to China and Russia. Yes, Russia! Because every time the US loses, Russia wins. Or has it escaped you that Putin isn't saying anything anymore about the election? He doesn't need to, we are already inflicting maximal damage on ourselves without him. Any word he says would redirect our fury away from ourselves toward Russia again.
Unfortunately, as usual, only history will be able to fully account for the damage Trump is causing right now.
2
Just as long as crooked Kushner brokers peace in the Middle East before all or any this happens.
1
Since Blow doesn't have a nuclear button it is apparent to anybody that he is less dangerous than Trump. Your assertions regarding "fake news" to which Trump happily takes credit tells me that you're willfully uninformed just like our President. And Obama didn't abuse any powers he was just black. Sorry white fellow from Tennessee that is not a crime.
1
I feel like we are living backwards in time with a Nero or Caligula in the White House. Can it get any worse? Well, yes it can, if Trump remains full term, but the alternative of extremist & intolerant Pence or slick boy Ryan may be as bad or worse than Trump. It's kind of like H.C. Andersen's THE EMPEROR'S NEW CLOTHES. There are the Trumpest Jackal-like opportunists who lick his heels (like Stephen Miller, Kellyanne Conway, certain senators & congress persons etc.) and know he is totally naked but would never admit it,...then there are his supporters who live in this blind fantasy that Trump is garbed in glorious raiment and he is going to bestow same upon them. Ha, ha, ha...NOT! We have a lot of deluded & ignorant folks across this wide once great land, and a lot of evil greedy & power hungry elected & employed villains working in our government from the highest levels down. It is indeed a time to be embarrassed being an American born citizen. Corruption and influence has existed in our countries history from its founding, but never more than today. "An empire is not conquered from without, but from within."...The Rise and the Fall of the Roman Empire.
5
"And in so doing, they are moving dangerously close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican could be seen as being an unpatriotic American." Patriotism is worse than a meaningless phrase to these people. It's a suckers thing. I do not get what it is that compels a number of opinion writers such as yourself to make these kinds of hair splitting moral statements. Trump and the individuals who are aligned with him do not know or care about any kind of loyalty other than that which they give to themselves and demands from those who associate with them. The people who are running the nation are patriotic to themselves. They would, will, destroy Trump or each other the instant he is no longer useful to them as a tool to get what they want for themselves. We can count on this behaviour from every rat who has already left the sinking ship. Selling Trump or each other to the Law is the only thing they have left to sell.
2
News media is has yet to report on the on-going investigation into Obama FBI and Justice department irregularities during the 2016 campaign.. the implications of which far exceed any of the hyperbole paranoia of the "Russian collusion" story that is now collapsing.. very dishonest .. using the organs of the intelligence community to spy of political rivals should be alarming to everyone no matter what your political strip.. please start reporting the actual news..
Mr. Blow's editorials are the most one-sided, uncompromising and strongly worded ones I've read in the Times--and I am at pains to disagree with a single word he's written. His essays are a bedrock of sanity and integrity in these very uncertain times.
24
It's hard to know where Trump stands on some absolute level of fitness. I heard Doris Kearns-Goodwin say recently on NPR that Trump utterly lacks the "temperament" of president, but his showmanlike bluster on behalf of the deplorables who watch tv against an imperious, bookish and arrogant elite may fit the times. We've had many personally dangerous presidents in the past, including Reagan in mental decline while under the sway of his wife's astrology; Nixon being paranoid; JFK apparently dropping acid and, well, you know what else including Marilyn and the mob; FDR having a long affair (fodder for blackmail in wartime); Harding being in the company of crooks; Wilson being stroked out -- and that's just a few highlights from the past 100 years. Of course, everything in politics by definition is political. But must journalism be so rabidly partisan? I'm getting sick of the ad hominem attacks on Trump, and I didn't even vote for him.
By any objective measure, one has to be stark raving mad to dive into US politics.
2
Ad hominem doesn't mean inaccurate.
First the democrats said the Russians changed the elections; which they did not; then they cried collusion. Now that is a myth; get over the election. It is over and President Trump is the president. We have a tax plan where 93% of people will obtain a refund, a great economy, tax breaks where companies are giving bonuses and incentives to their employees, the U.S. going back fully to a Constitution with competent judges, the UN and NATO having to pay their fair share and a taxpayer protected from runaway spending by a community organizer who did nothing for 8 yrs. except leave a mess of a healthcare plan. Obama did not know a thing about business and his terms in office proved it.
2
The GOP isn't going to do anything about Trump because he's the idiot with a pen that they have long needed to pass their agenda. As long as he continues to support the goals of the donor class such as the recent tax plan they have no reason to abandon him. The only thing that would cause the GOP to turn on Trump is if he suddenly becomes an obstacle to achieving their goals.
We have to remember that the current GOP isn't the same party that held their president accountable during the Nixon investigation into the Watergate scandal. They put the well-being of the nation first and while it may have cost them one election they won the next 3 elections.
The only people who can do anything about Trump is the American people. If you don't like what you're seeing in Washington DC then become part of the solution. For so very long we haven't been paying attention. This last election was a bit of a temper tantrum by voters. We can turn things around by running for office, supporting moderate candidates, and staying engaged with what our government is doing in our name.
If you're not sure what leadership looks like I suggest you watch Oprah's golden globe speech. Things might be a hot mess right now but there is always a leader who knows exactly what needs to be said. The American spirit is much stronger than a man who ran for the highest office as a publicity stunt and is now having very public meltdowns.
11
Speaking as someone with over 25 years experience caring for individuals suffering from mental illnesses this is an astute analysis.
I “get” that his pathetic subordinates have devolved to untruthful flattery in order to protect their jobs and further their own agendas, this is a familiar strategy for courtiers throughout history. And also one of the reasons for a certain Declaration made back in 1776.
10
You can’t say that you love America and not take a stand to defend it from harm.
Do you feel Trump is Dividing the country, or Uniting it?
- Dividing the country: 62%
- Uniting the country: 32%
Speak out. Impeach. Convict. Move-on.
Organize.
Vote.
Show the world America works.
6
Charles, I agree with the entire op-ed. Except for your conclusion:
"And in so doing, they are moving dangerously close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican could be seen as being an unpatriotic American."
That day has long since passed.
Perhaps it was last April, when the President described neo-Nazis as "fine people."
Perhaps it was 2 years ago, when he kicked off his campaign by maligning people who are Mexican.
Perhaps it was when we heard him openly bragging about sexual assault.
Perhaps it was when he began playing nuclear brinkmanship via the use of playground taunts.
Perhaps it was when he mocked a human being with a disability.
Perhaps . . .
There can only be so many "red lines." He has crossed them all.
Substantive policy differences and opinions as to the role of government are fine. But supporting this man is not fine.
Doing so is indeed unpatriotic.
17
It was apparent from the beginning of his campaign that he has a very limited vocabulary. “Art of The Deal” was truly one of the worst books I’ve ever attempted to read. It was so horrible that I threw it in the trash to make sure I would not be tempted to pick it up again. So why did so many Americans vote for this guy? I think it was a combination of Obama fatigue and Clinton backlash. Throw in Bernie’s avowed socialism and Trump threw his hat into the perfect storm. He was the outrageous, boorish, protest candidate. He represents part of the electorate that is tired of being ignored, so they rose up and did the unthinkable just to show that they could. Trump thinks he was elected because he was the best candidate but it was really the opposite. He won because he wasn’t Hillary and represents a slap in the face to the establishment. His unfitness is a positive attribute to those who want to shake Washington to it’s corrupt core. Contrary to popular belief, the voters are like, really smart.
5
No, really bigoted.
“You can’t say that you love America and not take a stand to defend it from harm.”
Maybe those that support Trump don’t see any of this as harmful. They approve of the results they’re getting, the regulations undone, the conservatives filling every bench. They like that Trump is messing with the status quo. I may be shocked, baffled, appalled and furious over the shredding of norms-behavioral and political- but lots of people are okay with all or much of it. Maybe we’re being too delicate. We get the vapors all the live long day over every outrageous word and action. Meanwhile the ruling party talks about Trumps agenda, or Trumps meetings or Trumps calls to a head of state. While we’re busy wringing our hands they’re getting on with it. Maybe he isn’t a likeable man but he’s got a lot of support out there. Isn’t it time we stopped wasting time on gasping outrage and started figuring out how to work around this boob?
1
Perhaps, what you perceive as to be "normal" and "right" are not so perceived by others.
Isn't politics a marketplace of the ideas of governance?
Why to you seem to be so eager to achieve by other means that which you have been unable to achieve at the ballot box?
There's no worked around for single-party government, especially when concern for the country has been replaced by desire to keep power.
I may not be a genius, but at least I was smart enough not to vote for DJT. None of this has been really surprising, many of us saw it coming from the git go. And yet, it is still hard to believe this administration is really happening. What a shame!
9
Bingo! You really nailed it here Charles. Being able to take advantage of people does not imply intelligence, only ruthlessness. Those of us who are musically gifted recognize others with the gift. Intelligence likewise recognizes intelligence. Any genius would recognize the value of input from intelligent, capable people, geniuses, or not. A truly genius President would seek their counsel for the benefit of his country, its people, and the world at large. It is clear that our President bandies this word around without knowing what it means. Ditto for this entire hideous joke of an administration. This is the worst sham ever perpetrated on the American people.
9
I'm a fan of your columns, but, calling the GOP support for Trump "politically expedient" and "unpatriotic" are too-pale shadows of far more accurate descriptors, "criminal" "treasonous" "complicit" and so forth. You know that, Mr. Blow. It appears that the reality of the misconduct is so extreme that seasoned commentators tend to see it through the lens of traditional-scale corruption.
Truth is sometimes most effective when it isn't watered down. Please shake that habit. The calibration is wrong. These violations of our nation's values should produce columns that boil blood. Please provide.
1
I’m a nurse. How long would anyone tolerate this Trump style behavior by their nurse?
9
People say there is a fine line between genius and insanity. Trump crossed that line years ago.
3
Like, this could be easy (and genius):
2020/Oprah
2020/Tom Hanks
2020/My dog, Riley (just to make a point)
2020/Bill and Melinda Gates
2020/about 100,000 other Americans who are smart, thoughtful, and care about the world
4
Wow. Check out the photo of Trump before the article. The picture speaks volumes. Trump looks like he's shriveled and aged since he became president. He appears to be running on empty. He needs to retire.
1
He looks a like a sleep deprived Bannon.
1
Yes, let's have another Harvard Law graduate whose claim to history is a history of evolving positions that reflect changing wind directions and led to nothing but hot air.
FDR and HST were not great intellectuals, but possessed moral fibre. Ike knew where to draw the line. LBJ did more for poor and Black Americans that any POTUS in history. Experience, decency and clarity of purpose are needed, not shallow speeches and celebrity status.
Whitehouse for the White House in 2020.
1
Oh they are already un-American. The most appalling aspect of the Trump presidency is the slavish sycophancy of the Republican Party and their willingness to enable Trump to attack his enemies, attack the press and the courts while personally profiting from his office, obstructing justice, and destablizing the country and the Western alliance. Apparently Republicans will put up with anything to advance the selfish agenda of their donors.
3
Supporting a malignant narcissist for the sake of one’s own political power or financial gain has been eroding the moral compass of our Nation for far too long. It’s not just an organizational behavior. Sadly, I know far too many people who “like” Trump because of their tax cuts or because work in the financial services sector and its good for business. . I do not count these individuals as friends. They are traitors of our Nation, as much as McConnell, Ryan, Nunez, Grassley, Trump’s Cabinet and the other assorted toadies who are rotting what remains of any morality in our Nation.
2
Thank you, Mr. Blow, for saying all these things that need to be said over and over until we get answers from that feckless republican party of defenders. But, of course, I expect nothing but a deafening silence from that bunch.
2
One highly worrisome issue is that Trump shows extreme Narcissistic Personality Disorder. These people rarely because they don't believe anything could possibly be wrong with them. The DSM-5 lists the symptoms as:
* Grandiosity with expectations of superior treatment from others
* Fixated on fantasies of power, success, intelligence, attractiveness, etc.
* Self-perception of being unique, superior, and associated with high-status people and institutions
* Needing continual admiration from others
* Sense of entitlement to special treatment and to obedience from others
* Exploitative of others to achieve personal gain
* Unwilling to empathize with the feelings, wishes, and needs of other people
* Intensely envious of others, and the belief that others are equally envious of them
* Pompous and arrogant demeanor
Is there any symptom there that we don't see from Trump on a daily basis?
NPD features: Deficient conscience; unscrupulous, amoral, disloyal, fraudulent, deceptive, arrogant, exploitative; a con artist & charlatan; dominating, contemptuous, vindictive, sexually seductive, enticing, beguiling, tantalizing; glib & clever; disinclined to real intimacy; indulges hedonistic desires; bewitches & inveigles others; pathological lying & swindling. Tends to have many affairs, often with exotic partners. They are thin-skinned & react to everytrivial or even imagined criticism with outbursts of rage, defiance, or by seeking revenge.
2
Republicans worship at the altar of power regardless of how corrupt or inept that power maybe. A large number of Americans displayed as much ignorance and as poor judgement as trump by voting for him. Let us all hope that enough of them have read, sobered up and are wiser by the midterms.
1
Mr Blow,
What comes first? feeding your family or the country wellbeing when you are not 100 percent sure he is hurting the country. The mentality of most republicans is $$$ first then everything else
GOOD NEWS: Trump is preparing for an interview with the Russia probe...“If Trump lies during this interview, he will be guilty of a felony.”
5
Most of Trump's actions are what right leaning Republicans have wanted ever since Reagan declared, "Government is the enemy." Republican elected officials and Trump's fans don't care one bit whether he's sane or smart, they just want him to keep destroying the things liberals like. It doesn't matter whether those things being destroyed are good for the country or not, if liberals like it, destroy it. Yes, that's crazy but that is the political situation in our country now when compromise has become a dirty word for the GOP.
5
What these fools don't get, is that some of those things liberals like, are helping them, too.
2
“Damages of $306 billion makes 2017 the costliest year ever for US weather disasters-$100 billion more than the previous record”
This is the cost of deregulation and climate change deniers.
States who allow profit over safety,public health and well being and do not enact and enforce regulations based on scientific evidence on best practices for preventing damage to our water quality,land use,mass housing projects,and food production should not ask the American tax payer for economic redress when disasters occur.
Why should my hard earned tax dollars go to pay for reconstruction when lawmakers refuse to heed the experts advice on how to mitigate the damages of flooding.Here’s a novel idea-don’t allow multi million
construction projects close to flood plains or coastal areas.
Republicans seem to dislike Big /Evil Government until they need it-healthcare (thank you Obama),the 2009 the economic recovery(thank you Obama),saving the auto industry(thank you Obama), the EPA,Medicare,Social Security.
Hold onto that huge tax refund you’re getting-that $306 billion doesn’t grow on trees.
Trump reminds me of a person who can't read and who spends every waking moment of his life trying to keep that fact a secret....
Whether it's about illiteracy or the merest ability to stay focused for 5minutes
at a time, it is clear that his presence in the White House works well for the Senate who needs the perfect fool to keep stuffing his face while they attack average Americans in favor of the rich. Have there ever been such disgraceful
men at the reins of power?
What i want to hear from you is a column a day on all the signing documents
and what they mean to the lives of the American people.....
The Chip Program
Drilling.....everywhere etc. etc etc. everything he has put his pen to......
We already know that he's mentally compromised......not one doubt in my mind..
It is time the American people know in detail just how and where he has
made their lives harder. And I sure would like to know...in dollars and cents
how much the members of the Senate and House will benefit from the tax legislation....on both sides of the aisle.....And just to be fair lets start with
the Minority "Leader".
2
The problem is that we discover sociopathic, narcisistic, mentally challenged individuals only after they are charged with prosecutable crimes. The manifestations of these serious personality flaws --the things cited in this and virtually every other Trump expose are neither prosecutable nor legally disqualifying. You cannot demand that an American undergo psychiatric evaluation in the US without a legal reason unlike Putin's Russia. If we had elected a Putin, Mussolini, Hitler, or Stalin who operated within the nation's Constitutional framework there is no post election check and balance that would allow for his removal. And that protection is a priceless Democratic.
That means that without an impeachable offense we need a political solution. The GoP must stand on principle or survival not myopic vested interests rewarding the rich and punishing the rest. Democrats must organize and sweep to victory on an anti-Trump, progressive agenda. Politicians must reject and reverse Trump carnage.
The likelihood of GoP Senators switching parties or blocking Trump's egregious excesses is small. So we must organize to sweep them out of office, retake power, reverse what has been done.
The media must declare war on evil, probe and report psychic and political corruption.
We must do this without trespassing the Constitution and reason. We must name what we have stepped in and the stench that emanates while maintaining basic decency. No small order.
1
I think Trump is conflating his wealth with an indicator of his own worth as a person or intelligence.
I guess Trump has not been made aware that any idiot can make money.
The fact that he did not lose all of his father's legacy is due to the lawyers and people he hired not his own savvy decisions. I think I saw it in the Times yesterday that if he had simply invested his $200M most of which his father left him he would have $12B today. Apparently due to his own business acumen he has something around $8B.
Everyone should have been seeing every republican as an unpatriotic American since the 70's.
10
The American people did not elect this clown. The antiquated, colonial relic Electoral College processed him through...
So, there's that.
20
The american people did in fact elect Trump. That's why Hillary gave a concession speech (because she lost), and Trump an inaugural address (because he won). Reasonable minds can differ on a lot of things, but not the foregoing as those are facts. We can reasonably discuss whether the electoral college should exist or not. Awarding the election to the person that received the most votes has inherent logic, but protecting the middle of the country from the policies that tend to come out of the coastal population centers also has some logic (whether that was the original purpose or not). Any law can be changed if voters care enough; until then, the law is what it is, and you can't avoid a loss by recharacterizing the opponent's victory as him merely being "processed through."
Also, it's not clear Hillary would have won even if the law were different because Trump would surely have adjusted his strategy, focused less time on the middle states and modified his message. Who knows what would have happened then?
I think the story of the election is a modern day rendition of the tortoise and the hare. While Hillary spent her final campaign months wooing celebrities and big money donors (assuming all she needed to do was let Trump undo himself) Trump was flying all over the country, appearing in front of his supporters and rallying his base. There are very few things hustle does not overcome, and Hillary got out-hustled by our current elected commander and chief.
A trumper resorting to "facts" to make a point? What gives??
A margin of three MILLION is not even close. The point is the majority of American voters didn't pick this clown. Change the subject all you want - that's expected by a trumper....you guys are relentless no matter how insane you have to sound.
That said, there is a weak argument to be made for goosing up the representation of rural Americans at the expense of urban America (where most of us live!)...and I'd fully expect you to try it.
First, I voted for Hillary.
Second, in general, assuming that anyone who would support Trump is irrational or stupid is both unfair and incorrect.
Third, no one is disputing Trump lost the popular vote, but nevertheless the american people very much elected Donald Trump. You say they didn't because you think the rules should be different. As I've pointed out, changing the rules, changes the way the game is played by both parties. Would that have caused a 4.4% change in voter behavior (3 million votes); I'd say probably not, but no one can say with any certainty.
Fourth, I never took a position on the electoral college. I merely summarized the rationale for each position and you assumed you could infer what my position was.
Believing “sources” and getting trolled by a bored old guy on twitter are true signs of mental illness.
You know this is a plot line to him, right?
2
Most people here don't "get" that, especially those who, like Mr. Blow, constantly disguise opinion as fact.
“Stable” genius?
Relative to rest of the herd in the barn, probably so.
8
Hah ! good one.
1
In the Trump Republican barn, some of the animals are more equal than the others.
Trump is a spoiled rich kid who always got what he wanted by manipulating and bullying the people around him. People who knew him them tell stories of his acting out in anger, bullying younger children, vandalism, cruelty and dislike of school and learning. Now in his 70's, nothing about Trump has changed. What is telling is that the Americans who voted for him care nothing about these traits, but look to him as a role model because he is rich. I have relatives who are economically lower middle class, but think that someday they can be like Trump. They listen to right-wing radio and TV, and believe that dismantling agencies like the EPA, Dept of Education, the FDA and CDC is a good idea, when they really have no idea what these agencies do. It is up to the rest of us to change the balance of power in November and stop this madness.
16
"I have relatives who are economically lower middle class, but think that someday they can be like Trump."
Have you ever asked them about their plans to acquire great wealth?
When you have to say "I'm a stable genius" ......you are ....not, stable nor a genius! Pathetic.
12
"You can’t say that you love America and not take a stand to defend it from harm."
As a Brit, I do my best to defend her from harm. Not because I love her, but because I need her to be healthy.
214
Yes this is very true, which is why I support the policies and proposals of the Trump administration, almost entirely. I ignore Tweets and political bloviating.
Typical traits of a person with narcissistic personality disorder: An insatiable appetite for the attention of others; Extreme feelings of jealousy; An expectation of special treatment; Exaggerating achievements, talents, and importance; Extreme sensitivity and a tendency to be easily hurt and to feel rejected with little provocation; Difficulty maintaining healthful relationships; Fantasizing about their own intelligence, success, power, and appearance; An ability to take advantage of others to achieve a goal, without regret or conscience;A lack empathy, or ability to understand and share the feelings of others, and a tendency to disregard others' feelings; A belief that only certain people can understand their uniqueness; A tendency to consider themselves as skilled in romance; Responding to criticism with anger, humiliation, and shame; Seeking out praise and positive reinforcement from others; An expectation that others will agree with them and go along with what they want;Whatever they crave or yearn for must be "the best”. If you don’t recognize that Trump displays most of these traits, you have not been paying attention. We who are not psychiatrists can set aside the issue of clinical diagnosis, and focus on Trump’s behavior. He shows none of the traits associated with effective leadership. The US deserves better in a president. And whatever you think about Hillary’s emails is entirely irrelevant to Trump’s unfitness for office.
9
Donald J. Trump is mentally ill - with severe personality pathology. You don't need to be an expert or to examine him to know that - notwithstanding the Goldwater Rule. Happily, though, more experts are coming forward to voice their concern. Everyone should read Dr. Bandy Lee at Yale and the essays she gathered by other mental health professionals in "The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump." He poses an existential threat to humanity. The more people who come forward, the more pressure there will be on his apologists. That's the only way he can be removed -politically. Apart from his unfavorable mental status his fundamental problem is that he has no integrity. Integrity: The quality of being honest and having strong moral principles; moral uprightness.
12
Who tweets that they are "like, really smart" to prove their intelligence?
After hearing Oprah's speech at the Golden Globes last night I think we me have a contender to replace our the failing Donald Trump. She is everything Trump is not. She is empathetic, curious, well-read, a student of history, humble, a natural leader, and sincerely intelligent. Oprah 2020, seriously. She gives me hope. I was spellbound by here ability to unite the room, command attention, elegantly speak to the issues, bring in history. She would make a great president.
7
Right, it sounded like Fredo’s defending himself to Michael in The Godfather II
2
Republicans are in a no-win situation. They have lashed themselves to a President who is manifestly unstable and experiencing a steady mental decline, a sad fact that is obvious to all but his most ardent supporters. The problem for the GOP leadership: they know all this, but if they desert Trump now, they will admit their own complicity in this Presidential farce, discredit the party that chose him as nominee, and ensure their own electoral demise. If they continue to insist that everything is fine, they will be able to use him as their signing machine in the White House until the electoral dam breaks in November 2018 and the Trump presidency is effectively over. After that, the President will be confined to Twitter rages and playing musical chairs with White House aides until he is thrown out of office. Let's hope that between now and then, Trump's minders make sure he doesn't decide to push that "big button" of his in a fit of pique.
9
What a sad day it was when he was sworn in as President. This man continues to demean the office and any right thinking person knows it. He serves only himself and the corporations in this country. As long as he stays in the White House that will remain unchanged. Thank you Charles for a great article.
11
The American electorate, the U.S. Congress, media, and political operatives, one and all, have to take responsibility for this debacle. And debacle it is.
The electorate are responsible because too many don't vote and/or are not critical enough in their information gathering; Congress because the elected Republicans want to hang on to power and money and are willing to let the Constitution be trashed and our institutions severely weakened to do it; the Democrats because many of them are too comfortable themselves and unable to mount a credible attack on current GOP policies; the media because campaigns bring in money and a Trumpian candidate brings in even more than usual so he got free uncritical air time for a year.
If our basic institutions are denigrated, our Department of Justice manipulated for political gain and cover up, our corporations write our tax laws, and those who know better say and do nothing, then evil will prevail. KA
3
1. It's possible to make lots of money if you're born with it.
2. It's possible to make lots of money if your an audacious criminal with no conscience.
3. If you have enough money and the right connections, you can buy judges, cops, FBI offices, politicians, political offices.
4. The diagnostic categories in the various editions of the DSM are interpretive constructs, not methodologically grounded diagnostic tools based on empirical realities. They are useful - and required by the insurance industry - but "mental illness" is not well understood. Even Alzheimers, not a mental illness of course, can only be given a definitive diagnosis post-mortem.
3
Thank goodness for Charles Blow; Thank you, Charles Blow. You are a great educator through your writing. I would love to take any class from you.
Do you teach? I would consider a barter - an opera voice lesson for a writing class!
3
While I agree that supporting an unfit, unstable Trump is, and has been, unpatriotic, I worry.
As one example, the values of a “patriotic” Russian in 1890 (devotion to the Tsar and Russian Orthodox Church) was very different from what it meant to be a patriotic Russian in 1950 (loyalty to the workers’ state and no religion), and they changed yet again with the collapse of the Soviet state. (To be clear, the values of a “nationalistic” Russian would not have changed over this period.)
Here in the United States, the values required to support Trump (tribalism, trust of similarly-minded individuals over institutions, and prioritization of personal authority and loyalty) are irreconcilable with traditional American values (primacy of our institutions, dispersal of power, and compromise amid diversity of backgrounds and opinions).
One or the other must go — but, woe for us all, it is not clear which it will be.
1
Like many others, I struggle to understand why Congressional Republicans continue to enable Trump when it's obvious that A) he's dangerously unstable and B) Pence would support their agenda more thoroughly and allow them to be more successful in moving toward their goals -- he'd be steering the boat in one direction rather than in circles.
It occurs to me that they're afraid -- not only of being punished in the voting booth by the Trump base, which is also in most cases their own base, but actually for their own personal well-being. Roughly a third of the country apparently thinks Trump is a great man who's doing just fine, and believes the opposition is literally their enemy. If only ten percent of that third is armed (it is) and is willing to fight for those beliefs, these Republican leaders don't dare to participate in his removal from office, either through impeachment or through the 25th Amendment. They know what he is, but they're between a rock and a hard place. They're waiting for him to do something so spectacularly stupid and dangerous that his base will turn against him... and so far there doesn't seem to be anything he COULD do to fit that requirement!
4
It puzzles me, too.
And in so doing, they are moving dangerously close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican could be seen as being an unpatriotic American.
Not "close". Done
6
Mr Blow, as always, so well said. I'd substitute "treason" for "unpatriotic," though, as I imagine you wish you could have said.
I am a geriatric psychiatrist and I fully agree with the comment by Sally Russell, above. Shortening time before repeating himself? Forgetting what he's said before? Dangerous, unpredictable impulsivity?
As with ANYONE ELSE, these are clear signals to justify a neuropsychological/psychiatric evaluation. Again, Bandy Lee and many others are simply asking for an EVALUATION, and they are not making diagnoses. This is completely separate from any prohibitions that evolve from the rather nebulous "Goldwater Rule." The consequences to a family and the public from a demented, impulsive driver are bad enough. We have means to utilize a humane and structured evaluation for those unfortunate sufferers.
We have the same for a forgetful, impulsive president, the behavioral consequences of whom could literally end civilization.
4
I'm continually dumbfounded as to why the pundits have just started blaming the Republicans for putting party before country vis-a-vis tRump. Doesn't anyone remember the midnight meeting when Obama was inaugurated where they vowed to oppose any legislation the Dems proposed and to make Obama a one term President or have our collective memories gotten that short.
5
I think you may have a fuzzy memory of that one.
1
Paula, I wonder if you are misreading what NotNormal actually said
"Fire and Fury" will have its brief moment on the stage and then will be heard of no more.
3
The phrase might have several meanings.
“The stable genius” might be somebody working within a horse stable compound, thus in the most cases the only human inhabitant of the building…
One is always the best if there is no competition…
The real genius leaves no room for any ambiguity.
On the other hand, who is the most famous stable genius in the history of humanity?
Who was born in a stable?
Is Mr. Trump actually telling us that he happened to be the second coming of Jesus Christ?
Now, that would be very unstable behavior…
Our sub-consciousness will often lead us into telling something we don’t want to openly pronounce or revealing our deepest thoughts…
Just think about Trump’s willingness to return the US embassy to Jerusalem in spite of the very explicit suggestions not to do it, coming even from the Pope and our closest allies.
The return of the US embassy to Jerusalem is the symbolic return of Trump to the old city…
Doesn’t the grandiose self-perception of himself firmly connects Mr. Trump to this basic message?
Remember his own words, we will not believe in all the victories he is going to deliver…
Isn’t it very troubling idea and the worldview?
2
Let's be honest. For anyone who's been watching the words and actions of Donald J. Trump in the past year, was this new book by Michael Wolff about his mental fallibility really necessary?
If anything, it was as redundant as Trump's own self-assessment of being a "very stable genius".
By now, we all know the Trump and Republican agenda, and the fact that it promises to do nothing more than increase debt and hardship on the average hard-working person, while the cream floats to the top.
And while everyone sits around waiting for the Democrats to 'do something' -- these are the same folks who don't realize that's exactly the same attitude that got us into this mess with this president to begin with.
The only way for any of this to change is for Americans themselves to get involved.
After all, what's a movemnt by the People, without the People?
At this point, we have everything to gain -- but we also have everything to lose.
4
I would like to read an article about Reasons To Support Trump held by Trump supporters . I still, even after a year, don't have a clue what these supporters are supporting.
3
The lack of questioning by Republican Congress members, senators, and administration workers is easy to understand. If you are in a job you are not qualified to hold and are highly paid you will do anything to stay there.
1
I would argue the more intelligent a person the less likely they are to be rich because they understand the big picture. One thing nearly all rich people has is a lack of empathy. It's incredibly difficult to live in an ivory tower studded with gems and have a feel for regular people.
I would also argue that it is very difficult to get rich in today's world without being a sociopath. A few years back there was a widely read article about sociopathy in the C-Suite.
The only thing you really need to get rich is a complete lack of feelings for your fellow man and a willingness to step on them to get what you want. I don't recall anyone ever suggesting Pol Pot or Papa Doc Duvalier or Kim Jong-un are very bright. They were just incredibly ruthless.
2
I am a Norwegian with strong ties to the US, both through family and business. A long time great fan of the US and its creative diversity. And now I find myself being worried out of my mind every time I read Trump's off-the-cuff tweets, which are really so weird and so totally out of touch with what I conceive to be reality and usefulness. And when on the news I see him signing his presidential orders surrounded by mostly old, strangeously smiling men, I get the feeling of watching a new realityshow for senior citizens called "You're President" . I am not by any means qualified to diagnose Trump, but I can safely say, I would probably not want him hanging around in my house if I could avoid it.
3
Thank you, Norway. We are just back from a two-week visit to Norway over the holidays. We are great fans of the Norwegians and their accomplishments. The Norwegian resistance was a model of selfless bravery and spirit that all of us should aspire to. It makes me sad to have to say it but we too are worried out of our minds.
4
Manage the damage or prevent worse -- you encapsulates the dilemma for ordinary perception, which cannot miss Trump's radical lack of presidential qualifications. But there is a dynamic: he is like a spent spinning top, wobbling more and more erratically. Republicans risk the republic by playing short-term politics the way capitalists play short-term profits.
1
After 2016, I'm out of the prediction business. But it seems reasonable to surmise that Trump's latest outburst will result in some permanent damage to his brand. It's basically unprecedented for a US president to go on Twitter and plead with the American people that he's a smart guy. As widely joked on social media, the outburst is reminiscent of the embarrassing tantrum done by Fredo Corleone in Godfather II.
2
As usual, a calmly thought out response to the chaotic craziness we all see coming out of Washington. Mr. Blow breaks it down nicely in simple easy to read sentences that contain wisdom and insight. Hopefully, the people he speaks of will also read his column and think about what he is saying...and, hopefully...they will check their conscience, check their own morals, and do the right thing.
No one should believe for a minute that Mr. Trump is completely in control of his mental faculties. What is particularly obvious is that conservatives and right wing Republicans in the administration are in control of the government’s agenda. Every so-called initiative of Mr. Trump’s, from immigration policy to environmental rollbacks, to civil rights have been at the top of the right wing wishlist for decades. He is merely the vessel in which these ideas are transported to the public.
In a serious book by E.J. Dionne, Norman Ornstein, and Thomas Mann, “One Nation After Trump,” the authors point to the unifying drive that the Trump presidency has engendered amongst Progressives, the drive to become active again in politics to resist and defeat Trumpism. The edifice is beginning to crumble and we know it.
1
The world according to Trump is horrifying and depressing. Thank you, Mr. Blow, for putting your finger on yet another reason why dysfunction and chaos exist in the White House. However, thank you, New York Times, for today's Kristoff article, Why 2017 Was the Best Year in Human History (http://nyti.ms/2ma8MN3). It's good medicine for what ails those of us who can't go a day without despairing the damage Trump is doing to America and the world.
Numerous people are well aware that the emperor has no clothes on. The problem is that they ultimately don't truly care. And it's the voters who put these people in office and allow them to remain there.
1
Charles the Republican congress have exactly what they want in Trump, send him a bill any kind of bill no matter how bad and he will sign it. Their dream come true.
If the Republicans want to protect the public, then they can perform their oversight of his agencies and operations. So far, they are more interested in sparing themselves from criticism from their base than from doing their jobs. The principles and policies they once stood for are now subservient to a cult of personality. This will not end well.
I've got the solution. Find a person that you can support and urge him/her to announce their candidacy for president. After two tiring years of campaigning through every state in the union, endless primaries, debates and media scrutiny, they may obtain their party's nomination. Then all you need to do is help that candidate appeal to enough voters across the country to win the general election. You are fooling yourself if you think there's any other way.
This focus on Trump, his personality or fitness, is not wise. Tsk-tsking his enablers is not wise.
Trump is competent enough to preside over the bulldozing by the far Right of a huge array of progressive policies that have been with us since the New Deal.
Trump wants everything to be about him. And the far Right is fine with that since it means that we use up our bandwidth on him, and lose track of what is happening in real world.
3
"These politicians are taking the politically expedient track for political gain or political survival. They would rather defend a compromised Republican president than have to live in the wake of a deposed one. They would like to try to manage the damage Trump may do, rather than prevent that damage from occurring."
Mr. Blow, these guys have one mission only: Stay in power. They don't care about doing what's right. Why are they gonna read this column and all of the sudden stop stealing candy from babies? Only preventing them from achieving power will make a change.
1
Mr. Bruni,
Your article is excellent - so representative of what we, the people, observe about this president and the Republican party.
I disagree with one sentence in next to last paragraph:
"They (republicans) would like to try to manage the damage Trump may do, rather than prevent that damage from occurring."
The Republicans are NOT trying to manage the damage being done to our Constitutional Democracy, our values, our compassion and humanity and our standing in the rest of the world.
The Republicans are EQUALLY RESPONSIBLE as trump for all the vicious damage being done.
Time is NOW for We the People to RESIST, REVOLT, VOTE.
Time is NOW for Mr. Mueller to make indictments of the trump family, his cronies, his friends --- get this group out of our government !
3
Don't you mean Mr. Blow?
Not that Mr. Bruni wouldn't agree.
yes - thanks to Mr. Blow. My mistake.
Thanks for correction.
The Republicans in Congress, ignoring, rationalizing and/or excusing Trumps irrational and unstable behavior is immoral. It is left to the media to continue the push for the Mueller investigation to continue its work and for the good, rational and decent Americans whether they are Democrats, Independents, or rational Republicans to flip the Congress in the next election. Only then will we be able to begin to undue some of the damage that has been done by the man-child president.
1
It’s telling to me that criticism of Trump comes down to commentary on his intellect, his inexperience in diplomacy, his psychological profile. What seems fundamental as regards his ability to lead, in my view, is his demonstrated nature as a person of goodwill and generosity and compassion ... in a word, “loving.” At day’s end that’ll be the only matter of substance for way forward ... and not number of dollars, the size of a “button,” the number of times on the the “dean’s list” back-when, etc. One wonders, Trump aside, what we as a nation are in desperate need of, based on columns like this. Like it or not, Trump seems, in a way, still to be calling the shots.
I have been saying for a while now, to anybody who will listen, that Donald Trump is profoundly anti-Constitutional. The Preamble of the Constitution is the equivalent of our country's mission statement:
"We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."
His rhetoric breeds disunion. His pardon of Joe Arpaio established injustice. His coddling of white supremacists promoted domestic chaos. His gutting of the state department and his saber rattling undercuts the common defense. His tax plan distorts and damages the general welfare. And, his treatment of citizens, residents and visitors does not secure the blessings of liberty for ourselves and our posterity.
Trump might be the latest symptom of the Republican Party, but he is emblematic of it; and they are protective of him and his anti-Constitutional ways. They need to go back to basics if they truly want to serve our country, including their donors. Unfortunately, most actions suggest that they want the country to serve them and their donors.
3
The country can survive Trump with all his faults, and some we probably don't know about yet, but I don't think America can sustain its good qualities if the right wing continues to get its way to make the government and lower classes subservient to the rich and powerful.
The right wing administration and congress are quite content have Trump, Mr burlesque, draw attention away from their doings. After all I don't think Trump has the capacity to formulate policy, good or bad. But he is a fantastic diversion, getting the cashier's attention while his buddies rob the store.
3
The Republicans in Congress know exactly what Donald Trump is, and they are using him very successfully to further their aims. They can pass almost anything, and the President will sign it; their only problem is agreeing among themselves. They pledge their allegiance to mammon, not our Constitution.
2
As always, Charles M Blow has spoken truth to power. In this column, he has articulated what we all know about our current POTUS. I have only one disagreement, and that is with his last sentence. We are not close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican can be seen as being an unpatriotic American. We are already at that day.
How many really smart people you know go around touting the fact that they are smart?
How many true geniuses you know go about proclaiming that they are geniuses?
How many mentally stable people you know go about asserting that they are not only very stable, but also stable geniuses?
Why are politicians, who are sworn to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States actually preserving, protecting and defending a president who is culpable on all three questions raised above?
If the Congress won’t do its job, maybe the Courts should – some sort of intervention might be necessary before the “bigger button” that works blows up the world, as we know it.
1
“Being gifted at exploitation is not the same as intellectualism. It is a skill, but one separate from scholarship.”
Trump is not even gifted at exploitation. He took his father’s money and ran with it. Despite numerous business failures, he was able to stay one step ahead of his creditors due to the amounts that they had invested in his projects. Trump’s projects, including airlines, casinos and buildings, typically made no money or lost tens of millions. When he ran out of money, he exploited his celebrity – and even then, he was taken seriously only by blue collar whites – to sell his name to the entities that took over and completed his buildings. He also routinely sued those to whom he owed money.
Trump has been a man on the run since the day he took over his father’s business. His next venture, after he lost the presidential election as he had expected he would, was reportedly a right wing-financed cable TV network. He kept afloat by selling properties to Russians, who may have used those investments to launder money. Mueller, Schneiderman and the US attorney have been investigating those investments.
Trumps single success –selling his name to the easily gulled –obtained him the presidency. He is incompetent, illiterate, unstable and dishonest -dangerous. He must be removed. Any Republican who refuses to do that is betraying his country. This is not a partisan issue – I certainly don’t support Pence, who will be POTUS if Trump goes- but a question of patriotism.
1
Yes, it seems to be true that most of us find Trump unacceptable, but please remember next time we all vote, that this time the choice is not between Trump and Mrs. Clinton, but about between the spineless, unpatriotic, self-interested party and the alternative.
1
It warms my heart to read all the sad stories here in the comments section of the most upper middle class bourgeoisie newspaper in our country.
DT being a master showman and persuader, he will receive the credit for the economic success that is just taking off. This will lift him in the ‘18 mid terms and on to a 2nd term in 2020
Ever since the influence of big money (I'm talking to you Charles and David) took over running the country by installing Republicans willing to declare climate change a hoax , guns don't kill people, "trickle down economics" makes us all rich, and we can't afford medicare, social security, or any other non-business welfare program, people have been experiencing politicians "taking the politically expedient track for political survival."
Republicans lost all semblance of serving the needs of a America when they opposed programs President Obama proposed even though they had proposed them earlier themselves. Remember, The Affordable Care Act was based on a plan devised by the Heritage Foundation. And the most recent Republican "achievement", the Trump tax cut, rewards Charles and David (et. al.) with windfall tax breaks paid for by the middle class and their children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren. If the Republicans wanted to do the patriotic thing and overhaul our byzantine tax system, they could have taken sufficient time to explore all the means of achieving fair taxation for everyone. But, it was too much work, I suppose. So, it is much easier to take the Koch Brother's money and support from their vast interlocking political conglomerate. Patriotism? Don't be ridiculous!
2
Since I watched them use race to flip the South between 1960 and '64, I have had no questions about the moral standards of the Republican Party. That behavior has continued to this day with the particular bigotry or fear employed varying with the times; race is still their biggie. Nothing is likely to be done to curb President Trump's excesses until Democrats take back at least one house of congress. Republicans in congress have already shown they can tolerate actions that would have been unthinkable from any earlier president. As it has been since 1960, their behavior is rational and totally cynical. Mr. Blow says that Republicans, "are moving dangerously close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican could be seen as being an unpatriotic American." I think they got there years ago. Trump is just the scariest manifestation of disloyal Republican behavior.
1
Has anyone stopped to notice the potential dampening effect that the #MeToo movement has had on the likelihood of electing another white male to the White House? Better take this into consideration when choosing the next figurehead to represent each party, folks.
It seems to me obvious that Trump will never win re-election, but it is the Dems election to lose if they aren't canny in the selection of their next candidate. It may be radical, but I suggest a woman of color. Now get cracking and find her!
Thanks for noticing the #MeToo movement. In the presidential election of 2020, I expect that the Republicans will run against political correctness. It's the only card they have left.
The really interesting things here are the structural things than enable the country medium term at least to overcome a weak, less than competent President. Trump in his way was either very lucky or cunning as he gained what Nelson Rockefeller could not . The control of a potential Nuclear First strike in one mans hands is outrageous. Aside from this Trump is a man like anyone else with faults. His policies are terrible. If Trump is that much worse than the last Bush, then all we have between him and total misrule (the crassness of the handouts to the opulent is astounding) is a staff which mediates. If Trump is as bad as they say and the executive (aside from the terrible control of nuclear first strikes) is not the absolute monarch but rather depends upon his subbordinates to rule to the extent he does. A lot of the blame for bad policies like removal of the Obama mandate is due to the reactionary Republican Congress. Lets hope we can wait long enough for the Republicans to be voted out which is the only solution to this. Lets hope we can have rational costing healthcare without a depression. Lets hope the Koreans diffuse the situation there. While The North Korean Dictator is a terrible ruler, objectively speaking the North Koreans have no less right to Nuclear Weapons than the U.S. or Russia. Like Israel Palestine, lack of solutions is due to lack of will and reactionary politics.
From a 74 y/o retired psychiatrist, with 40 years of clinical experience
in a nonprofit multidisciplinary medical center, private practice, and
the VA--for those who have the curiosity and patience to read up on
Personality Disorders--check out the American Psychiatric Association: Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition. (DSM-5)
Arlington, VA, American Psychiatric Association, 2013, pp 645-684.
You can learn about the decades of research, study and efforts to treat these most difficult and challenging disorders and make up your own mind about
public figures and elected officials who may be afflicted.
It amazes me that all of Trump's qualities or lack thereof, are getting so much attention now. I thought he was unfit for office just with his extremely inappropriate behavior. I would have thought that alone would have disqualified someone from being taken seriously as a presidential candidate. Evidently, it worked just the other way and brought out those who don't have much of a sense that the character of the person is as important as the policies he/she promotes.
1
Wile E. Coyote--like really dumb. Like Ace bomb factory dumb!
Trump's reaction to Wolff's book perfect illustrates the old saying, "It is better to be silent and be thought a fool, than to speak up and remove all doubt."
2
As long as he will sign whatever they put in front of him, don't look to republicans commitment to patriotism or country to affect what they do or say. Only a tidal wave that started in Virginia, Alabama.... will end this nightmare and charade. Pray for it.
1
As an educational psychologist and psychometrician I cannot say that the President isn’t of at least normal intelligence or bright normal ( high average) intellectual ability. But I do believe his Emotional IQ is at least low average and, that his social skills are lacking, with symptoms of weak impulse control.
I’d focus more on his lack of “character” in interacting with the world- the shame apparent in his gross lack of humility, warmth , and empathy which he struggles to present in his public persona.
While all of your points are valid, the bigger issue is the ineptness of ALL of our elected officials in Washington. The weaknesses of our government is on full display and it doesn’t matter if it is a hostile foreign power or another country, Donald Trump is exposing the weaknesses of America and it is dangerous to our national security. Sure, elections have consequences, however, at what point will Washington understand that the unintended consequences of his election is detrimental to our entire country. He will not get better. Howard Stern said it. The pressures of the office will only accelerate his frajility.
Shame on our government officials! If it is not apparent by now that we need term limits, it needs to be revisited ASAP. Our officials have become desensitized to truth and if they don’t act soon to protect DT and ALL American citizens not just his base, they need to resign. Enough!
I don't think someone needs to be a licensed doctor to make a judgement about someones mental health. In fact, our courts of law often use a prudent person rule to help jurors weight if something is amiss with regard to what a prudent person would believe. So I don't think it is inappropriate to use the many years you have on this planet and the many human interactions you accumulate to point out that this president is barking mad.
1
If Trump is stupid what does that say about his base, those that voted for him? Trump is not unique in his disdain for intelligence, HUGE swaths of Americans are stupid as well. Don't believe in climate change, don't trust vaccines, etc. They vote for Trump because Trump is their Archie Bunker: he talks like their grandfathers, their uncles and fathers and brothers- he talks the way they do in the privacy of their own homes. "Blacks are lazy." "Those Mexicans are taking over" etc. Trump is comforting because he is familiar to white America- Trump is literally the American Dad.
1
The closing line, "...they are moving dangerously close to the day when being a loyal Trump Republican could be seen as being an unpatriotic American."
Sorry Charles, but that day has come and gone. The republicans ceased being patriotic when they vowed to make Obama a one term president and then proceeded to oppose him on everything. That was the neon sign flashing that their loyalty was to their party, and in particular, themselves, over the country they took an oath to defend. Their oath is garbage. They break their oath daily...no, hourly. Call them the "oath breakers".
So, it should come as no surprise that the republicans in congress will do whatever they can to maintain power without regard to how it affects the USA. They care only about themselves...they could not care less about this country. But, in fairness, I do have to admit that republican politicians know that their most loyal supporters and voters feel the same way about the country and the constitution. They all want to use both for personal gain and screw the country in every way possible. So...I have to admit, republican politicians in general and Trump in particular are acting exactly as their base wants them to act. Anti-USA...anti-constitution. The base wants a fascist dictatorship...replacing the USA with the CSA...confederate states of America, with their primary ally of all countries in the world being Russia.
1
Protecting this President from the ongoing investigation is complicity to treason and crimes committed by DJT against the United States. In my book, knowingly concealing a crime is equal, or greater to the act itself. The only good that will come of this presidency is the thorough debridement of the festering rot among Republican lawmakers.
5
There is a well-known syndrome among Psychologists called the Dunning-Kruger Effect. Essentially this refers to people whose cognitive abilities are so impaired that they not only can't tell they are impaired, they believe themselves to be intellectually superior. In common parlance, they are too stupid to know they are stupid & they delude themselves into thinking their mental abilities are superior to everybody else. This is not a mental disease as, say, bi-polar disorder, because your actual intelligence level is inborn. Trump shows every classic sign of Dunning-Kruger. There is, as they say, no cure for stupid.
Trump has demonstrated a profound case of the D-K Effect as long as he has been in the public eye.
9
All the Republican elected officials who support this lunatic need to be handed their walking papers in the next election. No excuse for supporting this deranged idiot. A third grader could tell he is unqualified for the Office.
8
The unstable, narcissistic psychopath, self-proclaimed "King of Debt", pathologic liar, Dotard occupant of the White House (there are MANY more pejorative invectives that are applicable) has again proven that he is incompetent to hold office. He NEVER should have been elected. This Electoral aberration is the product of a perfect political storm and miscalculation, not the result of any mandate by the people. He has proven to be the most divisive moron in Presidential history, and one that has no concept of governance for ALL the people. He caters only to those who prostrate themselves before him and to himself ultimately.
This is very much like the rise of the Third Reich under Hitler, and must be stopped. America is not an autocratic nation, and Trump is not sane. He certainly is not a genius (witness his MANY bankruptcies, frauds, NDAs, lawsuits, etc., etc.), but rather a confidence artist with the demeanor of a two-year-old.
5
Could Hitler have succeeded if all those eventually prosecuted at the Nuremberg Trials had not supported him and his agenda? Republican senators and cabinet members who are sitting by and propping up this egomaniacal, racist, ignorant, misogynist as he ruins democracy and America's standing in the world should consider that.
6
Thank you, Charles Blow for calling a spade a spade. Love your column!
1
Trump is a stable genius, in reality he is a genius in a stable...with dumb animals
The ability to scam others may be genius of a sort, but it does not make you a human being that can be trusted or even someone that you can dare talk to. If this is what you want to call genius as Trump has labeled himself then you might as well call Hitler a genius.
2
I am like so fed up with him!
3
Oh come on - we have all known Donald Trump for 30 years he is a known quantity no surprises, for much longer than Obama, Romney or whoever. The fact is the American people voted for this guy. The message was clear traditional politicians were not seen as attractive, in comparison a load mouthed semi literate vulgarian misogynist failed businessman with a track record of sexual misbehaviour. America voted, America knew what it was getting, and now somehow you are all surprised. Seriously
2
"Come Back, Barack!"
4
Mr. Blow, we're here. We've been here before. It's called The Darkest Hour, brought to us, again, by the Republican Party. The very same party that did not oppose Hitler and Mussolini until Japan woke up Americans. I am glad Trump is getting all the bad publicity he so richly deserves, but I am frightened that Congress continues to work it's treason behind the scenes. Just look at the Republican efforts to control elections. Can there be any doubt that they are not patriots and have never been. They work for the rich, and themselves.
3
One question— are u better off now or a year ago?
1
Definitely a year ago
Perhaps we should ask that question of our fellow American citizens in Puerto Rico.
A problematic offshoot of this current so-called president that I see - Celebrities and the like now think (or others think) they can run for office and run this country (e.g., Oprah). I guess the logic is if that idiot can do it, I sure as heck can..... Ugh.
For those concerned and who read, try to understand psychopathy and sociopathy and their traits and make your own judgment. Not all those with these disorders are serial killers. Some are successful individuals. Here's a good place to start: https://www.psychologytoday.com/basics/psychopathy
One would have to be deaf, dumb and blind not to notice that something is not right with Trump.
5
McConnell and Ryan continue to prop up the idiot in the White House because they know he will sign anything put in front of him.
1
Republicans, especially the Republican "establishment", thought (and some of them actually stated) that after Donald Trump was elected POTUS, they would rein him in, and he would be "normalized."
They did not understand that history teaches us a different lesson. The Germans thought that after Adolf Hitler became Chancellor, they (and the majesty of the office) would "normalize" him. We know how well that worked out.
We now face a similar issue. After a year in office, Donald Trump is at least as narcissistic and overbearing as he was on January 20, 2017. We now KNOW (not suspect) that his administration is an organizational disaster, filled by him with relatives, cronies and hangers-on, who together have not figured out how to do even the normal things that the Executive Branch is supposed to do.
How much longer will the Republicans in Congress put up with such utter incompetence?
November 6, 2018 cannot come soon enough. We need to start the process of taking our government back by voting out as many of these feckless Republican fools in Congress as possible. In addition we need to vote out as many of their allies in state and local government.
VOTE THEM OUT. EVERY. LAST. ONE.
5
Thanks, Mr. Blow. I started the day laughing at the DRT “Gorilla Channel” meme. Now you’ve put my favorite animated unqualified obsessive monomaniac, Wile E. Coyote, to work as a character sub for Trump. This smile, is this what hope feels like?
1
One does not become president by being "normal".
1
As an educator of a range of students from kindergarten through college, I will argue with Charles Blow on only one point: The "president" calls himself a non-reader (or maybe only others call him that). Charles maintains that the "president" may know how to read, but this is where I take umbrage. Having been a teacher of reading for over 4 decades, I am concerned that our "president" may not have mastered the skills of a proficient reader which often makes one dislike reading. Therein lies the problem. Struggling to decode the text AND read for meaning often make one less likely to read, to have a negative attitude toward reading and to turn away from reading as a means of accessing accurate information. Therefore, the "president" relies on other means of sensory input: television news being his favorite source. It has not been lost on me, being a young student in the 50s when reading was pretty much the mode for most learning, that today's students (and professors, unfortunately) often turn to videos and other forms of graphic media (except reading) to gain information. The "president" is like an old horse refusing to learn new tricks. Although the office of president requires substantial concentration and investment in information gathering, our "president" would rather gain his "inch deep mile wide" knowledge from the telly instead of facing the difficult task of digging deeper into issues through the medium of text.
3
I think "Wile E. Coyote" conjures up a perfect image of our President. I would love to see it stick as he has so absurdly named many of his foes.
2
Paul Krugman was fond of citing a colleague who believed we're headed for a Wile E. Coyote moment.
For those who don't know, that's the moment when Coyote, or another cartoon character, runs off a cliff but doesn't start falling until he looks down and realizes he's no longer on terra firma. And even then, he attempts a wild scramble to get back on the land he's stepped off.
He says he’s a genius and attended the best school(s). So right after he releases his tax returns, can we see his Mensa membership card and transcripts?
2
If they come through as fast as Obama's, you'll be waiting a while.
Obama released his tax returns, went to Harvard Law and never publicly declared himself a genius - he didn't have to.
Once again, Charles Blow, like too many other journalist-political commentators, plays right into Trump's hand. It's what he does, not what he says, that matters. At heart, he's a 'rough 'n' tough' Bronx boy in the way he carries himself and the way he speaks. To measure him by Clinton/W/Obama standards is to completely misread him. He himself would say, "Sad."
1
He's a fake, an actor and not a good one either. Despite his very pretentious "tough guy" persona, he's a whinibg, delicate hot house lilly. He withers at the smallest of criticism. He doesn't even understand what instructive criticism means, and certainly doesn't value any given his way. He's inept, and his thinking about himself is extremely grandiose, indicating a serious problem either mental, pers [nudity disorder or plainly character flaws. All of you who keep defending him and protecting him don't really care about his welfare, rather you must have selfish, political motives behind it. All his defenders neither care for the welfare of the country or Trump's family, which in the long run will suffer for this Presidents incompetence and lack of character.
2
You make the comment that everything you have ever read indicates that Mr. Trump is not particularly smart. However, he graduated from an Ivy League university, Penn. So he is undoubtedly smart or he wouldn't have graduated. Either that, or Penn is a lousy university. Your choice.
Third option. His daddy bought him his degree. As did Kushner’s.
2
I am convinced that his daddy gave Penn a whole lot of money to give the boy passing grades (or "gentleman's C's as we used to call them).
4
You need to do a bit of research into the Wharton School of Business and it's reputation. Trump has far inflated his so called "Ivy League" college. His degree sure didn't help him with all his bankruptcies and finally being unable to borrow from any US banks after said failures.
2
An appropriate quote from Stephen Hawking.
"People who boast about their IQ are losers."
That says it all.
5
Crazy or just "crazy"? Stable or "unstable"?
Everyone is tempted to understand. Clinical diagnoses are begging to be had.
The clinical truth isn't as important plain reality: Trump's unfit. For a thousand different, rational reasons. He's reckless and dangerous to the whole world and that is plain for all to see.
Here's the controversial part - the one thing 45 has on his side that most of you won't acknowledge is the solitary key to sustaining our national nightmare: white American male privilege.
I said "controversial" but, it should not be. If 45 were a woman, a person of color or anything BUT a white man, a "workaround" would've been worked out by now! Test my hypothesis: imagine everything 45's done in the last 18 months but replace the clown with Obama or Hillary.
The prosecution rests.
2
people will surely wake up when Trump and his cronies will start destroying Social security and Medicare!
Dear President Trump,
It might come quite as a shock to you but the forgotten men and women of America don’t own the Wall Street stocks, so all those temporary spikes are completely irrelevant to us.
Unfortunately, we are going to be saddled with the colossal national debt that continues skyrocketing under your Administration while in the December our trade deficits reached the highest level in history.
I guess you are working so hard to make China great again.
Unfortunately, America dropped to the very bottom of your list.
Sir, you were elected solely to collect the windfall profits of the global corporations to pay off the national debt, not to do exactly the opposite.
However, you are neither the first nor the last elected official that betrayed his base…
Based on events see 3 possible endings from Trump's Presidency:
- Handcuffs
- Straight Jacket
- Stretcher
1
How many outrages have we witnessed since Trump declared his candidacy? And yet each was quickly overwhelmed by the next jaw-dropping head-shaker, to the point that we are all participants in an Overton Window tragicomedy. At least Eric Trump guilelessly took to Twitter this morning to explain the Trump Tower roof fire as a simple electrical glitch, or else this country might have suffered a 2018 version of the 1933 Reichstag fire and its aftermath. (Check your history, dear folks.)
If one is capable of using one's mind to achieve the ends they set out to achieve, is that not a substantial indication of intelligence? I imagine Trump is not particularly good at writing treatises or solving complex math problems, but he has been able to achieve quite a few of his goals that are not easy to achieve, and I think he must have some mental ability that has permitted him to do so. Some belittle his accomplishments by pointing out he was born rich, but few rich kids build massive skyscrapers throughout the globe with their name emblazoned thereon; few go on to become president. Some would say that Trump's ability is simple narcissism, but pathological self-love in and of itself is not typically a sufficient condition to get tens of millions of people to pull the lever for you (I know Hillary got more votes; she's not stupid either). Even if the narrative that he "played" people is accurate, few, if any, fools could concoct and successfully execute such a plan. All of this should be obvious, but apparently it has to be argued in this day and age. To the extent that you want to resist Trump and his agenda, you may find yourself more effective in doing so if you at least admitted he's got certain strengths rather than contorting logic to prove he's an idiot. He isn't so you may as well just accept that fact.
The question as to whether the members of the House and Senate have an obligation to resist Trump presumes they agree with you. But they don't all agree
1