I just wanted to document these realizations real quick.
My stepfather just passed away after an eight-year battle with Lewy Body Dementia. I for one have never thought that Donald Trump was in state of mental decline, but rather simply ruthlessly operating in the Fox News alternate universe of deceit and lies as a learned political and business tactic.
But I’m noticing a lot of basic similarities. Yet, with any good liar, you have to be practiced and comfortable enough to live and believe the lie. Become the lie. Make it, insist that it is real until the last second before there is no escape. So it is very difficult to get into his mind.
Before my stepfather even began his decline, he was always steadfast in his convictions. He would NEVER admit that he was wrong. He was a 23-year retired Navy Chief Petty Officer, sailed around the world representing the United States in NATO, decorated Vietnam combat veteran, pilot, he could do anything. He repaired sonars and raised me and literally knew how to do almost anything. Physics, calculus, running a business… he was quite a character.
The first sign of his dementia was a commodities trading loss. Two months earlier he had privately led a group of Air Force pilots to Venezuela or Panama, I forget the exact Country, to pick up three or four airplanes and bring them all back to the U.S. He led the entire procedure, guided them through Costa Rica, landed in Mexico for fuel… That was his last big adventure.
He was trying to obtain a million dollars for his and my Mother’s retirement. He had, unknowingly to my Mom, put up their beach house, my Mom's art studio and other assets as part of a margin trade, and loss it all in about five minutes one day. Around $950,000.
He had always thought and insisted he was perfectly mentally stable, never made a mistake, America was the greatest, Bill Clinton was a “man without honor”, etc. He never knew or realized for a split second he was in a state of mental decline and actually began to blame and accuse others for theirs. Within a few months he was urinating on the floor and watching the same episode of NCIS five or six times a day, locking himself in the suburban in his underwear and racing the engine for an hour, it was hell.
But what if Donald Trump was actually in a state of beginning initial dementia? Some of the things he says in interviews are just flat-out insane for someone even operating in the Fox News world as a political tactic. He sounds like he’s possibly “losing it”. Ainsley Earhardt was looking at him like he was literally insane during that Fox News interview a couple of days ago.
He could actually believe and insist that he is the best at everything, pointing to his head, “with this thinking!” He thinks it is a good idea or can’t understand not to fire Sessions, pardon Manafort… in the end he just does his own thing, cannot see or forecast the consequences.
It reminds me a lot of my stepdad. Never wrong, fully committed, in it until death, would never let on and there was nothing to let on to. He firmly believe everyone else around him was crazy, stupid, and he was still as sharp as he was while in the Navy. Even three or four years into his disease he had zero comprehension that such a disease even existed.
So how much of what we are seeing is just plain and simple “appealing to the base?” Did he really think he could get away with all of this stuff by simply operating a presidency like Sean Hannity?
Or does he firmly believe these things, while playing only a Fox News feed on Air Force One, literally no comprehension or care of any traditions of the office whatsoever,. playing the part so well, no guilt, no shame, as if it were all real and he is the best and the brightest…
Like I said, my stepfather was somewhat like this before he even had the disease. You could point out that he had made a mistake with an electronics part, that a capacitor was green that he said was red… he would simply demand that you were wrong. But just the simple aspect of not being able to see or be aware of any decline in his mind whatsoever, it simply could not be… If you said something, he turned to the next person in the room and accused them of having Alzheimer’s. They cannot comprehend that they could possibly have a disease. And then it is too late, and you are spending ten hours a day babysitting.
I think Trump may possibly be in a permanent, serious state of unknowing denial, with complete unawareness of his own self and mental state of mind. He believes his actions are the right thing to do, has has to, or else he would know and understand where he is headed. He can’t possibly just be playing to the base.
Even back to firing Comey… Almost everything he’s done has been a haphazard, quick and power-play decision that he thought was a good idea, and firmly believes his own reasons for making them. This is also the reason that the NYT has only called one thing he said an actual “lie”, because it’s so difficult to determine if he actually believes these things or not.
Just some personal thoughts and parallels from experience.
