A Renewed Attack On The President

As the possibilities of the Russian collusion investigation fade, a new attack on the President is necessary.  The current assault on the President involves an attack on his mental health status.  It is not a coincidence that these attacks are coming from several sources.  On September 6th a Yale University psychiatrist reported to the media that two members of the Trump administration have been “scared” by the President.  Dr. Bandy Lee told Salon and the New York Daily News that two Trump White House officials contacted her last October and informed her that Trump was ”unraveling.”  She gave them a confusing response: "Not wishing to confuse the role I chose, as an educator of the public, and a potential treatment role, I referred them to the local emergency room without inquiring much further.”  Mentioning her potential treatment role is a bit grandiose.  It is unlikely that the President would call on her for “treatment.”  Dr. Lee is the author of "The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump: 27 Psychiatrists and Mental Health Experts Assess a President.”    She is also the author of an article in which she claims her book keeps “within the letter of the Goldwater rule.”    This rule supposedly prohibits psychiatrists from diagnosing public figures without a personal examination and without consent.  After explaining the Goldwater rule she then proceeds to diagnose the president.  Not surprisingly her conclusion is that the President is crazy.  David Frum in The Atlantic claims the anonymous article has, “enflamed the paranoia of the president.”  

The Hill article on the doctor’s concerns followed the previous day’s New York Times by anonymous. Anonymous is supposedly a high ranking Trump administration official.  He claimed that the idea of removing Trump from office had been discussed by his top aides. The 25th Amendment contains the procedure for removing a president that his cabinet believes is incapacitated.  Sen. Elizabeth Warren believes it is time for White House officials to invoke the 25th Amendment and remove the President. In her eyes he is obviously incapacitated, or as Martin Sheen dubbed him an “empty-headed moron.” Martin Sheen played a psychiatrist in the 1987 movie “The Believers.”

This leads to the question: Who is it that is really crazy?  Do you recall all the Tea Party members who were removed from the Senate chamber for disrupting the Ruth Bader Ginsberg’s confirmation hearings?  Neither do I. Perhaps, it was just not covered in the press. The left and the right have totally different ways of dealing with problems.  The left’s view is influenced by the entertainment industry.  A movie star who played a psychiatrist can diagnose people.  Stars who played farm wives (Jane Fonda, Sissy Spacek, Jessica Lange, and Sally Field) can testify before Congress on the future of family farms.  The New York Times can claim that the Wakanda in the movie “Black Panther” offers an almost too perfect rebuttal to President Trump’s comments about African nations. Former New York Times executive editor Jill Abramson carries a little plastic Obama doll in her purse.  She pulls it out every now and then to remind herself that the United States had a progressive, African American president until very recently.  She claims, “Some people find this strange, but you have to take comfort where you can find it in Donald Trump’s America.”

Then there are the mass demonstrations where the attendance can be measured by the amount of trash left behind.  On the anniversary of President Trump’s election leftist performed a “howl-in.” From New York City's Washington Square Park to Eugene, Oregon thousands of people took part in what Facebook called “Scream helplessly at the sky on the anniversary of the election.”  Eva Sahana of Refuse Fascism announced, "We are screaming in rage, we are screaming in pain, but we are screaming in unity and solidarity 'cause we have a plan and a way forward.”  The Philadelphia screamers outside City Hall concluded with chants of “F--- Trump.”  In addition to the scream movement there is the “Pussyhat Project.”  On January 21, 2017, a day after Donald Trump's inauguration, approximately 200,000 people were supposed to march on Washington DC to advocate for gender equality.  Tens of thousands of them were anticipated to wear  "pussy hats" — pink knitted beanies with cat ears.  

The leftist elite is so convinced of its intellectual superiority that it has lost touch with reality. If you are involved in a contest where you believe your opponent is less competent than you and he defeats you, you may explain that by saying you were not putting much effort into the contest. You may be able to excuse your defeat up to the third contest.  However, if your opponent defeats you overwhelmingly ten times in a row it is time to concede that your opponent is a better contestant.  If you admit this you may be able to improve your performance by going back to school.  If you insist that you are still a superior contestant you will be continually defeated.

Chuck Todd complains: Leftist media in a hole, not digging hard enough

Chuck Todd recently wrote an article for the Atlantic magazine entitled, “It’s Time for the Press to Stop Complaining—And to Start Fighting Back.”  In it he complains, “antipathy toward the media right now has risen to a level I’ve never personally experienced before.”  He has not seen such hostility since the early civil rights movement. Present day critics have a lot in common with those southern rednecks who opposed civil rights.  In this article Todd attacks members of the media like Rush Limbaugh, Laura Ingraham and Tucker Carlson.  By attacking these members of the media could Chuck Todd be a threat to the First Amendment?  Of course not.  But that is one of the charges against media critics. According to Todd there is a “campaign to destroy the legitimacy of the American news media.”

Todd suggests that critics of the media artificially stoked hatred because it could “deliver them some combination of fame, wealth, and power.”  He claims, “They are thriving financially by exploiting the very same free-press umbrella they seem determined to undermine.”  Are critics of the media sawing off the limb they are sitting on: the limb of a tree that has made them fantastically wealthy?  This is a critical point because they are, in fact, not attacking “the media.”  What they are attacking is the Mainstream Media, more properly called the Deep State Media: a media that marches in lockstep with the commands of the Deep State.

Todd’s criticism of his opponents’ wealth (they “attained wealth and power by exploiting the fears of older white people”) may not have been the wisest tactic.  His ownnet worth is reported to be $2 million.  He may consider this a modest amount compared to other media stars. Barbara Walters is reportedly worth $150 million, Diane Sawyer, $80 million, Katie Couric $55 million and the very talented and intellectually gifted Mika Brzezinski $12 million.  All this wealth may partially explain why the media elite is not in touch with the reality faced by most working class Americans.

The media elite has claimed to be objective for generations.  Todd fully acknowledges reporters “bring their own biases to their work.”  But he does not see this as a major problem.  He believes most reporters try to be balanced.  The Center for Public Integritysurveyed people identified in federal campaign finance filings as journalists, reporters, news editors or television news anchors.  They found that these people gave $396,000 to the presidential campaigns of Clinton and Trump.  96 percent of this money benefited the Clinton campaign.  This overwhelming financial support for Hillary Clinton does not necessarily mean that these reporters’ coverage was biased.  Or does it?  Todd complained, “what did we reporters do in the face of this cable onslaught that would eventually turn into a social-media virus and lead us to the election of the most fact-free presidential candidate in American history?  We did nothing, because we were trained to say nothing. Good reporters know that they have to let the chips fall where they may.”  This is where Todd reveals his delusional mind-set.  According to a study from the Pew Research Center's Journalism Project “only 5 percent of news stories about Trump were positive, compared to 42 percent for Obama.”

Todd claims he is “not advocating for a more activist press in the political sense, but for a more aggressive one.  In the eyes of the “deplorables” or those bitter people who “cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them” the Deep State Media seems aggressive enough.  This may explain the declining readership and viewing audiences of their outlets.  A more aggressive approach may lead to further declines.  Todd asserts, “American democracy requires a functioning press that informs voters and creates a shared set of facts.”  Unfortunately the Deep State Media is not fulfilling that requirement.