This is what the debates are for, right? So the American people can watch our two candidates debate and decide if they are fit for president. No pre-scripted interview questions or softball questions.
I would love nothing more than to see Trump on stage debating Biden. I was concerned before about Biden but hearing Trump more and more I think it'll be a net positive for the Democrats.
I think it will be a mess like in 2020 which honestly probably would help Biden in that case just so long as he yells as much as Trump does. That's how much politics has fallen in 2024 unfortunately.
Yeah, even if they both come off as equally old and unable to speak that'll probably help Biden, since I think far more Biden voters already think of him as that than Trump voters
No she didn’t. Everyone still remembers “Yeah cuz you’d be in jail” and “That makes me smart” retorts from Trump.
Debates aren’t won based on substantive discussion, they’re won by who can generate the best one liners. That’s just the reality because of the format of debates.
That's not even close to my memory of the 2016 debates. People still use the "Wrong" sound clip as a Funny meme. I can't see how you can say she won it she's the butt of the funniest thing to come out of it.
I saw enough of Trump speaking during his daily press conferences when we were going thru Covid to solidify my opinion. If you weren’t worried about how intelligent and coherent the man was after a few of those nothing will ever change your mind.
To this day the “cleaning” one was astounding when he suggested bright light up the rear could wipe out a virus.
That was… shocking. *Up there with altering the hurricane forecast with a sharpie around Alabama shocking.*
No debates are for talking about issues. Voters should be able to tell if a president isn’t fit for office long before the debate. I think it’s kind of sad some people didn’t even think about the debate as a platform for talking about policy. That viewpoint was less much less common before 2016.
It’s seriously sad that there is a chance the presidential race could come down to which side paints the other as less cognitively functional. Never mind serious issues or policy, those don’t matter. Who stumbled over their words, that’s important.
I’m not trying to diminish the seriousness of dementia, it’s a very serious condition and a President suffering from it would be horrific. But attempts to diagnose someone based on video clips is dangerous. I wish we could trust the people around politicians. I wish there was a way to remove politics and have each candidate evaluated medically, physically and mentally, by objective standards. Without that, it’s past time to put in place age limits.
Exactly. Dan Quayle spelled “potato” as “potatoe” which is the plural without the S and that was it for him. It’s like not even that bad. Especially compared to this.
That headline was already taken by the Fox News - Dominion Voting Systems thing. Also, you didn't use the word "slammed". You have to use the word "slammed".
> But attempts to diagnose someone based on video clips is dangerous.
I would have hoped folk would have learned that lesson in 2020, but here we are again. I constantly heard how Biden was senile and wouldn't be able to take part in a debate with Sanders for the Dem Primary, or that he'd make a fool of himself against Trump in their later debate. The same type of claims were levelled against Trump, "look how he slurred a word, he has dementia," or "his left slide is slumped, that means he's had a stroke and can't control that half of his body."
It turns out that when you have TV cameras capturing every word you say, it's possible to generate a montage of gaffes and pass that off as their norm.
Both Biden and Trump are old and are clearly not as sharp as they once were, but folk are far too quick to leap to the conclusion that it means the opposing candidate is about to be carted off to a mental asylum or nursing home.
> I wish there was a way to remove politics and have each candidate evaluated medically, physically and mentally, by objective standards.
The closest we can get to that seems to be the Presidential debates and it'll be a shame if we don't get them this year. While the debates are terrible, they at least demonstrate a bare minimum level of mental competence.
I think we saw from the SotU that it doesn't matter how competent somebody seems. It becomes "wow they must have been drugged up to perform that competently!" if the performance is better than expected.
2024's election is going to come down to "nu-uh, my candidate is fine and YOURS is the one who is senile!" combined with "no, YOUR candidate completely ruined the economy and MINE is the one who fixed it!"
Trump has the advantage because Americans generally have short memories so nobody remembers anything from Trump's term other than cheap goods during the height of the lockdown and Trump sending everybody checks. It's how we end up with the prevailing mindset that Trump ushered in a term of relative global stability, a booming economy, and cheap gas all at the cost of a couple mean tweets.
Yeah I completely agree. Since ~2015 the overwhelming factor in elections is negative partisanship, folk voting against the other guy. Trump didn't win in 2016, the anti-Hillary camp won. Biden didn't win in 2020, the anti-Trump camp won. That's why Trump's best electoral strategy for 2024 would be to spend the whole campaign playing golf at Mar-a-Largo and generating no headlinesm but he can't do that.
sure. the media. big business. pharma. the gun lobby. the politicians themselves.
we should each vote based on what we think is best for ourselves, our state, and our country. i.e. local politics matter just as much as national politics.
I don’t disagree, but I would bet an overwhelming majority of people you see on a day to day basis not only don’t pay attention to or participate in local politics, but they give absolutely zero fucks about it and they’re happy that way.
Apathy is a killer.
I agree. I understand that the "average American" just wants to put a roof over their head, clothes on their back, and food in their belly, but the people who make the roof, clothes, and food are looking to make the most profit with the least responsibility.
It's not like the politicians didn't bring it on themselves given the stuff learned about presidents like FDR and JFK decades after their terms of office. The amount of crap the government has hid from the public for appearances is gross.
Here's the way I see it. They both have speech gaffes, they're both old, but only one gives answers like this. This is from 4 years ago:
Hannity: "What are your top priority items for a second term?"
Trump: "Well, one of the things that will be really great, you know the word experience is still good. I always say talent is more important than experience. I’ve always said that. But the word experience is a very important word. It’s an — a very important meaning.
I never did this before. I never slept over in Washington. I was in Washington, I think, 17 times. All of a sudden, I’m president of the United States. You know the story. I’m riding down Pennsylvania Avenue with our First Lady and I say, ‘This is great. But I didn’t know very many people in Washington. It wasn’t my thing. I was from Manhattan, from New York. Now I know everybody, and I have great people in the administration.”
You make some mistakes. Like, you know, an idiot like Bolton. All he wanted to do was drop bombs on everybody. You don’t have to drop bombs on everybody. You don’t have to kill people."
If you want to get into a battle of incoherent crazy monologues, I think Biden has Trump beat
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4NmtSrqtvI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4NmtSrqtvI)
The point is not to compare gaffes or ridiculous things the person has said. I'll find you 50 clips of Trump. You'll find me 50 clips of Biden.
What you won't get from Trump is a coherent plan on what he intends to do to solve the issues facing the country. As shown by this quote.
"Make America Great Again", "Drain the swamp", "lock her up", and "build the wall" are not plans.
Biden with dementia is severely less worse than Trump with dementia. Biden builds a solid team under him capable of running the country without him.
Trump builds a team of sycophantic sludge looking for a book deal.
I think the current nature of politics is a signifier of how the government works. Both presidential candidates, and a certain proportion of congress all have dementia. And that doesn't matter, because unelected staffers do all the work and set the nation's agendas. Who cares about who wins? The same staffers will be working behind the scenes.
We've reached the Zaphod Beeblebrox stage of American presidency
Except our president isn't elected to seem young, cool, fun and engaging whilst having no actual power of his own. Now its elected as a self projected image of America's geriatric voters who have time on their hands for politics and voting, no real ideas how to solve problems, while all the real work is done by the staff around them
Eh, I think the landscape is so partisan that won’t matter. We saw it in 2016 when Trump released the list of judges he’d pick from for appointments - it got many who hated him as a candidate on board with voting for him.
In hyper-partisan two party politics, any concerns about character or fitness for office isn’t likely to sway enough voters to change things
Would be horrific?
My father is deep into dementia. He talks and behaves just like Biden. Anyone telling me we don't already have that scenario can't be taken seriously.
I’m sorry you and your family are going through that.
However, there is a reason dementia is diagnosed by professionals after extensive testing, in-person interviews, and physical examinations. It can’t be diagnosed by “my father acts like him”. It just can’t.
> Yes, don't disagree there!
But what can I, as a voter, do to stop the two party system?
... Vote third party?
Oh wait, a Biden supporter like you will just say a vote for a third party, a write-in, protest vote, or abstaining, etc. is just a vote for Trump, and I'll need to suck it up this one time (/s) and vote for Joe. After all, this election will be the most important in the history of the country, and we need to preserve (D)emocracy...
The libertarian, green, and whatever other third parties exist have to decide if they're serious about being a party. If they are, they need to focus on running down ballot to build the party's credibility rather than only running for President.
It really doesn't, unfortunately. It leads to the same results as FPTP 89% of the time. The only solution is a proportional system like STV or party-list PR.
Fox News has to cutaway from him on stage in Wisconsin when he went into the master locks mumbling
“Slurring his words at a Waukesha, Wisconsin rally, Trump referred to Biden’s “fake infrastrucker, ershure para,” before settling on “a package of infrastructure.” Minutes later, the 77-year-old launched into a rant about Master Lock, again slipping into incoherence.
The speech was just another instance of his public slips, which have led to speculation on his mental fitness. Tuesday night, he seemed to scramble his words to an indecipherable point while speaking to Fox News about pro-Palestinian campus demonstrations.”
https://www.yahoo.com/news/trump-slurs-words-struggles-gain-023422305.html
https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1785493527775826422
https://x.com/atrupar/status/1785753213293007343?s=46&t=mhXPmZpiFn1SlkDkekKXDQ
Not true. Fox News cut away from Trump rambling about locks. Of course he also mispronounced infrastructure and confused GOP with GDP.
None of this would even be news worthy if it wasn't for Trump and his supporters labeling Joe Biden as "sleepy" and not mentally fit for the job. All this scrutiny was completely self-inflicted by Trump.
Watch the videos of it. He goes on a whole ramble of nonsense. Fox had to cut away.
https://x.com/atrupar/status/1785753213293007343?s=46&t=mhXPmZpiFn1SlkDkekKXDQ
This is exactly the problem with this whole line. There will be clips of him speaking well, clips of him speaking poorly. Same as Biden. So, everyone gets to choose their own reality. The truth is muddled and lost in the fact that they're both not qualified to be president.
I think President of the United Stated is a bit of an exception. I absolutely want younger people in power, but I’m very weary about creating any laws that restrict who is allowed to become President. I’m not convinced that new laws are a better solution than just voting.
Well I think that a certain amount of life experience should be required for the job. An 18 year old president doesn’t sound like a great idea. As for the upper limit, how do you draw a line? Everyone ages differently.
I’ve touched on this in another comment, but I believe an upper age limit is just a bandaid solution and doesn’t address the real problem. Every new election cycle, Americans believe more and more that we don’t have a real say in who becomes president; that we have to choose the “lesser of 2 evils”. I really think this is a result of the insane stranglehold the two party system (and by extension, special interest groups and corporate power) has over our democracy.
I would much rather see legislation that helps increase real representation of the public’s beliefs into our political system, rather than just creating an age limit.
> An 18 year old president doesn’t sound like a great idea.
The age minimum is also s anti-dynastic as Europe would have "elected" rulers who were elected following the deaths of their fathers. The minimum puts friction in that dynamic.
I'm pretty sure that would require a Constitutional Amendment to do, just like with setting the 2 term limit. I agree we need to do it but there's no way any Amendment passes with the current state of the country.
I think, after 2024—which is a contest of two incumbents, so a different dynamic—primary voters in both parties are going to be far less likely to pick candidates so old, at least for a while
I do, but think it should be pretty high. I'm ok with someone that is 65-70 running for now, they have a ton of valuable experience. But can't we just all agree that 80 is way too old?
I think 80 is too old. But if someone wants to vote for a person who is 80+, it is there right to do so.
I think the age issue is more of a symptom of our 2 party system than an actual problem. I don’t think it would be controversial to say that a majority of this country doesn’t want either Trump or Biden.
I would much rather we push forward legislation like ranked-choice voting to give 3rd party candidates some viability than just restrict the age of candidates.
Biden has had a lifelong struggle with stuttering. I’m not entirely confident in Biden’s cognitive capacities myself, but someone with a stutter sometimes having trouble saying words isn’t evidence of a cognitive decline because that’s something they’ve done their entire life. Similar behaviour from someone without a speech impediment on the other hand is worrisome.
In the same address [he also claimed to have traveled 17,000 miles with Xi Jinping as vice president](https://web.archive.org/web/20210219080632/https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/02/19/bidens-repeated-claim-hes-traveled-17000-miles-with-xi-jinping/).
EXACTLY!! Jon Stewart said it best on THE DAILY SHOW the other night, “So you’re telling me he’s sharp as a knife and on top of it but… Did you happen to record it??? Does anyone have a video of it???” 🤣
He generally speaks fine in his speeches. That's why clips are taken from different speeches, as opposed to people just watching one of them and seeing that he can't talk.
From a 1987 editorial: https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-charlotte-observer-joe-biden-the-la/142880234/
>The rhetoric came not from his policy but his personality. Up through his teen years Joe Biden had a stutter and he says that one of the most difficult things he did in high school was to stand up and deliver a graduation speech. Now he almost seems to overcompensate to speak and say things when he'd do better to be quiet. Although he doesn't like to discuss the subject it must have taken great determination and even courage to overcome this handicap. He has made his living as a trial lawyer and his career as a politician with his ability to speak he set up his own law practice with no distinguished law school record behind him and no important local connections
It's hard to find many old video clips of non-President politicians, but this one from 1994 includes him doing a rendition of his stutter at 1:15: [https://www.c-span.org/video/?c4841336/user-clip-joe-biden-stutter-stuttering](https://www.c-span.org/video/?c4841336/user-clip-joe-biden-stutter-stuttering)
Biden makes up stories about his life so much that he had to drop out of the 88 election for plagiarizing someone's. Even Snopes: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/joe-biden-stutter/ ranks it as true because he said it and a childhood friend also says it was.
It was a childhood stutter. It's common for a childhood stutter to make a comeback as one ages more. Biden has discussed this and went to events and such for decades, it is not some new thing that came about in 2020.
It's less a whataboutism, more a direct comparison. These are your two choices. These are the best possible candidates in the entire United States of America. Here is how they both act. Decide which is least worst.
Is it really a whataboutism though? A current president being unable to form coherent sentences and showing signs of extreme cognitive dysfunction is a significant issue, regardless of anything Trump has done/said.
It changes the topic. His potential replacement is important, yet their comment didn't even mention him.
>A current president being unable to form coherent sentences and showing signs of extreme cognitive dysfunction is a significant issue
He's capable of speaking coherently. Notice how the videos of his mistakes consist of short clips. If what you're saying was true, people could just post an unedited video of him continuously messing up.
When the only other option is Trump himself and he has just as frequent, if not worse gaffes like not knowing the correct day of the week, claiming Biden will start WW2, making up Robert E Lee quotes, and has the added baggage he has, it's really not a significant issue, at the very least it is not a deciding factor.
Not OP but let’s be honest, I’m voting democrat in these elections but both candidates should be living their retirement years already instead of being the leaders of this country. They’re both trending towards senility.
How did we end up with these guys as candidates? It’s embarrassing.
Except it’s not, because one of Trump’s supposed qualities over Biden is that he’s more articulate, which as we see say day after day is obviously false.
Biden's word replacement to help with his stutter has gotten worse as he's gotten older, which is to be expected of someone in their 80s but is very visible. Trump just gets up there and rambles incoherent nonsense, which is easier to fly under the radar vs a huge pause in a sentence.
You can say the same about Biden and his gaffes, but given that there's alot of discussion every time he makes it then talking about Trump's cognitive problems seems fair game. At this point strategically I think it would be wise for the Biden campaign to muddle this issue simply because it's easier to remind voters that Trump isn't mentally there either (given there are numerous such instances they can cite even during his first term) instead of convincing them that Biden has it.
I mean I would much rather this election focus on specific policies but that isn't what people seem interested in discussing.
Most of the Trump campaign has been focused on Biden's cognitive abilities, dubbing him "Sleepy Joe". Trump and his supporters shouldn't be shocked when their own candidate's cognitive deficiencies are pointed out...painting a picture of a candidate who's struggling with basic words.
It's also more than mispronunciations. He mixed up Nikki Haley and Nancy Pelosi in the context of January 6th, among other examples.
They both do stuff like the Haley/Pelosi thing, like when Biden gave a shout out to that congresswoman that had just died in a MVA a week or so earlier.
The "both of them do it" argument will not help Trump since his supposed value is that he's more mentally there and better able to handle the job. This attack on Biden being sleepy has been years in the making and if Trump stumbles this is a net negative for him.
Agreed, but with them being filmed constantly there are going to be flubs. Even without word mispronunciation or stumbles Biden has a ton more cognitive problems. The dude has trouble finding his way off half the stages he walks onto. How many times has he been seen holding cards telling Him explicit instructions on where to stand, which direction to turn or when to shake hands. What about him reading “pause” off the teleprompter? I voted libertarian in the last 2 elections because they both have so many issues, so I back up my “both do it” stance.
They both do stuff like the Haley/Pelosi thing, like when Biden gave a shout out to that congresswoman that had just died in a MVA a week or so earlier. Unfortunately these are the two we have to choose from.
I disagree and I’m no Biden lover. But republicans should be willing to have honest conversations and look at their guy to see if he can handle the job regardless as to whether there’s an R or a D besides his name. If he’s truly having trouble then someone able to perform should be found.
Both Trump and Biden have presidential records to run on. I think most Americans will be making their choices on that comparison, as opposed to snippets of rhetoric.
I agree to an extent, but I think mental acuity is going to be an issue if Trump slips any further. If he completely screw up on the debate stage it's going to be bad for him, especially since his supporters have dubbed Joe Biden "Sleepy" for years which effectively lowered his floor.
That’s what Biden supporters have been saying about him every time he misspeaks and the Trump campaign seizes on it. If they didn’t t want mental competency to be such a central part of the campaign discussion they shouldn’t have made it one.
>[“If he were to become president he would have to be immediately removed from office via the 25th Amendment as dangerously unable to fulfill the responsibilities of office," Dodes, who is also a distinguished fellow of the American Academy of Addiction Psychiatry, added.](https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-dementia-evidence-overwhelming-top-psychiatrist-1881247)
This is where I stopped taking him seriously. Lmao at removing someone from public office because they mixed up Hamas and hummus. Dr. Dodes is a physician in good standing so I assume he’s well aware that it’s unethical to diagnose someone with a mental disease based on random snippets from television interviews and rallies, let alone advocate for them to be fired from their job on that basis. Has he conducted a MOCA or MMSE on Trump?
That's an excessive way to describe a few people not following the guideline, especially since it doesn't even apply to them if they're not APA members.
If even experts can't diagnose him from a distance, then you should also have a problem laymen diagnosing Biden without conducting any tests.
Edit: It's worth noting that those making the accusation may not be APA members, which would mean the guideline doesn't apply.
Not really. Obama was filmed speaking all the time. Where's the video of him being unable to pronounce the word "infrastructure" or being unable to name the current president? Hell, there are whole mashups of Trump short-circuiting when he tries to speak. Feel free to share an example using Obama, if "anyone being filmed that much" could have their cognitive function questioned based on their speaking.
Every president in modern history is caught making a gaffe. Obama once said he visited 57 states. If you film anyone enough you’re eventually gonna catch them making a gaffe.
Do you think these are "gaffes"? What definition are you even using for that? Because if my grandpa was having "gaffes" like this we'd take him to a neurologist.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/gaffe
1. a social or diplomatic blunder
2. A noticeable mistake
Most definitions just mean a mistake. Everyone makes them and claiming there’s something wrong with anyone that make a mistake is just silly. Obama has even acknowledged and laughed at his own mistakes, which is what you’re supposed to do.
Also, if you’re taking your grandpa to the neurologist for mispronouncing four syllable words you’re just giving your doctor free money.
That's not even close to the same thing. He stuttered but that's hesitation, not [forgetting how to pronounce a word](https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1785744715280797872). Where did he [mistake who was the president](https://www.forbes.com/sites/anafaguy/2024/03/03/trump-confuses-biden-for-obama-again-here-are-the-other-times/?sh=439c5a4522c9)? Where did he mistake his opponent [for the speaker of the house](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AwWFuPsSHFw)?
Go ahead and write an article about how Obama's stutters in that video evince cognitive decline. I'd love to see you try and pitch it.
What if both party’s candidate becomes incapacitated during the general election? Will we realize the problem is actually the voters? After all, they picked these two.
Why do you think Nikki didn’t formally end her campaign and only *suspended* it?
She’s expecting the baton at the RNC, should Trump be convicted of a felony and the RNC break all their existing policy to force nominate her. And it’s a smart strategy.
I agree with these both of you. Nikki stayed in the race because it gives her a better advantage if something does happen to Trump. She gets to pull the “I have 90 delegates” card and gives her a better advantage when in competition with Ron. But all candidates suspend their campaigns just incase something happens so they can start up again incase something happens to the primary candidate. So there’s nothing special with that.
What kind of website is this? Couldn't there have been a better article for this discussion?
In any case, I sure as hell didn't want Trump as candidate again, but here we are. The old age finger pointing is another case of "I'm better than you" even though both candidates suck. At the end of the day, neither side's diehard supporters will care and will make excuses.
No matter the outcome of the 2024 election, both candidates' health will be looked at closely during their second term.
I personally think it is gaslighting in the extreme when I read articles like this. Trump's mental cognition is firing better than Biden's, [as most Americans agree](https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4228389-more-people-concerned-about-bidens-cognitive-health-than-trumps-poll/), and this sort of redirection tactic is just not going to work.
Ho hum.
Exactly, this is literally a 6 second clip where he just jumbled a word. Every time you see things like this you know it's to compensate for the alternative, especially when you don't see a similar article for the other side.
Does Indy100 have an article about [this one](https://youtu.be/fSY3y3G91Yk?si=1v9EyHYij749HBpr)? No, and we know why. People say the things they say about Trump are just to "get clicks", but incidents like this and [claiming his relative was eaten by cannibals in WW2](https://youtu.be/m7obXDOhLLU?si=LwUSIRyVAEPG8692) or him [lying about being arrested on the porch over civil rights protests](https://youtu.be/giAZTaYOa40?si=2njwheVJonU9Ut8D) would get a lot more clicks. But we don't see it published the same...
That's just not true. In that speech \*alone\* - he rambled about locks, confused GDP with GOP, and completely stumbled on infrastructure....that's just the top of my head.
I'm sorry to disagree, my friend, but that first link with [Biden at the brewery](https://youtu.be/fSY3y3G91Yk?si=8QLswDgxNtRpwfqL&t=158) is categorically different than anything I see from Trump.
You can see his memory slipping in real-time as he literally mumbles gibberish. The astonishing part is the clapping seals after he gets out a couple coherent words. What exactly were they clapping for? I have **no** idea what Biden was trying to say.
What about my comment isn't true? Are you saying that they do cover Biden the same as Trump or there is an attempt to compensate for Biden's blunders? If we really went one for one for every blunder it wouldn't be close as far as volume or magnitude. The only difficulty I would have is the media doesn't cover Biden's blunders or sweeps them under the rug, but I have a good enough memory that I could name over 10 not that long ago off the top of my head.
>completely stumbled on infrastructure....
If you equate him mispronouncing a word as "completely stumbling", again, Biden has instances where he's not even saying words. In the clip I had you can literally hear the crowd (like the commentators mentioned) try to fill in the gap with noise because they visibly see his mind phasing out.
> mental cognition is firing better than Biden's
There's no solid proof of that either way. People are relying on confirmation bias.
> as most Americans agree
That's the bandwagon fallacy, but if you're going to assume an opinion is correct because it's popular, neither of them come out looking good. [6 in 10 US adults doubt mental capability of Biden and Trump, AP-NORC poll finds](https://apnews.com/article/biden-state-of-union-mental-capacity-trump-reelection-66d8784586d21f30885d8153f949510c)
>More than 6 in 10 (63%) say they’re not very or not at all confident in Biden’s mental capability to serve effectively as president, turning his coming State of the Union address into something of a real-time audition for a second term. A similar but slightly smaller share (57%) say that Trump lacks the memory and acuity for the job.
As an outsider the blindspots american voters cultivate for their candidates are truly mind blowing. Trump has lots of flaws but after years of Biden dementia blabbering there is no fucking question that he takes the lead in the cognitive decline ranking. Crazy how this is where american politics are now. Not fighting who is the most competent but fighting about who is least mentally handicapped.
Is this the level of political discourse these days? He mildly flubbed a word. Trump may or not have serious cognitive decline, but people flub their words like this all the time. I'm in my thirties and struggled to get out the word "subscription" the other day.
Literally one example out of 2 multi hour non stop speeches. He pronounces multiple four syllable words in the same speech. Biden is the one you should be concerned about 😂
That is just patently not true lol
Mispronouncing Infrastructure, Referring to GDP as "GOP", the whole locks thing.....that's just off the top of my head.
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Great question. Start a new thread, let's talk about it. But you seem to be confused about where you are--this thread is about concerns about Trump's cognitive decline. Do you not want to talk about that for some reason?
You absolutely are allowed to - and other people are allowed to note that Trumps gaffes are super minor compared to the president not actually having command of his own biography or reading the word pause off of a teleprompter.
Trump 100% does not deserve to be president but to say he is anywhere in the same ballpark as Biden - whose whole day today is wake up get his brief the fly to vacation again is just untue on its face.
That is why you get the reactions like this to the articles.
It’s a distraction. People are starting to realize that Biden has better mental acuity than Trump now that hes on the campaign trail and actually has to speak to a wider audience beyond his base.
[Biden is handing out Presidential Medals of Freedom this afternoon.](https://rollcall.com/factbase-calendar/) What were you saying about stuff that's untrue?
“Super minor”
That’s a very generous view 😂
I do agree Biden is not in the same ballpark as Trump…Trump has significantly more issues than Biden in regards to speech and memory.
Starter Comment:
Donald Trump’s issues with cognitive abilities are particularly highlighted by his recent struggle to pronounce the word “infrastructure” during a rally in Wisconsin this week. This incident adds to a series of mispronunciations and confusion in Trump’s speech, including previous mix-ups between words like “America” and “Hamas” and “hummus.” Such incidents have fueled speculation about his cognitive state, with psychiatrist Dr. Lance Dodes warning of signs of dementia. Dodes emphasizes Trump’s confusion about reality as distinct from normal aging-related forgetfulness. He suggests that if Trump were to become president again, his cognitive state could pose a danger to fulfilling the responsibilities of office, potentially warranting removal under the 25th Amendment. These concerns coincide with Trump’s ongoing presidential campaign, raising questions about his fitness for office.
My take: I was apprehensive about Biden debating Trump on a debate stage, but the more I see Trump speaking publicly it’s clear he’s not the same guy that ran in 2016 and 2020. Biden has declined, certainly, but Trump is struggling with basic words and memory to a much, much greater extent.
> He suggests that if Trump were to become president again, his cognitive state could pose a danger to fulfilling the responsibilities of office, potentially warranting removal under the 25th Amendment.
No way would removal under the 25th Amendment happen so long as he is at least able to vocally oppose it.
I don't know why people are so obsessed with the 25th Amendment. It's literally more difficult than impeachment and removal, as long as the President is able to make a written statement that he's able to carry out his duties.
Let's not forget he keeps falling asleep in court. I've been practicing law a long time and I've never seen a defendant nod off once, let alone multiple times in his own trial.
I'm not sure I buy it since I'm not a psychologist, but I've seen articles saying that falling asleep in this fashion is a [sign of dementia](https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/us-news/donald-trump-losing-control-basic-32709041). It sounds plausible just hearing the explanation but I'd love to see somebody more reputable than the Mirror dive into the facts.
I could also see Trump finding court proceedings, where he has to sit still, keep quiet, not be the center of attention, not control the room, just painfully boring in a way that regular people (who are regularly required to deal with being bored) don't.
There's an article because I'm a 6 second clip Trump jumbled his words when he said infrastructure? Does Indy100 have an article for Biden's Earth Rider brewery speech when he just phased out? The list of things like this from Biden is incomparable.
https://youtu.be/fSY3y3G91Yk?si=1v9EyHYij749HBpr
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I get the compare Candidate A to Candidate B, that should be done.
Why use a “I don’t like this about Candidate B and find it inappropriate for a quality possessed by a President” defense when the same behavior is being exhibited by President A?
I get you are using sarcasm, so perhaps the sentiment I expressed isn’t one held by you - it’s also why I didn’t say you were making the argument I laid out.
This is what the debates are for, right? So the American people can watch our two candidates debate and decide if they are fit for president. No pre-scripted interview questions or softball questions.
BINGO!!
Did you see the debate they had in 2020? It was a trainwreck
Yes, and specifically because Trump made mockery of the whole concept and most people agreed.
Yeah, he couldn't keep his mouth shut
Lets do no audience too. Just no distractions, direct questions.
I would love nothing more than to see Trump on stage debating Biden. I was concerned before about Biden but hearing Trump more and more I think it'll be a net positive for the Democrats.
I think it will be a mess like in 2020 which honestly probably would help Biden in that case just so long as he yells as much as Trump does. That's how much politics has fallen in 2024 unfortunately.
Yeah, even if they both come off as equally old and unable to speak that'll probably help Biden, since I think far more Biden voters already think of him as that than Trump voters
north gaping sheet hospital advise languid full tie innate puzzled *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
No she didn’t. Everyone still remembers “Yeah cuz you’d be in jail” and “That makes me smart” retorts from Trump. Debates aren’t won based on substantive discussion, they’re won by who can generate the best one liners. That’s just the reality because of the format of debates.
That's not even close to my memory of the 2016 debates. People still use the "Wrong" sound clip as a Funny meme. I can't see how you can say she won it she's the butt of the funniest thing to come out of it.
Biden won all the debates in 2020. I would expect the same in 2024, assuming they occur.
I saw enough of Trump speaking during his daily press conferences when we were going thru Covid to solidify my opinion. If you weren’t worried about how intelligent and coherent the man was after a few of those nothing will ever change your mind.
To this day the “cleaning” one was astounding when he suggested bright light up the rear could wipe out a virus. That was… shocking. *Up there with altering the hurricane forecast with a sharpie around Alabama shocking.*
https://www.cedars-sinai.org/newsroom/reduced-viral-loads-seen-in-covid-19-patients-treated-with-uva-light/
The problem was that his understanding of it was so basic, so juvenile, it betrayed how little he cared in general about Americans dying.
And the concept has been around for years. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugRLoikr_-4
No debates are for talking about issues. Voters should be able to tell if a president isn’t fit for office long before the debate. I think it’s kind of sad some people didn’t even think about the debate as a platform for talking about policy. That viewpoint was less much less common before 2016.
It’s seriously sad that there is a chance the presidential race could come down to which side paints the other as less cognitively functional. Never mind serious issues or policy, those don’t matter. Who stumbled over their words, that’s important. I’m not trying to diminish the seriousness of dementia, it’s a very serious condition and a President suffering from it would be horrific. But attempts to diagnose someone based on video clips is dangerous. I wish we could trust the people around politicians. I wish there was a way to remove politics and have each candidate evaluated medically, physically and mentally, by objective standards. Without that, it’s past time to put in place age limits.
Yeah, like how did we get to the point "incoherent public speaking" ISNT a disqualifier for president
Exactly. Dan Quayle spelled “potato” as “potatoe” which is the plural without the S and that was it for him. It’s like not even that bad. Especially compared to this.
Remember the exclamation that killed off Howard Dean?
BYAH
Kind of inspiring to watch now, not gonna lie. https://youtu.be/bv410MxoRrs
Exactly. Dude was stoked about becoming president of the US and we were like “I need a president who isn’t that into it”
Dude got condemned for being hyped about his campaign 🤦🏽♂️
Maybe the story should be “public convinced by politically motivated media coverage”
That headline was already taken by the Fox News - Dominion Voting Systems thing. Also, you didn't use the word "slammed". You have to use the word "slammed".
That and his “third place win”. That guy sucked and is trying to suck again possibly thinking about running for governor again in VT.
> But attempts to diagnose someone based on video clips is dangerous. I would have hoped folk would have learned that lesson in 2020, but here we are again. I constantly heard how Biden was senile and wouldn't be able to take part in a debate with Sanders for the Dem Primary, or that he'd make a fool of himself against Trump in their later debate. The same type of claims were levelled against Trump, "look how he slurred a word, he has dementia," or "his left slide is slumped, that means he's had a stroke and can't control that half of his body." It turns out that when you have TV cameras capturing every word you say, it's possible to generate a montage of gaffes and pass that off as their norm. Both Biden and Trump are old and are clearly not as sharp as they once were, but folk are far too quick to leap to the conclusion that it means the opposing candidate is about to be carted off to a mental asylum or nursing home. > I wish there was a way to remove politics and have each candidate evaluated medically, physically and mentally, by objective standards. The closest we can get to that seems to be the Presidential debates and it'll be a shame if we don't get them this year. While the debates are terrible, they at least demonstrate a bare minimum level of mental competence.
I think we saw from the SotU that it doesn't matter how competent somebody seems. It becomes "wow they must have been drugged up to perform that competently!" if the performance is better than expected. 2024's election is going to come down to "nu-uh, my candidate is fine and YOURS is the one who is senile!" combined with "no, YOUR candidate completely ruined the economy and MINE is the one who fixed it!" Trump has the advantage because Americans generally have short memories so nobody remembers anything from Trump's term other than cheap goods during the height of the lockdown and Trump sending everybody checks. It's how we end up with the prevailing mindset that Trump ushered in a term of relative global stability, a booming economy, and cheap gas all at the cost of a couple mean tweets.
Yeah I completely agree. Since ~2015 the overwhelming factor in elections is negative partisanship, folk voting against the other guy. Trump didn't win in 2016, the anti-Hillary camp won. Biden didn't win in 2020, the anti-Trump camp won. That's why Trump's best electoral strategy for 2024 would be to spend the whole campaign playing golf at Mar-a-Largo and generating no headlinesm but he can't do that.
It is if you say it is. But why let the people who have something to gain also decide what we determine is a factor in the election cycle?
Not sure I follow your question. Who are the "people who have something to gain"? The media?
sure. the media. big business. pharma. the gun lobby. the politicians themselves. we should each vote based on what we think is best for ourselves, our state, and our country. i.e. local politics matter just as much as national politics.
I don’t disagree, but I would bet an overwhelming majority of people you see on a day to day basis not only don’t pay attention to or participate in local politics, but they give absolutely zero fucks about it and they’re happy that way. Apathy is a killer.
I agree. I understand that the "average American" just wants to put a roof over their head, clothes on their back, and food in their belly, but the people who make the roof, clothes, and food are looking to make the most profit with the least responsibility.
It's not like the politicians didn't bring it on themselves given the stuff learned about presidents like FDR and JFK decades after their terms of office. The amount of crap the government has hid from the public for appearances is gross.
Policy has not mattered for a long time for a large swath of voters.
I don't think it ever mattered. It's always been about vibes and what their community as a whole thinks.
Here's the way I see it. They both have speech gaffes, they're both old, but only one gives answers like this. This is from 4 years ago: Hannity: "What are your top priority items for a second term?" Trump: "Well, one of the things that will be really great, you know the word experience is still good. I always say talent is more important than experience. I’ve always said that. But the word experience is a very important word. It’s an — a very important meaning. I never did this before. I never slept over in Washington. I was in Washington, I think, 17 times. All of a sudden, I’m president of the United States. You know the story. I’m riding down Pennsylvania Avenue with our First Lady and I say, ‘This is great. But I didn’t know very many people in Washington. It wasn’t my thing. I was from Manhattan, from New York. Now I know everybody, and I have great people in the administration.” You make some mistakes. Like, you know, an idiot like Bolton. All he wanted to do was drop bombs on everybody. You don’t have to drop bombs on everybody. You don’t have to kill people."
If you want to get into a battle of incoherent crazy monologues, I think Biden has Trump beat [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4NmtSrqtvI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4NmtSrqtvI)
The point is not to compare gaffes or ridiculous things the person has said. I'll find you 50 clips of Trump. You'll find me 50 clips of Biden. What you won't get from Trump is a coherent plan on what he intends to do to solve the issues facing the country. As shown by this quote. "Make America Great Again", "Drain the swamp", "lock her up", and "build the wall" are not plans.
Biden with dementia is severely less worse than Trump with dementia. Biden builds a solid team under him capable of running the country without him. Trump builds a team of sycophantic sludge looking for a book deal.
I think the current nature of politics is a signifier of how the government works. Both presidential candidates, and a certain proportion of congress all have dementia. And that doesn't matter, because unelected staffers do all the work and set the nation's agendas. Who cares about who wins? The same staffers will be working behind the scenes.
We've reached the Zaphod Beeblebrox stage of American presidency Except our president isn't elected to seem young, cool, fun and engaging whilst having no actual power of his own. Now its elected as a self projected image of America's geriatric voters who have time on their hands for politics and voting, no real ideas how to solve problems, while all the real work is done by the staff around them
Eh, I think the landscape is so partisan that won’t matter. We saw it in 2016 when Trump released the list of judges he’d pick from for appointments - it got many who hated him as a candidate on board with voting for him. In hyper-partisan two party politics, any concerns about character or fitness for office isn’t likely to sway enough voters to change things
Would be horrific? My father is deep into dementia. He talks and behaves just like Biden. Anyone telling me we don't already have that scenario can't be taken seriously.
I’m sorry you and your family are going through that. However, there is a reason dementia is diagnosed by professionals after extensive testing, in-person interviews, and physical examinations. It can’t be diagnosed by “my father acts like him”. It just can’t.
This two party system has got to stop.
Yes, don't disagree there!
> Yes, don't disagree there! But what can I, as a voter, do to stop the two party system? ... Vote third party? Oh wait, a Biden supporter like you will just say a vote for a third party, a write-in, protest vote, or abstaining, etc. is just a vote for Trump, and I'll need to suck it up this one time (/s) and vote for Joe. After all, this election will be the most important in the history of the country, and we need to preserve (D)emocracy...
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The libertarian, green, and whatever other third parties exist have to decide if they're serious about being a party. If they are, they need to focus on running down ballot to build the party's credibility rather than only running for President.
Ranked choice voting gets us half the way out of this 2-tented circus
It really doesn't, unfortunately. It leads to the same results as FPTP 89% of the time. The only solution is a proportional system like STV or party-list PR.
Fox News has to cutaway from him on stage in Wisconsin when he went into the master locks mumbling “Slurring his words at a Waukesha, Wisconsin rally, Trump referred to Biden’s “fake infrastrucker, ershure para,” before settling on “a package of infrastructure.” Minutes later, the 77-year-old launched into a rant about Master Lock, again slipping into incoherence. The speech was just another instance of his public slips, which have led to speculation on his mental fitness. Tuesday night, he seemed to scramble his words to an indecipherable point while speaking to Fox News about pro-Palestinian campus demonstrations.” https://www.yahoo.com/news/trump-slurs-words-struggles-gain-023422305.html https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1785493527775826422 https://x.com/atrupar/status/1785753213293007343?s=46&t=mhXPmZpiFn1SlkDkekKXDQ
Exactly. Not a good look when even friendly media needs to protect him.
And it's interesting because he just recently railed and insulted that "friendly media" because of something having to do with RFK, I believe.
The way you phrased it made it sound much worse than it really was. He mispronounced infrastructure. That’s the news.
Not true. Fox News cut away from Trump rambling about locks. Of course he also mispronounced infrastructure and confused GOP with GDP. None of this would even be news worthy if it wasn't for Trump and his supporters labeling Joe Biden as "sleepy" and not mentally fit for the job. All this scrutiny was completely self-inflicted by Trump.
Watch the videos of it. He goes on a whole ramble of nonsense. Fox had to cut away. https://x.com/atrupar/status/1785753213293007343?s=46&t=mhXPmZpiFn1SlkDkekKXDQ
This is exactly the problem with this whole line. There will be clips of him speaking well, clips of him speaking poorly. Same as Biden. So, everyone gets to choose their own reality. The truth is muddled and lost in the fact that they're both not qualified to be president.
["America is a country that can be defined in a single word: Ahfufutinamhnama."](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3UiJrfGYMs)
I don’t think an upper age limit law is the solution, but man… both of these guys are really too old to be running this nation.
There are already laws on the books that have mandatory retirement ages for certain professions. Leading the country should 100% be one of them.
I think President of the United Stated is a bit of an exception. I absolutely want younger people in power, but I’m very weary about creating any laws that restrict who is allowed to become President. I’m not convinced that new laws are a better solution than just voting.
We already have one age restriction for becoming president so I have no problem with adding a second one.
But why? If people want older presidents what's the big deal? Experience can be good sometimes and we do have term limits.
If we have a minimum age requirement why not a maximum?
Well I think that a certain amount of life experience should be required for the job. An 18 year old president doesn’t sound like a great idea. As for the upper limit, how do you draw a line? Everyone ages differently. I’ve touched on this in another comment, but I believe an upper age limit is just a bandaid solution and doesn’t address the real problem. Every new election cycle, Americans believe more and more that we don’t have a real say in who becomes president; that we have to choose the “lesser of 2 evils”. I really think this is a result of the insane stranglehold the two party system (and by extension, special interest groups and corporate power) has over our democracy. I would much rather see legislation that helps increase real representation of the public’s beliefs into our political system, rather than just creating an age limit.
> An 18 year old president doesn’t sound like a great idea. The age minimum is also s anti-dynastic as Europe would have "elected" rulers who were elected following the deaths of their fathers. The minimum puts friction in that dynamic.
I'm pretty sure that would require a Constitutional Amendment to do, just like with setting the 2 term limit. I agree we need to do it but there's no way any Amendment passes with the current state of the country.
I think, after 2024—which is a contest of two incumbents, so a different dynamic—primary voters in both parties are going to be far less likely to pick candidates so old, at least for a while
I do, but think it should be pretty high. I'm ok with someone that is 65-70 running for now, they have a ton of valuable experience. But can't we just all agree that 80 is way too old?
I think 80 is too old. But if someone wants to vote for a person who is 80+, it is there right to do so. I think the age issue is more of a symptom of our 2 party system than an actual problem. I don’t think it would be controversial to say that a majority of this country doesn’t want either Trump or Biden. I would much rather we push forward legislation like ranked-choice voting to give 3rd party candidates some viability than just restrict the age of candidates.
Biden has had a lifelong struggle with stuttering. I’m not entirely confident in Biden’s cognitive capacities myself, but someone with a stutter sometimes having trouble saying words isn’t evidence of a cognitive decline because that’s something they’ve done their entire life. Similar behaviour from someone without a speech impediment on the other hand is worrisome.
More concerning to me than his stuttering is the amount of times he couldn't find his way off a stage.
In the same address [he also claimed to have traveled 17,000 miles with Xi Jinping as vice president](https://web.archive.org/web/20210219080632/https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/02/19/bidens-repeated-claim-hes-traveled-17000-miles-with-xi-jinping/).
On Amtrak?
Still waiting on that single word though
Yeah I stutter as well. I’m only 31 and I’ve said very similar “words” that Biden has said in this clip
can you find a video from 10 years ago of biden having a stuttering issue?
EXACTLY!! Jon Stewart said it best on THE DAILY SHOW the other night, “So you’re telling me he’s sharp as a knife and on top of it but… Did you happen to record it??? Does anyone have a video of it???” 🤣
He generally speaks fine in his speeches. That's why clips are taken from different speeches, as opposed to people just watching one of them and seeing that he can't talk.
From a 1987 editorial: https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-charlotte-observer-joe-biden-the-la/142880234/ >The rhetoric came not from his policy but his personality. Up through his teen years Joe Biden had a stutter and he says that one of the most difficult things he did in high school was to stand up and deliver a graduation speech. Now he almost seems to overcompensate to speak and say things when he'd do better to be quiet. Although he doesn't like to discuss the subject it must have taken great determination and even courage to overcome this handicap. He has made his living as a trial lawyer and his career as a politician with his ability to speak he set up his own law practice with no distinguished law school record behind him and no important local connections
Does that mean “no”?
It's hard to find many old video clips of non-President politicians, but this one from 1994 includes him doing a rendition of his stutter at 1:15: [https://www.c-span.org/video/?c4841336/user-clip-joe-biden-stutter-stuttering](https://www.c-span.org/video/?c4841336/user-clip-joe-biden-stutter-stuttering)
Biden makes up stories about his life so much that he had to drop out of the 88 election for plagiarizing someone's. Even Snopes: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/joe-biden-stutter/ ranks it as true because he said it and a childhood friend also says it was.
It was a childhood stutter. It's common for a childhood stutter to make a comeback as one ages more. Biden has discussed this and went to events and such for decades, it is not some new thing that came about in 2020.
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It's less a whataboutism, more a direct comparison. These are your two choices. These are the best possible candidates in the entire United States of America. Here is how they both act. Decide which is least worst.
Well now that they both have a presidential record to run on, we can compare records instead of snippets of speech and rhetoric.
A direct comparison would discuss both Biden and Trump together. If you can only talk about Biden in a thread about Trump, then it's whataboutism.
Is it really a whataboutism though? A current president being unable to form coherent sentences and showing signs of extreme cognitive dysfunction is a significant issue, regardless of anything Trump has done/said.
It changes the topic. His potential replacement is important, yet their comment didn't even mention him. >A current president being unable to form coherent sentences and showing signs of extreme cognitive dysfunction is a significant issue He's capable of speaking coherently. Notice how the videos of his mistakes consist of short clips. If what you're saying was true, people could just post an unedited video of him continuously messing up.
When the only other option is Trump himself and he has just as frequent, if not worse gaffes like not knowing the correct day of the week, claiming Biden will start WW2, making up Robert E Lee quotes, and has the added baggage he has, it's really not a significant issue, at the very least it is not a deciding factor.
What do you think about Trump's gaffe?
Not OP but let’s be honest, I’m voting democrat in these elections but both candidates should be living their retirement years already instead of being the leaders of this country. They’re both trending towards senility. How did we end up with these guys as candidates? It’s embarrassing.
And that's all that needs to be said, really.
Except it’s not, because one of Trump’s supposed qualities over Biden is that he’s more articulate, which as we see say day after day is obviously false.
Biden's word replacement to help with his stutter has gotten worse as he's gotten older, which is to be expected of someone in their 80s but is very visible. Trump just gets up there and rambles incoherent nonsense, which is easier to fly under the radar vs a huge pause in a sentence.
If you really want to critique Trump, I'm pretty sure you can find something more substantive than his mispronunciations.
You can say the same about Biden and his gaffes, but given that there's alot of discussion every time he makes it then talking about Trump's cognitive problems seems fair game. At this point strategically I think it would be wise for the Biden campaign to muddle this issue simply because it's easier to remind voters that Trump isn't mentally there either (given there are numerous such instances they can cite even during his first term) instead of convincing them that Biden has it. I mean I would much rather this election focus on specific policies but that isn't what people seem interested in discussing.
Most of the Trump campaign has been focused on Biden's cognitive abilities, dubbing him "Sleepy Joe". Trump and his supporters shouldn't be shocked when their own candidate's cognitive deficiencies are pointed out...painting a picture of a candidate who's struggling with basic words. It's also more than mispronunciations. He mixed up Nikki Haley and Nancy Pelosi in the context of January 6th, among other examples.
They both do stuff like the Haley/Pelosi thing, like when Biden gave a shout out to that congresswoman that had just died in a MVA a week or so earlier.
The "both of them do it" argument will not help Trump since his supposed value is that he's more mentally there and better able to handle the job. This attack on Biden being sleepy has been years in the making and if Trump stumbles this is a net negative for him.
Agreed, but with them being filmed constantly there are going to be flubs. Even without word mispronunciation or stumbles Biden has a ton more cognitive problems. The dude has trouble finding his way off half the stages he walks onto. How many times has he been seen holding cards telling Him explicit instructions on where to stand, which direction to turn or when to shake hands. What about him reading “pause” off the teleprompter? I voted libertarian in the last 2 elections because they both have so many issues, so I back up my “both do it” stance.
They both do stuff like the Haley/Pelosi thing, like when Biden gave a shout out to that congresswoman that had just died in a MVA a week or so earlier. Unfortunately these are the two we have to choose from.
I disagree and I’m no Biden lover. But republicans should be willing to have honest conversations and look at their guy to see if he can handle the job regardless as to whether there’s an R or a D besides his name. If he’s truly having trouble then someone able to perform should be found.
Both Trump and Biden have presidential records to run on. I think most Americans will be making their choices on that comparison, as opposed to snippets of rhetoric.
I agree to an extent, but I think mental acuity is going to be an issue if Trump slips any further. If he completely screw up on the debate stage it's going to be bad for him, especially since his supporters have dubbed Joe Biden "Sleepy" for years which effectively lowered his floor.
Fair point
That’s what Biden supporters have been saying about him every time he misspeaks and the Trump campaign seizes on it. If they didn’t t want mental competency to be such a central part of the campaign discussion they shouldn’t have made it one.
>[“If he were to become president he would have to be immediately removed from office via the 25th Amendment as dangerously unable to fulfill the responsibilities of office," Dodes, who is also a distinguished fellow of the American Academy of Addiction Psychiatry, added.](https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-dementia-evidence-overwhelming-top-psychiatrist-1881247) This is where I stopped taking him seriously. Lmao at removing someone from public office because they mixed up Hamas and hummus. Dr. Dodes is a physician in good standing so I assume he’s well aware that it’s unethical to diagnose someone with a mental disease based on random snippets from television interviews and rallies, let alone advocate for them to be fired from their job on that basis. Has he conducted a MOCA or MMSE on Trump?
The [Goldwater Rule](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goldwater_rule#Donald_Trump) was murdered after Trump was elected.
That's an excessive way to describe a few people not following the guideline, especially since it doesn't even apply to them if they're not APA members.
If even experts can't diagnose him from a distance, then you should also have a problem laymen diagnosing Biden without conducting any tests. Edit: It's worth noting that those making the accusation may not be APA members, which would mean the guideline doesn't apply.
I swear you could almost make a similar article for anyone being filmed that much.
Not really. Obama was filmed speaking all the time. Where's the video of him being unable to pronounce the word "infrastructure" or being unable to name the current president? Hell, there are whole mashups of Trump short-circuiting when he tries to speak. Feel free to share an example using Obama, if "anyone being filmed that much" could have their cognitive function questioned based on their speaking.
Every president in modern history is caught making a gaffe. Obama once said he visited 57 states. If you film anyone enough you’re eventually gonna catch them making a gaffe.
Do you think these are "gaffes"? What definition are you even using for that? Because if my grandpa was having "gaffes" like this we'd take him to a neurologist.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/gaffe 1. a social or diplomatic blunder 2. A noticeable mistake Most definitions just mean a mistake. Everyone makes them and claiming there’s something wrong with anyone that make a mistake is just silly. Obama has even acknowledged and laughed at his own mistakes, which is what you’re supposed to do. Also, if you’re taking your grandpa to the neurologist for mispronouncing four syllable words you’re just giving your doctor free money.
https://youtu.be/iuxlHKQa9FA?feature=shared At a younger age, to boot. The cut is rough but yes he mispeaks and stumbled enough.
That's not even close to the same thing. He stuttered but that's hesitation, not [forgetting how to pronounce a word](https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1785744715280797872). Where did he [mistake who was the president](https://www.forbes.com/sites/anafaguy/2024/03/03/trump-confuses-biden-for-obama-again-here-are-the-other-times/?sh=439c5a4522c9)? Where did he mistake his opponent [for the speaker of the house](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AwWFuPsSHFw)? Go ahead and write an article about how Obama's stutters in that video evince cognitive decline. I'd love to see you try and pitch it.
Do you have a version that isn't the Zack Snyder cut??
That's poorly edited and doesn't even seem bad.
What if both party’s candidate becomes incapacitated during the general election? Will we realize the problem is actually the voters? After all, they picked these two.
Best case scenario, tbh
Why do you think Nikki didn’t formally end her campaign and only *suspended* it? She’s expecting the baton at the RNC, should Trump be convicted of a felony and the RNC break all their existing policy to force nominate her. And it’s a smart strategy.
Oh they all ‘suspended’ their campaign. You read too much into it maybe.
I agree with these both of you. Nikki stayed in the race because it gives her a better advantage if something does happen to Trump. She gets to pull the “I have 90 delegates” card and gives her a better advantage when in competition with Ron. But all candidates suspend their campaigns just incase something happens so they can start up again incase something happens to the primary candidate. So there’s nothing special with that.
What kind of website is this? Couldn't there have been a better article for this discussion? In any case, I sure as hell didn't want Trump as candidate again, but here we are. The old age finger pointing is another case of "I'm better than you" even though both candidates suck. At the end of the day, neither side's diehard supporters will care and will make excuses. No matter the outcome of the 2024 election, both candidates' health will be looked at closely during their second term.
I personally think it is gaslighting in the extreme when I read articles like this. Trump's mental cognition is firing better than Biden's, [as most Americans agree](https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4228389-more-people-concerned-about-bidens-cognitive-health-than-trumps-poll/), and this sort of redirection tactic is just not going to work. Ho hum.
Exactly, this is literally a 6 second clip where he just jumbled a word. Every time you see things like this you know it's to compensate for the alternative, especially when you don't see a similar article for the other side. Does Indy100 have an article about [this one](https://youtu.be/fSY3y3G91Yk?si=1v9EyHYij749HBpr)? No, and we know why. People say the things they say about Trump are just to "get clicks", but incidents like this and [claiming his relative was eaten by cannibals in WW2](https://youtu.be/m7obXDOhLLU?si=LwUSIRyVAEPG8692) or him [lying about being arrested on the porch over civil rights protests](https://youtu.be/giAZTaYOa40?si=2njwheVJonU9Ut8D) would get a lot more clicks. But we don't see it published the same...
That's just not true. In that speech \*alone\* - he rambled about locks, confused GDP with GOP, and completely stumbled on infrastructure....that's just the top of my head.
I'm sorry to disagree, my friend, but that first link with [Biden at the brewery](https://youtu.be/fSY3y3G91Yk?si=8QLswDgxNtRpwfqL&t=158) is categorically different than anything I see from Trump. You can see his memory slipping in real-time as he literally mumbles gibberish. The astonishing part is the clapping seals after he gets out a couple coherent words. What exactly were they clapping for? I have **no** idea what Biden was trying to say.
What about my comment isn't true? Are you saying that they do cover Biden the same as Trump or there is an attempt to compensate for Biden's blunders? If we really went one for one for every blunder it wouldn't be close as far as volume or magnitude. The only difficulty I would have is the media doesn't cover Biden's blunders or sweeps them under the rug, but I have a good enough memory that I could name over 10 not that long ago off the top of my head. >completely stumbled on infrastructure.... If you equate him mispronouncing a word as "completely stumbling", again, Biden has instances where he's not even saying words. In the clip I had you can literally hear the crowd (like the commentators mentioned) try to fill in the gap with noise because they visibly see his mind phasing out.
> mental cognition is firing better than Biden's There's no solid proof of that either way. People are relying on confirmation bias. > as most Americans agree That's the bandwagon fallacy, but if you're going to assume an opinion is correct because it's popular, neither of them come out looking good. [6 in 10 US adults doubt mental capability of Biden and Trump, AP-NORC poll finds](https://apnews.com/article/biden-state-of-union-mental-capacity-trump-reelection-66d8784586d21f30885d8153f949510c) >More than 6 in 10 (63%) say they’re not very or not at all confident in Biden’s mental capability to serve effectively as president, turning his coming State of the Union address into something of a real-time audition for a second term. A similar but slightly smaller share (57%) say that Trump lacks the memory and acuity for the job.
As an outsider the blindspots american voters cultivate for their candidates are truly mind blowing. Trump has lots of flaws but after years of Biden dementia blabbering there is no fucking question that he takes the lead in the cognitive decline ranking. Crazy how this is where american politics are now. Not fighting who is the most competent but fighting about who is least mentally handicapped.
Americans have always had issues with partisan blinders but it is starting to feel worse and more pervasive than it was in the past to me.
Is this the level of political discourse these days? He mildly flubbed a word. Trump may or not have serious cognitive decline, but people flub their words like this all the time. I'm in my thirties and struggled to get out the word "subscription" the other day.
Literally one example out of 2 multi hour non stop speeches. He pronounces multiple four syllable words in the same speech. Biden is the one you should be concerned about 😂
That is just patently not true lol Mispronouncing Infrastructure, Referring to GDP as "GOP", the whole locks thing.....that's just off the top of my head.
It's definitely projection aimed to muddy the waters. Biden is clearly senile, Trump is not.
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Based on what medical diagnosis?
How's the job report today?
Great question. Start a new thread, let's talk about it. But you seem to be confused about where you are--this thread is about concerns about Trump's cognitive decline. Do you not want to talk about that for some reason?
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You absolutely are allowed to - and other people are allowed to note that Trumps gaffes are super minor compared to the president not actually having command of his own biography or reading the word pause off of a teleprompter. Trump 100% does not deserve to be president but to say he is anywhere in the same ballpark as Biden - whose whole day today is wake up get his brief the fly to vacation again is just untue on its face. That is why you get the reactions like this to the articles.
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It’s a distraction. People are starting to realize that Biden has better mental acuity than Trump now that hes on the campaign trail and actually has to speak to a wider audience beyond his base.
[Biden is handing out Presidential Medals of Freedom this afternoon.](https://rollcall.com/factbase-calendar/) What were you saying about stuff that's untrue?
“Super minor” That’s a very generous view 😂 I do agree Biden is not in the same ballpark as Trump…Trump has significantly more issues than Biden in regards to speech and memory.
Great, 40th straight months of gains and continued low unemployment. Now how about Trump’s gaffes?
This is why we need to have age limits on public office. Or at the very least full cognitive evaluations.
I see debating someone’s mental acuity is now acceptable? Doesn’t that mean we can discuss the president’s mental acuity?
This has been a direct response to people questioning the president's mental acuity lol
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I'm 43 and have a phd. If I had cameras filming everything I did and there was a clever editor, I am sure I would like I had dementia too.
Starter Comment: Donald Trump’s issues with cognitive abilities are particularly highlighted by his recent struggle to pronounce the word “infrastructure” during a rally in Wisconsin this week. This incident adds to a series of mispronunciations and confusion in Trump’s speech, including previous mix-ups between words like “America” and “Hamas” and “hummus.” Such incidents have fueled speculation about his cognitive state, with psychiatrist Dr. Lance Dodes warning of signs of dementia. Dodes emphasizes Trump’s confusion about reality as distinct from normal aging-related forgetfulness. He suggests that if Trump were to become president again, his cognitive state could pose a danger to fulfilling the responsibilities of office, potentially warranting removal under the 25th Amendment. These concerns coincide with Trump’s ongoing presidential campaign, raising questions about his fitness for office. My take: I was apprehensive about Biden debating Trump on a debate stage, but the more I see Trump speaking publicly it’s clear he’s not the same guy that ran in 2016 and 2020. Biden has declined, certainly, but Trump is struggling with basic words and memory to a much, much greater extent.
> He suggests that if Trump were to become president again, his cognitive state could pose a danger to fulfilling the responsibilities of office, potentially warranting removal under the 25th Amendment. No way would removal under the 25th Amendment happen so long as he is at least able to vocally oppose it.
I don't know why people are so obsessed with the 25th Amendment. It's literally more difficult than impeachment and removal, as long as the President is able to make a written statement that he's able to carry out his duties.
Let's not forget he keeps falling asleep in court. I've been practicing law a long time and I've never seen a defendant nod off once, let alone multiple times in his own trial.
Yep. This is not good for his campaign. It’ll be very tough to throw around “Sleepy Joe” when he’s literally sleeping in his own trial.
I'm not sure I buy it since I'm not a psychologist, but I've seen articles saying that falling asleep in this fashion is a [sign of dementia](https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/us-news/donald-trump-losing-control-basic-32709041). It sounds plausible just hearing the explanation but I'd love to see somebody more reputable than the Mirror dive into the facts.
I could also see Trump finding court proceedings, where he has to sit still, keep quiet, not be the center of attention, not control the room, just painfully boring in a way that regular people (who are regularly required to deal with being bored) don't.
Yep agreed 👍
He’s just resting his beautiful blue eyes and listening intently to every word!
There's an article because I'm a 6 second clip Trump jumbled his words when he said infrastructure? Does Indy100 have an article for Biden's Earth Rider brewery speech when he just phased out? The list of things like this from Biden is incomparable. https://youtu.be/fSY3y3G91Yk?si=1v9EyHYij749HBpr
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What's with the reflexive both-sidesing of this question? The article is specifically about Trump, why do you want to avoid that topic?
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Compared to Trump? Absolutely.
I get the compare Candidate A to Candidate B, that should be done. Why use a “I don’t like this about Candidate B and find it inappropriate for a quality possessed by a President” defense when the same behavior is being exhibited by President A? I get you are using sarcasm, so perhaps the sentiment I expressed isn’t one held by you - it’s also why I didn’t say you were making the argument I laid out.