DIAGNOSIS: O'Donnell recalls a better day!

THURSDAY, APRIL 16, 2026

Why doesn't he do this now? Last evening, in his opening monologue on The Last Word, Lawrence O'Donnell recalled a (slightly) more forthright day.

In the course of his monologue, he made several glancing references to Peter Baker's recent front-page essay for the New York Times. Headline included, we recall the most interesting part of Baker's thumb-sucker pseudo-report:

Trump’s Erratic Behavior and Extreme Comments Revive Mental Health Debate

[...]

Mr. Trump’s stability has been a recurring issue since he first sought the presidency in 2016. Numerous psychiatrists and other mental health professionals have weighed in with their own opinions even without the opportunity to evaluate him. John F. Kelly, his longest serving White House chief of staff in the first term, even bought a book by 27 of those specialists called “The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump,” in an effort to understand his boss and came to the conclusion that he was mentally ill.  

It's true! Way back in 2017, Yale psychiatrist Dr. Bandy X. Lee edited a best-selling book with that very title. 

In line with an ancient guild tradition, the Times disappeared Dr. Lee's book at that time. In his lengthy essay for the Times, Baker maintained a version of that tradition, as we noted in yesterday's report.   

Sad! In his lengthy report for the Times, Baker didn't quote any of the 27 medical specialists who contributed to Dr. Lee's book. Instead, he offered a fuzzy, weirdly unsourced account of what General Kelly allegedly concluded upon reading the best-selling book.  

Twenty-seven medical specialists were thereby kicked to the curb. Readers were offered only the alleged assessment of General Kelly, who's highly regarded for his integrity but isn't a medical specialist! 

So it goes as journalistic children like Baker take their crayons and continue to color within the lines. Last evening, a form of this refusal to serve was present for the world to see at the start of The Last Word. 

Is it possible? Is it possible that President Trump is suffering from certain forms of mental illness which may, in fact, be immensely dangerous?  

It seems to us that the obvious (possible) answer is yes! But then, we aren't medical specialists either, any more than General Kelly (or Lawrence O'Donnell) is.

Early in last evening monologue, O'Donnell recalled a better day. He recalled the time when he was willing to interview medical specialists about the president's mental health.

It's been years since MSNBC / MS NOW presented transcripts of their primetime "cable news" programs. They suspended that practice years ago, we presume for the obvious reason.

For that reason, we can't direct you to a transcript of O'Donnell's monologue last night. But thanks to this videotape, you can watch the monologue—and at roughly 10:05 p.m., you'll see O'Donnell say this:  

O'DONNELL (4/15/26): If Donald Trump ever did talk to people that are "deep into the psychological world," he is just statistically likely to be speaking to someone who thinks Donald Trump has very serious mental problems, as described in the book, The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump, which was featured on the program in the first year of Donald Trump's first presidency. 

As he continued, O'Donnell described the overall structure of that long-ignored book. He then recalled the way his own program occasionally functioned, way back when The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump appeared: 

O'DONNELL: In his very first appearance on this program, in the second month of Donald Trump's presidency, ten years ago, former Harvard Medical School professor Dr. Lance Dodes said this: 

DR. DODES (videotape, 2017): Lying in the way he does it—repeated, dangerous lying—makes him unfit and is a sign of serious mental disturbance... 

Serious mental disturbance! The fact that he said it doesn't mean that it's right. But that's what Dr. Dodes said on the air, in prime time,, way back in 2017.

Dr. Dodes was one of the contributors to Dr. Lee's disappeared book. As you can see if you watch the tape of last evening's show, that statement by Dr. Dodes went on at some length from there. 

Soon, though, you'll see O'Donnell present a more significant statement by Dr. Dodes—a statement from January 2021: 

O'DONNELL: Professor Dodes returned to this program three days after the January 6th attack and said this:

DR. DODES (videotape, 2021): A delusional psychopath who has been the same his whole adult life, and who we knew would get worse the more stress he was under, because that's what happens with people with this kind of severe disorder. ...He is going to continue to get worse.

He is going to continue to get worse! That's what the experienced specialist said!

There's a great deal more to what Dr. Dodes said that day. We'll suggest that you watch the tape of last night's program to see his fuller statement—his fuller statement from January 2021.

That said:

He is going to continue to get worse, the medical specialist said at that time. 

Many people seem to think that some such downward spiral is now underway—and five years later, in late February of this very year, a second medical specialist went on CNN in prime time and said this:

ERIN BURNETT (2/26/26): You've known him your whole life. Do you actually see a [cognitive] decline?

MARY L. TRUMP: I do, but I think it's important to remember that Donald has never been fit in any capacity. Obviously, what we're dealing with now are age-related cognitive declines. We're dealing with physical issues that the White House tries to cover over.

But this is somebody who for decades now has had serious, undiagnosed and untreated psychiatric disorders, which are only going to worsen, especially given the pressure he's under and given the cognitive and physical declines.  

The fact that she said it doesn't mean that it's true. But her famous uncle's medical problems "are only going to worsen," this second specialist said. 

Under the circumstances, that sounds like an extremely dangerous state of affairs. And yet, how strange! 

From that day to this, we've seen no one say a word about what Mary L. Trump said on CNN that night. Any by the way, Lawrence O'Donnell no longer interviews medical specialists about the president's medical / mental condition.

 Back then, O'Donnell would (occasionally) speak with Dr. Dodes. But those days are long, long gone.

Last evening, O'Donnell recalled an earlier day—a time when he would actually interview actual medical specialists right there on The Last Word. The following fact went unexplained:

At the New York Times, and on The Last Word, those days are long, long gone!

Tomorrow: An imitation of journalism, an imitation of life

DIAGNOSIS: We don't know what we're talking about!

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 15, 2026

Neither do Baker's dozens: We start today with a restatement of our own general assumptions:  

First, we assume that Mary L. Trump is probably right when she says that her uncle, the sitting president, is involved in an obvious cognitive decline.  

(We regard that as a tragic event on the personal human level. We regard it as a dangerous state of affairs, given the uncle's vast power.) 

Second, we assume that Mary Trump is probably right when she describes her uncle as "somebody who for decades now has had serious, undiagnosed and untreated psychiatric disorders." In that remark, Mary Trump is saying that her uncle has long been afflicted by various forms of "mental illness." 

(For ourselves, we regard a serous "mental illness" as an illness. We think that (serious) "mental illness" is a personal tragedy. We don't think that some such assessment should be treated as the ultimate insult.)

Finally, we assume that Mary Trump is probably right when she says that her uncle's untreated psychiatric disorders "are only going to worsen." 

(We assume that that assessment is probably accurate. Under the circumstances, we regard that as an extremely dangerous state of affairs.)

We're inclined to assume that Mary Trump, a doctorate-holding clinical therapist, is right in those three assessments. Now for the rest of the story: 

Because we ourselves aren't medical specialists, we don't have the slightest idea what we're talking about! 

We're offering our best assessments concerning these matters, but those best assessments can only take us so far. Our best assessments may be accurate—obviously, we think they are—but in the normal course of events, we'd want to hear from experienced medical specialists about these profoundly important matters. 

We'd like to hear from (carefully selected) medical specialists. We don't need to hear from the dozens of loudmouths Peter Baker chose to quote in yesterday's thumb-sucker piece. 

Baker's essay appeared above the fold on the front page of yesterday's New York Times. As we noted yesterday, it appears online beneath this dual headline:  

Trump’s Erratic Behavior and Extreme Comments Revive Mental Health Debate
As the president threatens to wipe out Iran and attacks the pope, even some former allies and advisers are questioning whether he has grown increasingly unbalanced, describing him as “lunatic” and “clearly insane."

Those are wonderfully eye-catching headlines. Someone has described the president as "lunatic"—even as "clearly insane!" 

Those are thrilling assertions. The obvious problem is this:

“Lunatic” and “clearly insane" aren't clinical terms. They're the kinds of colloquial comments people tend to throw out, often as insults, at a dangerous time such as this. 

The second problem obtains: 

None of the many people Baker quotes is a medical specialist! Instead, he has quoted Ty Cobb, a high-ranking Washington lawyer, along with such political luminaries as these:  

Former Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, the Georgia Republican who recently broke with Mr. Trump, advocated using the 25th Amendment, telling CNN that threatening to destroy Iran’s civilization was “not tough rhetoric, it’s insanity.” Candace Owens, the far-right podcaster, called him “a genocidal lunatic.” Alex Jones, the conspiracy theorist and founder of Infowars, said Mr. Trump “does babble and sounds like the brain’s not doing too hot.”

Jones and Owens and Greene oh my! He has quoted such giants as these! 

He has also quoted Megyn Kelly, and he has quoted Tucker Carlson. Also, he has quoted such major Democratic office holders as these:

Democrats have pressed the point in recent days. Mr. Trump is “an extremely sick person” (Senator Chuck Schumer of New York), “unhinged” and “out of control” (Representative Hakeem Jeffries of New York) or, more bluntly, “batshit crazy” (Representative Ted Lieu of California). Representative Jamie Raskin of Maryland, wrote the White House physician requesting an evaluation, noting “signs consistent with dementia and cognitive decline” and “increasingly incoherent, volatile, profane, deranged, and threatening” tantrums. 

Rep. Lieu has said the president is "batshit crazy!" For better or worse, Baker chose to quote him.  

(All four Dems may be fully sincere. But none is a medical specialist!)

There's more to be said about the long list of people Baker quotes in his front-page piece. For today, we'll leave it at this:   

Baker doesn't quite a single medical specialist at any point in his piece! Indeed, in the most interesting part of his lengthy piece, the childish journo says this:   

Mr. Trump’s stability has been a recurring issue since he first sought the presidency in 2016. Numerous psychiatrists and other mental health professionals have weighed in with their own opinions even without the opportunity to evaluate him. John F. Kelly, his longest serving White House chief of staff in the first term, even bought a book by 27 of those specialists called “The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump,” in an effort to understand his boss and came to the conclusion that he was mentally ill.  

Did General Kelly really conclude that the president is "mentally ill?" It's a remarkable claim—and it goes weirdly unsourced, although the claim seems to track back to The Divider, the book Baker co-authored with Susan Glasser in 2022.

More on that tomorrow! For today, please understand this: 

Baker doesn't quote any of the 27 "psychiatrists and other mental health professionals" who contributed to The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump. (In that book's second edition, the number jumped to 37.)

Baker doesn't quote any of those medical specialists. Instead, he attributes a somewhat fuzzy claim to General Kelly—and though General Kelly is widely admired as a person of high integrity, let's all understand this:

General Kelly isn't a medical specialist! In the end, he doesn't know what he's actually talking about, any more than we do! 

Baker had 28 different people he could have quoted at that point in his lengthy front-page piece. For whatever reason, he skipped the 27 mental health professionals, choosing instead to state the alleged view of the one person who isn't a medical specialist!  

He quoted every nut he could find, not excusing Alex Jones. He didn't quote a single person who is a medical specialist!

We'll continue from here tomorrow. For ourselves, we're inclined to regard this essay as the latest disgrace. But also, we regard it as a major bit of anthropology—as the latest example of the way we humans seem to be wired to function.

Tomorrow: Possible diagnoses

Still coming: The Paul Reiser joke from way back when:

"Are we here to play some golf? Or are we just gonna f*ck around?"

DIAGNOSIS: Peter Baker's coloring book!

TUESDAY, APRIL 14, 2026

Watters whips it out: It may be time to seek a diagnosis for our failing society as a whole. We'll start with something from yesterday—something we didn't see in real time. 

In a rare act of self-indulgence, we skipped yesterday's edition of The Five, this nation's most-watched "cable news" program. 

Yesterday, as the program began, occasional co-host Harold Ford sat in the Jessica Tarlov chair. Also, comedian Tom Shillue sat in the chair of regular co-host Greg Gutfeld. 

There would be little point in watching, we incorrectly mused. At any rate, the line-up this day went exactly like this: 

The Five: Monday, April 13, 2026 
Emily Compagno: co-host, Outnumbered
Harold Ford Jr.: former congressman 
Jesse Watters: anchor, Jesse Watters Primetime
Dana Perino: co-host, America's Newsroom
Tom Shillue: comedian; occasional guest, Gutfeld!  

There would be nothing to see there, we surmised. But that assessment was wrong.  

In the program's second segment, the panel discussed Rep. Swalwell's announcement that he would be dropping his gubernatorial bid. 

There was no reason why they shouldn't have been discussing, or at least pretending to discuss, this significant topic. But when moderator Dana Perino threw to Watters, the most-watched star in the Fox News Channel firmament offered these typical comments:

WATTERS (4/13/26): It's a "He said, she said," Dana. And then I read a lot more, and it's like a "He said, she said, she said, she said, she said, she said." Because there are a lo-o-ot of women coming forward here, and it's not all pretty.  

One of the allegations was that he sucked on a girl's toes, OK? I just want to say, I mean, guys—do not do that? Ever? OK? 

And also, don't just whip it out!  

Allegedly, he was just whipping it out—in a car, In broad daylight. In front of the intern. 

[Covers his eyes in horror]

Like, that's not the moment you do it! It has to be done in the moment of maybe some passion. 

PERINO: Never with an intern! 

WATTERS (laughing): Never with an intern! 

PERINO: [Rolls her eyes, smirks at the camera]  

WATTERS: And also, sending cock-a doodle pics...  

As you can see by clicking the link, the superstar halfwit continued from there, at significant length. He did so on the American nation's most-watched "cable news" program, as four co-hosts gazed on.

 We aren't going to try explain the problems with Watters' extended advice to the fellas. We'll only say this:

Each evening. on the10 p.m. Gutfeld! show, the presentations tend to get dumber and substantially uglier.  

Question One:

Is something wrong with a Red American nation which has made idiocy of this familiar kind the heart and soul of primetime "cable news" coverage?

We'd have to say that there is! But then, we turn to this:

Question Two:

Is something wrong with a Blue America whose journalistic elites refuse to report or discuss the ugliness and the sheer inanity of the Fox News Channel's broadcasts?

Again, we're forced to say that there is! Something is badly wrong with the moral and intellectual profile of our own Blue elites.

With respect to those elites, we call your attention to the lengthy piece by Peter Baker which appears in today's New York Times. 

In print editions, it appears above the fold on the paper's front page. Online, Baker's piece appears under this intriguing dual headline:

Trump’s Erratic Behavior and Extreme Comments Revive Mental Health Debate
As the president threatens to wipe out Iran and attacks the pope, even some former allies and advisers are questioning whether he has grown increasingly unbalanced, describing him as “lunatic” and “clearly insane.”

On its face, that may seem like the very sort of analysis piece we've been repeatedly requesting. But in its actual execution, the essay strikes us as the latest bit of coloring inside the lines from Baker's front page coloring book.

We're embarrassed for Baker today. Also, we're embarrassed for the bulk of what the furious Lawrence O'Donnell said about this piece on last Evening's The Last Word.

At this site, we've been asking a very important question for perhaps a hundred years:

Is something wrong with President Trump? More specifically is something wrong with his mental health in a way which is actively dangerous and which is likely to get even worse?

If the president is so afflicted, that is of course a human tragedy. It's also a very dangerous state of affairs—a state of affairs which should be explored through interviews with (carefully selected) medical specialists.

That's what Baker (and his editors) are still refusing to do! Regarding the unhelpfully furious O'Donnell, the less said today the better.

We'll examine Baker's essay tomorrow. For today, our diagnosis stands uncharged:

We human beings simply aren't built for this line of work! Our elites are never going to attempt to tackle this crucial task.

They won't report and they won't discuss what happens on the Fox News Channel. Also, they won't speak to medical specialists about the deeply strange behavior of the world's most powerful man.

Our cautious elites will never do that! Dearest darlings, use your heads! Such things simply aren't done!

Tomorrow: The term "mentally ill" has been uttered for the first time!

DIAGNOSIS: There the president goes again!

MONDAY, APRIL 13, 2026

Nothing to look at, Smerconish says: "And so it did happen like it could have been foreseen..."  

With apologies, we're quoting from the early Bob Dylan. That said:

What we awoke to this morning was this report from Mediaite. We apologize for that site's devotion to eye-catching language in the apparent search for clicks:  

Trump Goes On a Jaw-Dropping Tirade Against Pope Leo: ‘I Don’t Want a Pope Who Criticizes the President of the United States!’

President Donald Trump went absolutely scorched earth on Pope Leo XIV in a Sunday night social media post, slamming the pontiff for his recent criticism of the Iran war and on a number of topics spanning from crime to COVID-19.

Trump—in a lengthy post on Truth Social—told the pope he’s had enough of his denunciations.

The president said Pope Leo had “terrible” thoughts on foreign policy and was “WEAK” on both crime and nuclear weapons. He also took credit for the Chicago-born pope becoming the first American pontiff last year.  

The report continues from there. As could have been foreseen, the president now made his apparent state of disorder extremely hard to miss:  

Trump Posts Jesus-Like Picture of Himself Performing Miracle on Sick Man, Minutes After Ramping Up Feud With Pope Leo

President Donald Trump posted an AI-generated image of himself seemingly in the role of Jesus Christ on Sunday night, complete with the robe-donning president reinvigorating a sick man with his healing hand while a nurse looked on and an American Eagle soared above.

The bizarre—and some would probably argue sacrilegious—post was made about 40 minutes after the president went off on Pope Leo XIV in a blistering social media rant. More on that below.

Trump’s picture had a lot going on in it. Beyond the aforementioned details, a praying woman and a man wearing what looks to be some sort of ICE uniform look on pensively as Trump works his miracle.   

The president’s hand is lit up in a holy manner, and behind him is the American flag and the Statue of Liberty; fighter jets and what appears to be soldiers who have become angels are also seen above Trump; an American soldier is also seen watching Trump as he cures the man in a hospital bed.

And so on, bizarrely, from there. 

We Americans have been exposed to this type of apparent madness again and again and again. That said, we've also been exposed to the madness displayed, in the most recent instance, by CNN's Michael Smerconish. 

Mediaite reports: 

CNN’s Smerconish Hits at Remove Trump Crowd in Lengthy Defense: ‘Madness IS the Method’

CNN host Michael Smerconish defended President Donald Trump against those calling for his removal from office via the 25th Amendment, arguing Trump’s critics don’t understand he plays the “madman card in public” to keep foreign enemies on their toes, when in reality he is making rational decisions behind closed doors. 

Smerconish made his case on the latest episode of his namesake show on Saturday. 

You'll have to read the full report yourself. That said:

The president isn't really "a madman," Smerconish insisted. According to Smerconish, the president has merely been playing "a madman" on Truth Social, and on TV.

For the record, Smerconish is perfectly intelligent. He has tended to cast himself in the role of "sensible centrist" throughout a lengthy career.  

Routinely, his work has been perfectly sensible. But in this latest attempt to deny the possibility of what seems to be sitting right there before him, Smerconish has taken the mainstream press by the scruff of the neck and has dragged it with him over the edge of the world.  

Last week, as we struggled with our own recent malady out of the blue (These pharmaceuticals today!), we highlighted some obvious questions concerning President Trump's recent very strange Truth Social posts. 

As you will recall, The New Yorker's David Remnick asked this question about the president's spate of posts concerning Iran: 

Who talks like that? 

It was an obvious question, with a blindingly obvious possible answer. At the same time, Megyn Kelly had asked such questions as these:

Can’t he just behave like a normal human? What does that say about him?  

Once again, those were excellent questions. One possible answer is obvious—but people like Remnick, Kelly and Smerconish have sworn a blood oath, within the guild, that they will never consider it. 

In this way, the madness of the sitting president meets the madness of the upper-end press corps (and the broader commentariat). But, cast in the role of a modern Cassandra, the president's niece, a doctorate-holding clinical therapist, had recently offered a pair of possible answers to those obvious questions:

ERIN BURNETT (2/26/26): You've known him your whole life. Do you actually see a [cognitive] decline?

MARY L. TRUMP: I do, but I think it's important to remember that Donald has never been fit in any capacity. Obviously, what we're dealing with now are age-related cognitive declines. We're dealing with physical issues that the White House tries to cover over.

But this is somebody who for decades now has had serious, undiagnosed and untreated psychiatric disorders, which are only going to worsen, especially given the pressure he's under and given the cognitive and physical declines.  

Who talks like that, Remnick had asked. Mary Trump offered two possible answers: 

1) A person afflicted by an obvious cognitive decline.  
2) A person afflicted by an obvious cognitive decline layered atop decades of "serious, undiagnosed and untreated psychiatric disorders." 

Her uncle is "mentally ill," the president's niece had plainly said. If we believe in modern medical science that's an obvious possible answer to the questions which were later asked. 

That said, madmen like Remnick, Kelly and Smerconish have sworn an oath to the gods. They've sworn that question of "mental illness"—even of something as common as "age-related cognitive decline"—must never be raised with respect to someone like President Trump, who is now attacking the pope and portraying himself as a version of Jesus Christ.  

This is madness encountering madness. We'll explore this moral and intellectual disaster all this week.

At this site, we're struggling to return to full functioning in the wake of last week's walk on the wild side. 

That said, Mary Trump has offered a clearcut medical diagnosis with respect to her famous uncle. In part, she has diagnosed some form of "mental illness"—but what kind of diagnosis is that?

SATURDAY: We hope to hit the ground running...

 SATURDAY, APRIL 11, 2026

...after the world lost a week: We hit the ground running, admittedly at a rather slow speed, after yesterday's medical summit.

Results from the summit were several: 

One pharmaceutical was kicked to the curb. Another was replaced by a substitute. We returned to our sprawling campus, fell into a deep sleep.

These pharmaceuticals today! At any rate, "Doc" assured us we'd be back on track—and our current reports will (we hope) resume on Monday morning.

Where we left off:

"Who talks like that," David Remnick had said, speaking to Jen Psaki. For the sake of clarity, we'll highlight that excellent question:

Who talks like that?

Also, Megyn Kelly has asked several similar questions, including these:

Can’t he just behave like a normal human? What does that say about him?

One possible answer to all those questions is stunningly obvious. The fact that no one knows how to provide it—or the fact that no one is willing to do so—is anthropology all the way down concerning our bodies, ourselves.

One possible answer is blindingly obvious. With a bit of luck, we'll return to this topic at the start of the week. 

Almost surely, the president isn't "a normal human." But what's the excuse, or the explanation, for the conduct of everyone else?

ILLNESS: "Who talks like this?" David Remnick had said!

THURSDAY, APRIL 9, 2026

And then, we had Megyn Kelly: And then, we had Megyn Kelly's reaction to the president's recent threats. 

To view the tape, you can just click here. With apologies for our decision not to bleep, we think we can answer her questions: 

KELLY (4/7/26): I don’t know about you, but I am sick of this shit! I’m just—I’m sick of it. Can’t he just behave like a normal human? I mean, honestly, like the president—“3D chess.” Just shut up! Fucking shut up about that shit! 

You don’t threaten to wipe out an entire civilization. We’re talking about civilians, just casually in a social media post. 

You know, like, I am the first to try to understand Trump and his strategy and not freak out over his weird social media posts and language that is loose and incendiary...But this is completely irresponsible and disgusting. This is wrong. It’s wrong. He should not be doing it.

I don’t care that it’s a negotia–his negotiation tactic is to kill an entire country full of civilians–men, women, and children–an American president, so that the Strait of Hormuz will be opened? It’s just wrong. It’s not hard to say it, it’s not hard to recognize it. I wish he would stop doing this. Like, he can’t negotiate without doing this? What does that say about him? What does that say about the position that our country is in right now in these negotiations? 

He’s got to say this? He can’t be a dignified, strong leader without threatening a bunch of war crimes? Like what is he, Genghis Khan? Like, what is he trying to do and why can’t he do it with strength–threats, sure, go for it–that don’t diminish and demean the United States of America in this way?  

So she said, on Tuesday's edition of The Megyn Kelly Show. For today, we'll regard these as her basic questions: 

Can’t he just behave like a normal human? What does that say about him?  

We think we can provide one (obvious) possible answer to those important questions. In yesterday's post, we said the same thing about David Remnick's recent question:

Who talks like this, Remnick had said.

We think we know how to answer these questions. 

Tomorrow morning, we're going down to see the doc. If we can start to return to normal levels of energy and focus, we'll be happy to tell you what one obvious answer is.

ILLNESS: "Who talks like this?" the gentleman said!

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 8, 2026

We think we have his answer: Yesterday morning, President Trump offered this post on Truth Social:

Truth Social
Donald J. Trump

@realDonaldTrump

A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will. However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS? We will find out tonight, one of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the World. 47 years of extortion, corruption, and death, will finally end. God Bless the Great People of Iran!

The president gave his blessing to "the great people of Iran," even as he threatened, during the day, to destroy all their bridges and all their power plants and to destroy their ancient civilization.

At the start of last evening's The Last Word, after the president had announced a fourteen day pause, Lawrence O'Donnell suggested that the president's threats had already destroyed "a whole civilization"—our own. 

He said the mere fact of the past week's threats had created "a stain" on the way the United States is seen around the world. He said that stain will never be washed away. 

We don't know if that's right or that's wrong. 

Near the end of the previous hour, David Remnick had appeared on The Briefing with Jen Psaki. 

Remnick has been editor of The New Yorker ever since 1998.  He had a question to ask about the president's astonishing threats:  

"Who talks like this?" Remnick asked. 

He had asked a very good question. We'll guess that Remnick is aware of one (obvious) possible answer.

At this site, we feel fairly sure that we can answer his question! Because we're still weirdly under the weather, we'll offer the answer tomorrow.

ILLNESS: "He has gone insane," the lady said!

TUESDAY, APRIL 7, 2026

No one can say we weren't warned: Our most disabled president said this, early on Easter Sunday: 

Truth Details  

Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump   

Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran. There will be nothing like it!!! Open the Fuckin’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell - JUST WATCH! Praise be to Allah. President DONALD J. TRUMP

So he declared, on Truth Social. But then again, so what?

Yesterday afternoon, on the gong show known as The Five, Jesse Watters said this: 

WATTERS (4/7/26): I didn't think his [recent] tweets were any more bombastic than they usually are. And bombing power plants is not a war crime. 

How about obliterating every power plant, along with every bridge? Because that's what the sitting president has been promising.

As Fox's silliest child engaged in this messaging conduct, the chyron below him said this:   

"OPEN THE F***IN' STRAIT"  
LEFT MELTS DOWN OVER TRUMP'S TOUGH TALK ON IRAN 

Even Fox wouldn't display what the president actually said. To the producers of the nation's most-watched "cable news" program, the president's Easter Sunday message was simply the latest example of "owning the libs," in this case through a bit of "tough talk."   

Watters didn't see anything new, or anything strange, in a profane Easter Sunday rant which openly mocked the religion of Islam. Let's be sure to make this a holy, civilizational war! So the president urged. 

There's really nothing to say today. We just have to tremble and wait as the stated 8 p.m. deadline approaches.  

That said, one person had a different reaction to that "Open the Fuckin’ Strait" post.  That person was Marjorie Taylor Greene, the former Republican congresswoman.  

Last evening, on The Last Word, Lawrence O'Donnell built his opening monologue around Greene's reaction to the Easter morning post. To read the lady's lengthy post, you can just click here. 

As we said, Greene's post is lengthy. Headline included, this is the start of Mediaite's report:  

‘He Has Gone Insane!’ MTG Absolutely Bludgeons Trump in Fiery Reaction to President’s ‘Evil’ Threat Against Iran    

Former congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene called out President Donald Trump’s new threat against Iran in stunning fashion—claiming it shows “he has gone insane.”

Greene’s comments followed Trump’s Truth Social post in which he warned of attacks on Iran’s bridges and power plants if the Strait of Hormuz is not reopened by Tuesday.  

 [...]    

“On Easter morning, this is what President Trump posted,” Greene wrote, in a post on X. “Everyone in his administration that claims to be a Christian needs to fall on their knees and beg forgiveness from God and stop worshipping the President and intervene in Trump’s madness. I know all of you and him and he has gone insane, and all of you are complicit.”   

"He has gone insane," she said. Later, she said, "This is evil."   

The fact that she said it doesn't mean that it's true. Also, "insane" isn't a clinical medical term, and Greene isn't a medical specialist.  

In February, the president's niece, who does have a medical background, offered the latest warning. We're sorry to make you sit through this again:  

ERIN BURNETT (2/26/26): You've known him your whole life. Do you actually see a [cognitive] decline?

MARY L. TRUMP: I do, but I think it's important to remember that Donald has never been fit in any capacity. Obviously, what we're dealing with now are age-related cognitive declines. We're dealing with physical issues that the White House tries to cover over.

But this is somebody who for decades now has had serious, undiagnosed and untreated psychiatric disorders, which are only going to worsen, especially given the pressure he's under and given the cognitive and physical declines.  

This is "only going to worsen," she said. And this very day, here we are!

We'd been warned about this, again and again, dating to 2017. But over here in Blue America, the living was easy for journalistic elites. No one tried to start the discussion, and no one ever will.

Also, no one was willing to report and discuss the clowning which streams from the Fox News Channel. The silence of Blues was total. 

Meanwhile, this:

This morning, as we prepare to post, the president has posted this:

Truth Social

Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump

A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will. However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS? We will find out tonight, one of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the World. 47 years of extortion, corruption, and death, will finally end. God Bless the Great People of Iran!   

The pomposity is matched by the madness. It will all make sense on The Five. 

We must sit and wait to see what happens. No one can say we weren't warned!

MONDAY: We're breaking the promise we made this morning!

MONDAY, APRIL 6, 2026

On the bright side, we have an excuse: In this morning's report, we said we were going to post the text of the president recent unusual statements.

(This afternoon, in his press event, he added to the list.)

We're holding off for a day. Starting Saturday morning, we had an undesirable response to a prescribed pharmaceutical. As we regain full functioning, we'll wait for a brighter day.

ILLNESS: It will only get worse, observers had said!

MONDAY, APRIL 6, 2026

Stone Age, here we come: Is this what we've been worried about in months and years of reports at this site? 

We refer to one part of what the president's niece recently said. We're forced to show you again:

ERIN BURNETT (2/26/26): You've known him your whole life. Do you actually see a [cognitive] decline?

MARY L. TRUMP: I do, but I think it's important to remember that Donald has never been fit in any capacity. Obviously, what we're dealing with now are age-related cognitive declines. We're dealing with physical issues that the White House tries to cover over.

But this is somebody who for decades now has had serious, undiagnosed and untreated psychiatric disorders, which are only going to worsen, especially given the pressure he's under and given the cognitive and physical declines.  

What is the phrase to which we refer? Fellow citizens, gaze on our works and despair:

...which are only going to worsen 

The current, highly unusual situation is only going to get worse!

The fact that she said it doesn't mean that it's true. But when Bandy X. Lee, the Yale psychiatrist, edited a best-selling book all the way back in 2017, the medical specialists whose work she presented frequently said the same thing.  

For better or worse, those medical specialists have been banned from the public discourse. They've been banned in accord with a long-standing rule of the journalistic guild, according to which issues of mental health, but especially of mental illness, must never be included in any discussion of major political figures.

That was always a very good rule, until such time as it possibly wasn't. Along the way, it was sometimes honored in the breech. 

But even now, in the case of the sitting president, our sharpest global observers fall back on language like this: 

From Fareed Zakaria GPS, CNN

BEDDOES (4/5/26): I mean, the first thing to say is I was shocked hearing you read that [Truth Social] post as I was reading it myself. And it is—I mean, and I use this word advisedly, it sounds unhinged. That that is the President of the United States is just profoundly shocking. And I think we've all become somewhat inured to statements by the president of the United States.

But even by his standards, that was very shocking. And I wasn't surprised when I looked on my phone just a few minutes ago to find several people asking whether this was actually real.  

The speaker was Zanny Minton Beddoes, editor-in-chief of The Economist. She's one of the sharpest observers of the war in Iran available to cable news viewers. 

But even yesterday, she fell back on the established weasel word for what seems perhaps to be happening right before our eyes. We single her out because she's so well-informed and so mentally sharp. 

The weasel word is this:  

Unhinged   

Unhinged! It's a way to keep your commentary in the safe zone, even as observers ask if this latest Truth Social post could possibly be real.  

We don't say this to criticize Beddoes. This is uniform press corps practice and, for better or worse, it isn't going to stop. 

(Beddoes was engaged in a conversation about Iran with Zakaria and Richard Haass. Neither of those highly qualified observers took things beyond that one word.)

Beddoes was referring to the now-famous Truth Social post the president offered yesterday morning, as Easter Sunday dawned. It extended a worrisome series of statements over the preceding five days, starting with something he said in his televised address last Wednesday night:   

Televised address, Wednesday, April 1, 2026

Thanks to the progress we’ve made, I can say tonight that we are on track to complete all of America’s military objectives shortly, very shortly. 

We’re going to hit them extremely hard over the next two to three weeks. We’re going to bring them back to the Stone Ages, where they belong.

In a wandering, self-contradictory speech, that reference to "bringing them back to the Stone Ages" was the start of a series of worrisome statements—statements so strange that major observers were falling back on "unhinged." As of yesterday morning, the president's latest Truth Social post was so strange that we saw several major observers seek safety in that dodge.   

This afternoon, we'll post the text of the president's unhinged statements, from the Stone Ages comment on. We want to create an historical record, presenting the text of these statements exactly as they were made.  

Speaking with Erin Burnett, the president's niece, a clinical therapist, described her uncle as someone "who for decades now has had serious, undiagnosed and untreated psychiatric disorders."   

She said those disorders are going to worsen. She was speaking of something called "mental illness," but here's a very important question:

What kind of "illness" is that?

FRIDAY: He was some mother's darling...

FRIDAY, APRIL 3, 2026

Or so Hank Williams said: Is something "wrong" with President Trump? At this site, we would assume that it seems like there is. 

Next week, we'll be examining some of the basic concepts involved in this somewhat complex conceptual arena. Early this morning, as we pondered the possible dangers involved in the current state of affairs, we also thought of Hank Williams. 

The president's niece believes that her famous uncle is seriously unwell. She regards this as a very dangerous state of affairs—though she also takes us back to what she regards as the start of the story, when her uncle was two years old.

We've suggested that (serious) "mental illness" should be regarded as a deeply unfortunate illness. This morning, we found ourselves thinking of where this sort of thing can start—and of these Hank Williams lyrics:

Tramp on the Street

[...]

He was some mother's darling, he was some mother's son.
Once he was fair and once he was young.
And some mother rocked him, her darling, to sleep
But they left him to die like a tramp on the street.

Some mother rocked him, her darling, to sleep? 

Mary Trump suggests that it actually wasn't that way inside her uncle's dysfunctional childhood home. She also says, sympathetically though only up to a point, that it went downhill from there.

That said, Williams was one of the greatest of our American voices, and you can hear him sing those lyrics simply by clicking this. 

(As you'll see if you click that link, you'll hear him do that as part of a radio show called "The Health and Happiness Show.")

In fact, "A Tramp on the Street" was a hymn. At this particular time in the Christian calendar, it may have a specific resonance for believing Christians.

In the larger sense, the song encourages us to know how to pity those who may be deeply afflicted in various ways. We strongly recommend that performance by one of this nation's most resonant voices, by a giant star who died at an early age—29!—a bit like his "tramp on the street."

HEALTH: He said the press is holding back...

FRIDAY, APRIL 3, 2026

...from a real description of President Trump: Ten minutes into his opening monologue, Lawrence O'Donnell delivered the S-bomb last night.  

He was speaking about the sitting president. Suddenly, he rendered this:

O'DONNELL (4/2/26): Donald Trump achieved minor celebrity, working at the bottom of the barrel in so-called reality TV, where his catchphrase was the worst thing you could hear in the workplace:  "You're fired." 

People's live have actually been destroyed by those words in real life. But a sociopath might think that saying those words is entertaining. 

So it went as the cable news press corps continued to flirt with the highly important question at hand:

Is it possible that something is wrong with the sitting president?   

On this sprawling campus, we've admired the fact that Lawrence O'Donnell has taken the president's conduct personally. He isn't going through the motions as he reviews the president's conduct—but then, on the other hand, he isn't a medical specialist. 

By way of contrast, the president's niece actually is a doctorate wielding clinical therapist. As we've noted in the past, this is the way Mary L. Trump assessed her famous uncle in her 2020 best-seller, Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World's Most Dangerous Man:  

Prologue

[...]

None of the Trump siblings emerged unscathed from my grandfather’s sociopathy and my grandmother’s illnesses, both physical and psychological, but my uncle Donald and my father, Freddy, suffered more than the rest. In order to get a complete picture of Donald, his psychopathologies, and the meaning of his dysfunctional behavior, we need a thorough family history.

In the last three years, I’ve watched as countless pundits, armchair psychologists, and journalists have kept missing the mark, using phrases such as “malignant narcissism” and “narcissistic personality disorder” in an attempt to make sense of Donald’s often bizarre and self-defeating behavior. I have no problem calling Donald a narcissist—he meets all nine criteria as outlined in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5)—but the label gets us only so far.

[...]

Does Donald have other symptoms we aren’t aware of? Are there other disorders that might have as much or more explanatory power? Maybe. A case could be made that he also meets the criteria for antisocial personality disorder, which in its most severe form is generally considered sociopathy but can also refer to chronic criminality, arrogance, and disregard for the rights of others...

The fact is, Donald’s pathologies are so complex and his behaviors so often inexplicable that coming up with an accurate and comprehensive diagnosis would require a full battery of psychological and neuropsychological tests that he’ll never sit for. 

For our fullest presentation of the niece's account, you can just click here.   

In her book, Mary Trump repeatedly described the president's father—her own grandfather, who she knew as a child and as an adult—as "a high-functioning sociopath." On a narrow clinical basis, she described the sitting president in the manner shown above. 

Elsewhere in her book, she also gave a fuller account of the way her uncle was raised within a family she described as highly dysfunctional, She started with a terrible medical incident afflicting the president's mother when he was only two.

The fact that she said it doesn't mean that it's true, but so the niece assessed. 

As we noted yesterday, Mary Trump appeared on CNN in late February. At that time, she offered a briefer assessment of the current state of affairs. 

Speaking of her famous uncle, she described an "obvious" cognitive decline—a cognitive decline layered atop decades of "serious, undiagnosed and untreated psychiatric disorders, which are only going to worsen." 

Once again, so she assessed. Her assessments might be less than perfectly accurate—but given her medical background, we can say she likely has some basic idea of what she's talking about.  

Our journalists—and even our lawyers—quite frequently probably don't! Despite that fact, our cable journalists and their guests continued to offer glancing assessments in the wake of last Thursday's televised "cabinet meeting," in which the sitting president engaged in several rambling discussions which seemed perhaps a bit strange.   

Some pundits seemed to suggest the presence of a cognitive decline. Others seemed to suggest the presence of some version of "mental illness," whatever that may be 

As we noted yesterday, one of the president's former lawyers has even said that the president is "clearly insane" (whatever that means). With that, we turn to an intriguing assessment which appeared last Thursday.

 Only a few hours had passed since the cabinet meeting occurred. At Mediaite, the headline atop a (fascinating) opinion piece by Colby Hall was now saying this:

We’ve Stopped Noticing That Trump’s Cabinet Meetings Are Completely Insane 

"Completely insane," the headline said. In fairness, the headline referred to the president's cabinet meetings, not to the president himself.  

Now for the rest of the story: 

According to The Wrap, Colby Hall co-founded Mediaite (with Dan Abrams) back in 2009. 

In recent months, Hall has produced valuable work at that site, where he's now managing editor.  That includes yesterday's (researched) essay, in which he describes the way viewers of the Fox News Channel have been kept in the dark about the president's declining approval numbers.

(Headline: Fox News Viewers Have No Clue Trump’s Approval Rating Has Cratered. Can someone explain why the New York Times and The Atlantic aren't producing carefully researched work of this same type?)  

Hall has produced some excellent work. (Nobody's work is perfect.) With that, we return to last Thursday's opinion piece, the one which had the words "completely insane" sitting right there in its headline. 

Like quite a few others, Hall had been struck by that day's "cabinet meeting"—but what exactly was he saying in this instant reaction?   

We'll have to admit that we don't really know! But for starters, let us say this about that:  

The word "insane" doesn't appear at any point in the text of Hall's essay. Also, his essay mainly concerns the work of the mainstream press. More specifically, it seems to concern something his colleagues in the press are refusing or failing to do.   

According to Hall, what are our journalists failing or refusing to do? Even today, we can't exactly say.  Ironically, it seems to us that Hall himself refused or failed to explain what he meant in the course of his essay.

That said, we can tell you this:

When the rubber started to meet the road, Hall offered this account of the way the mainstream press corps covered Joe Biden's decline:

OPINION
We’ve Stopped Noticing That Trump’s Cabinet Meetings Are Completely Insane 

[...]

Compare Thursday to how the press covered Joe Biden’s decline—and I mean that as an observation, not a complaint, because that coverage was legitimate. Biden’s visible deterioration became a persistent, serious, ultimately determinative story. Reporters documented it carefully. Editors treated it as a genuine question about presidential capacity. The press built a vocabulary for that kind of breakdown and applied it with consistency.

We're not sure why Hall made those statements. It seems to us that the mainstream press was much less aggressive in its description of President Biden's (unfortunate) decline.

At any rate, Hall alleges that journalists were persistent and serious in their treatment of President Biden. He says it hasn't been like that with respect to President Trump. This is the way he continues:

[Continuing directly]

That same press watched Trump move from Iranian casualty counts to Sharpie unit economics to Venezuelan oil revenue to King Charles’s cancer to Gavin Newsom’s self-reported learning disability—in a single unbroken monologue, at a wartime cabinet meeting, in front of cameras—and filed it under: here’s what the president said today.

We have a vocabulary for one kind of presidential communication failure. We have decided, apparently, not to develop one for this kind [of presidential communication failure]. And that asymmetry is a choice, even when it doesn’t feel like one.

...The question is whether we are actually describing what we’re watching, or whether we’ve quietly shifted into translation mode—taking what happens in that room and rendering it into something that fits the templates we already have, because that’s easier and faster and the templates are what the traffic wants.

I think we’re translating. I think we’ve been translating for a while now. And the thing about translation is that something always gets lost—usually the part that would require us to stop and say, out loud, in a published sentence: this is not what this has ever looked like before, and we should probably name that.

What was Hall saying there? We have no clear idea. He seems to be saying that the press corps offered clear descriptions of President Biden's "deterioration," but is failing to describe something that's right before them in the case of President Trump.

He said the press corps lacks "a vocabulary" for the kind of "presidential communication failure" taking place with President Trump. That may be, he suggests, because "this isn't what [presidential communication] has ever looked like before."

Is the press corps holding something back? It almost seems like Hall himself is doing so, even as he voices this intriguing complaint!

For the record, there's a bit more to Hall's essay. This is the way he ends:

[Continuing directly]

Read the transcript. I mean actually read it, the whole thing, not the clips. Read it the way you’d read a document from a foreign government you were trying to understand. Ask yourself what you would write if you didn’t already have a template for it.

Then ask yourself why we don’t write that. 

According to Hall, there's something the press corps is failing or refusing to write—but he never quite says what it is! In closing, we ourselves would say this:

"Cognitive decline" is a human tragedy. So can be the various forms of (significant) "mental illness." It's also true that terrible dangers can be involved.

Is that medical language the vocabulary the press is avoiding in the case of President Trump? We don't know what Hall meant in this oddly fuzzy column—but some extremely aggressive language was sitting up there in his headline, including the word "insane."

A final point:

"Mental illness" (and "cognitive decline") should not be wielded as an insult. In our view, it should be viewed sympathetically, as an unfortunate form of "illness" (as an unfortunate form of disease). 

The danger involved can be great—but we should remember that we're dealing with an "illness." 

We say that if we want to be good, or if we want to win.

This afternoon: The vocabulary of Hank Williams ("He was some mother's son...")

THURSDAY: The president made one of his ludicrous claims!

THURSDAY, APRIL 2, 2026

It's the absolute truth, Gutfeld said: Is something wrong with President Trump? 

Yesterday, he did a drop-in at the Supreme Court. Following that, he placed a familiar crazy claim right there on Truth Social.

Headline included, Mediaite reports:

‘STUPID’: Trump Rages Over Birthright Citizenship After Leaving Supreme Court Early

President Donald Trump took to Truth Social to rage about birthright citizenship just moments after oral arguments concluded in the highly-anticipated Supreme Court case on the issue Wednesday.

“We are the only Country in the World STUPID enough to allow ‘Birthright’ Citizenship! President DONALD J. TRUMP,” the president wrote on Truth Social. 

It was Trump’s first public comment on the case since he attended the beginning of oral arguments on Wednesday. He’s the first sitting president to attend oral arguments in a Supreme Court case and was there for roughly 80 minutes before leaving.

We're the only country that STUPID, the sitting president said. Simply put, the president loves this groaning misstatement. It's been corrected again and again and again, but he just continues to say it.

Wisely or otherwise, do other countries have birthright citizenship, the same way we do? As the Christian Science Monitor explains, virtually every country in North and South America has unrestricted birthright citizenship, just the way we do. 

That includes our immediate neighbors to the north and to the south. Under the fancy Latin heading Jus soli, the leading authority tattles: 

Jus soli

[...]

Canada: Subsection 3(2) of the Citizenship Act states that Canadian citizenship by birth in Canada—including Canadian airspace and territorial waters—is granted to a child born in Canada even if neither parent was a Canadian citizen or permanent resident except if either parent was a diplomat, in service to a diplomat, or employed by an international agency of equal status to a diplomat. However, if neither parent was a diplomat, the nationality or immigration status of the parents does not matter. 

Mexico: Article 30 of the Constitution of Mexico states that persons born in Mexican territory are natural-born citizens of Mexico regardless of their parents' nationality. The definition of "territory" includes vessels/aircraft flagged to Mexico travelling in international waters or airspace. 

The leading authority provides a similar rundown for such South American countries as Argentina, Brazil and Chile (and on and on from there). Wisely or otherwise, virtually every country in the Americas has this unrestricted citizenship policy.

Having said that, so what? The president seems to prefer the bogus claim. 

(Does he possibly believe his false claim? We have no idea.)

At any rate, the president emerged from the hearing, then banged out his bogus claim. As if that wasn't bad enough, after that, along came The Five. 

Amazingly, the problem started with Jessica Tarlov, the program's twice-weekly liberal punching bag. During yesterday's second segment, she quoted the president's remark: 

TARLOV (4/1/26): ...and you know that today didn't go well because Donald Trump's Truth Social post, once he left, was, “We are the only country in the world stupid enough to allow birthright citizenship."  

He didn't say, "The government kicked butt." He didn't say, "We are going to win this thing." He said, basically, "I'm going to throw a temper tantrum." And a couple of—

At that point, the interruption came—in this case, from Greg Gutfeld. By the time the interruption had run its course, Gutfeld had told four million viewers that the president's statement was "the absolute truth"—and there was indication that Tarlov disagreed. 

Let the interruption begin! To see the exchange, click here:

[Continuing directly from above] 
GUTFELD: That was a fact! Is that not a fact? It doesn't matter? 

TARLOV: No, it actually doesn't matter, because you know how he behaves when he's excited about something. You know—

GUTFELD: So you're focusing on emotion and not the fact that's the absolute truth. 

Tarlov blustered a bit from there. She never said that the president's familiar claim is in fact crazily false.

In all honesty, Tarlov herself seemed to believe that the president's claim was accurate.  Gutfeld proceeded to tell four million souls that the president's crazy claim is "the absolute truth."

So it goes on the most-watched "cable news" show in our un-serious nation. We've never seen a major Blue American journalist comment on the imitation of life produced by the Fox News Channel in the form of this clown-car program.  

That happened during yesterday's second segment. During the third segment, the program gave birth to the latest plea by Jesse Watters. We'll touch on that prayer tomorrow.

At any rate, the president made one of his crazy clams. It's the absolute truth, Gutfeld said.

Tarlov never disagreed, and neither did anyone else. As a nation, the Blue with the Red, this is the clown car we've chosen. 

HEALTH: "Clearly insane," the lawyer said!

THURSDAY, APRIL 2, 2026

But also, the clinical therapist's tale: "Clearly insane," the lawyer said on Tuesday night, speaking to Jim Acosta

The lawyer used some startling language. We take you to Mediaite's report about the lawyer's remarks:

Ex-Trump Lawyer Calls President ‘Clearly Insane’: ‘I Think He’s Gone’

Former Trump White House lawyer Ty Cobb called the president “clearly insane” and argued his last night social media posts only further prove he’s mentally “gone.”

Cobb joined Acosta on his podcast The Jim Acosta Show on Tuesday evening where he blasted his former client, arguing his “screeds” on Iran and more in the dead of night on Truth Social highlight “the level of his insanity and depravity.”

“It’s not a surprise that we’re in this much trouble. It’s not a surprise given the fact that the cabinet will not invoke the 25th Amendment for a man who’s clearly insane. And this war highlights that. And these screeds that come out nightly, at 2 a.m. or 4 a.m. or whatever time Trump decides to vent without oversight, it highlights the level of his insanity and depravity,” Cobb told Acosta. 

And so on from there. Cobb had made similar comments in the recent past, as we noted in yesterday morning's report. 

On Tuesday night, he went there again. 

Ty Cobb is a (highly regarded) lawyer—but he's not a medical specialist. Also, "insane" is not a clinical term, eye-catching though it may be.  

Is something wrong with President Trump? In the aftermath of last Thursday's televised "cabinet meeting," many observers have seemed to suggest that the answer is yes. 

As we've noted in the past few days, some of these observers seemed to be suggesting that the sitting president has experienced some sort of cognitive decline. Other observers seemed to be suggesting that the president may be afflicted with some version of "mental illness." 

On Tuesday, speaking with Acosta, Cobb took the latter route. But here we go again in this most restricted of all possible journalistic worlds: 

Cobb, a lawyer, isn't an experienced medical specialist. Because our major news orgs have all agreed that issues of mental health must be avoided in the political context, everyone else we've quoted in the past few days shares that same shortcoming. 

None of the observers we've cited have been medical specialists! But hold on:

In training, and within a limited range of clinical experience, Mary L. Trump, the president's niece, actually is such a specialist.

As we noted back on March 4, Mary Trump shared her current view of her uncle's health on Thursday evening, February 26. She spoke that evening with CNN's Erin Burnett, on Erin Burnett OutFront. 

The fact that she said it doesn't mean that it's right! But Mary Trump is a doctorate-wielding clinical therapist, and these are the views she expressed:

BURNETT (2/26/26): You've known him your whole life. Do you actually see a [cognitive] decline?

MARY L. TRUMP: I do, but I think it's important to remember that Donald has never been fit in any capacity. Obviously, what we're dealing with now are age-related cognitive declines. We're dealing with physical issues that the White House tries to cover over.

But this is somebody who for decades now has had serious, undiagnosed and untreated psychiatric disorders, which are only going to worsen, especially given the pressure he's under and given the cognitive and physical declines. 

Rightly or possibly wrongly, so said Mary Trump.  She seemed to say that her uncle has experienced an obvious cognitive decline—but it isn't just any such decline. In the view of Mary Trump, it's a cognitive decline which is layered atop decades worth of "serious psychiatric disorders."

Those were her assessments. We repeat them because they were offered, not because they just have to be accurate.

Her assessments may be inaccurate, but there her assessments stand. With respect to our mainstream American discourse—with respect to the modern practice of American journalism—a further fact should be noted at this time: 

Of all the people offering recent thoughts about the state of the president's health, Mary Trump is the only such observer who can be assumed to have some basic idea what she's talking about. 

She isn't a lawyer, and she isn't a pundit; she's an actual medical specialist! For that reason, it's almost amazing that CNN allowed her to go on the air and, however briefly, offer those medical assessments. 

For decades, American news orgs have all agreed—issues of mental health must never be discussed with respect to major political figures. In our view, that was always a very good rule—until the time came when it wasn't.

Now we're engaged in a great Red-Blue civil war, along with a war in Iraq. Many observers seem to be concerned about the state of the president's health. They're concerned about the state of his cognition, perhaps about the possibility of underlying "mental disorders."

Rightly or wrongly, many people hold such concerns; many others don't. In our view, such matters are always a human tragedy—but we think observers are almost surely right when they give voice to such concerns.

He's the most powerful person on the planet. In fairness, you are allowed to voice your opinion about his health at this perilous time--but you're only allowed to do so if you aren't a medical specialist. You're allowed to opine if there's no particular reason to think you know what you're talking about!

"Clearly insane," the lawyer said—but he's only a (very capable) lawyer. In her 2020 best-selling book, Too Much and Never Enough, Mary Trump gave a detailed assessment of her uncle's (many and serious) apparent "psychopathologies." 

We've quoted what she said in that book again and again and again. You've read those assessments nowhere else. For better or worse, her assessments were uniformly disappeared by the high-end political press.

Six years later, here we are. For better or worse, our journalists continue to play an understandable but debilitating game:

Lawyers can thunder as much as they like. No medical specialists need apply!  

Cognitive decline is a human tragedy. So is (serious) "mental illness."

Is the world's most powerful person possibly tangled in some such dangerous state of affairs? For better or worse, our journalists know the rules of the game:

What might medical specialists think? Our high-end journalists all know this:

Such people must never be asked!

Tomorrow: His fascinating opinion piece carried this headline:

We’ve Stopped Noticing That Trump’s Cabinet Meetings Are Completely Insane

WEDNESDAY: "Unrecognizable" lands in the Times!

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 1, 2026

Also, return of the whales: For some reason, the New York Times republished the article in yesterday's print editions, right on page A2. 

Originally, it seems to have appeared all the way back on February 5. Yesterday morning, the report by Dan Barry was back! Headline included, it started like this:

TIMES INSIDER
How Do You Write About a Slur?

In reporting on the resurgence of a word long regarded as a slur, we faced a challenge: Could we write about the inappropriate term—employed recently by, among others, the president of the United States—without using it?

Even here, in this Times Insider piece exploring that challenge, we again face a difficult question. How do we write about writing about a word that should be avoided?

The word is “retarded,” and it has been understood to be a slur against people with intellectual disabilities for nearly two generations. This is not news.

What is news is that after a steady decline in its usage, following a national campaign and federal legislation, the word has made a defiant comeback in some circles, in part because of its use by people of prominence. 

We're not sure we would have regarded the word in question as "a slur." That said, we certainly would never have used the word in question as an insult—and, like almost everyone else, we knew that other formulations were now regarded as less insulting, less hurtful.  

Based on three or four years of watching the Fox News Channel, we've also learned that certain people enjoy the practice of dishing such insults and using such words. A familiar name was there in the list when Barry named some recent users: 

(continuing directly)
In recent months the word has been resurrected by Elon Musk, the musician Kid Rock and the Fox News personality Greg Gutfeld. In a post on Truth Social in November, President Trump called Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota “seriously retarded,” and last month Harmeet K. Dhillon, the official overseeing the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, used “retards” in a social media post. I found this particularly striking, since the division’s responsibilities include protecting the rights of people with disabilities.

I have occasionally written about intellectual disabilities... I remember the word being bandied about in the schoolyards of my childhood in the early 1970s, particularly by bullies. Even then, many children avoided it; too hurtful. 

Even then, children in Iowa avoided the term. Today, on Fox, not so much!

Barry continued along from there—but sure enough, Greg Gutfeld was listed among the practitioners. Incredibly, Barry even ended up writing this about an earlier report about this same topic: 

We then sat down to write, only to grapple with a few challenges: When, how and how often should we use the word in a piece exploring its power to offend?

We did not want to simply paraphrase what Mr. Trump or Ms. Dhillon had written. We also quoted the podcaster Joe Rogan and Kid Rock to demonstrate the seemingly gleeful celebration of the word’s resurgence in some quarters. Mr. Rogan declared the word’s return “one of the great culture victories.” 

Say what? Joe Rogan once declared the word's resurgence to be “one of the great culture victories?" As a courtesy, we're going to assume that whatever it is he actually said, he had somehow been misunderstood. 

Sadly, also this: 

There are few ways to give offense which aren't actively relished by Gutfeld, who we regard as one the genuine "Unrecognizables" of the modern incel-adjacent, "conservative insult" era. 

For whatever reason, his desire to insult liberal women is one of the impulses he's sent out to satisfy each night at 10 o'clock Eastern. His gruesome loathing of women seems to be obvious—and sure enough:

Last Friday night, during his handful of opening jokes, there he went again! 

GUTFELD (3/27/26): Finally, a forty-foot whale washed up on a New York beach. 

Don't worry, though. The whale's next-of-kin have already been notified.

PHOTO: The women of The View

AUDIENCE: Laughter, hooting, applause 

In recent weeks, we've told you it seemed that he had been told to surrender this pitiful nightly pleasure. Last Friday night, the pleasure was back—and then, on Monday night, he decided to do it again:

GUTFELD (3/30/26): To aid the war effort in the gulf, the U.S. is considering sending SEAL Team 6. 

And if that doesn't work, they might even send in Whale Team 4.

PHOTO: The women of The View

AUDIENCE: Applause, cheering 

Suzanne Scott sends him out to do this every night. To our ear, the cheering rings out like a fire bell in the night. 

For the record, there is no insulting premise too stupid or too tired to please this kumquat's audience. In particular, there is no way to reassert male dominance that his tortured mind won't employ.

It isn't just the nightly return to braindead comparisons of the women of The View to horses and cows, to hippos and pigs, and to whales and generic "livestock." It's also the inane jokes about that time of the month, about the way women (and Asian-Americans) don't know how to drive, about how boring women's sports are, and even to pathetic displays like this: 

GUTFELD (3/30/26): Bill Maher is getting the Mark Twain Award for humor. 

Big deal! I'm getting the Shania Twain Award for being most likely to bang Shania Twain.

Sad! The next joke was the joke about the 40-foot whale.

(To his credit, he has stopped asking if Hunter Biden has started "banging" or "[BLEEP]ing" his mother, first lady Jill Biden. Back in 2024, we saw him go there three separate times. Producers let the word "banging" slither through, bleeped the more challenging term.)

He still likes to say that Taylor Swift is only a 5 or a 6. (Sad!) In such ways, a 61-year-old man who could apparently use some help is determined to set an ugly, stupid, braindead example for younger men of assorted ages. In fairness, the pay is good.

Final point:

High-end Blue America has completely accepted the braindead insults this fellow directs at women. Among our various tribal shortcomings, we Blues don't have a recognizable sexual politics, and we never have.

HEALTH: Is something wrong with the president's health?

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 1, 2026

Cognition v. "mental illness:" This morning, it has come to this, in this most rapidly changing of all possible worlds.  

The person whose health has been in question has granted an interview to The Telegraph's Connor Stringer. Dual headline included, this is the way the Stringer report begins: 

Trump interview: I am strongly considering pulling out of Nato
Exclusive: US president tells The Telegraph alliance is a ‘paper tiger’ and claims UK does not even have a navy

Donald Trump has told The Telegraph he is strongly considering pulling the United States out of Nato after it failed to join his war on Iran.

The US president labelled the alliance a “paper tiger” and said removing America from the defence treaty was now “beyond reconsideration”.

It is the strongest sign yet that the White House no longer regards Europe as a reliable defence partner following the rejection of Mr Trump’s demand that allies send warships to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.

Mr Trump was asked if he would reconsider the US’s membership of Nato after the conflict.

He replied: “Oh yes, I would say [it’s] beyond reconsideration. I was never swayed by Nato. I always knew they were a paper tiger, and Putin knows that too, by the way.”

He and Vlad are on the same page, as is frequently true. As an aside, we'll mention the fact that there exists in the psychological literature a variety of writings about the so-called "Samson Syndrome"—alternatively, "Samson's Complex"—which you can find described if you simply google around.

At any rate there the president went, threatening to walk out on NATO. Meanwhile, is there some such thing as a British Navy? The leading authority on the subject still seems to think that some entity called "The Royal Navy" continues to exist: 

Royal Navy

The Royal Navy (RN) is the naval warfare force of the United Kingdom, responsible for defending the UK, the Crown Dependencies, and the Overseas Territories from naval attack or invasion. It is a component of His Majesty's Naval Service, and its officers hold their commissions from the King. 

[...]

The Royal Navy maintains a fleet of technologically sophisticated ships, submarines, and aircraft, including two Queen Elizabeth-class aircraft carriers, four Vanguard-class ballistic missile submarines (which carry the Trident strategic nuclear weapons), six Astute-class nuclear-powered attack submarines, six Type 45 guided missile destroyers, seven Type 23 frigates, eight mine-countermeasure vessels and twenty-six patrol vessels. As of December 2025, there are 63 active and commissioned ships (including submarines as well as one historic ship, HMS Victory) in the Royal Navy, plus 9 ships of the Royal Fleet Auxiliary (RFA). There are also four Point-class sealift ships from the Merchant Navy available to the RFA under a private finance initiative, while the civilian Marine Services operate auxiliary vessels which further support the Royal Navy in various capacities. The RFA replenishes Royal Navy warships at sea and, since 2024–25, provides the lead elements of the Royal Navy's amphibious warfare capabilities through its three Bay-class landing ship vessels. It also works as a force multiplier for the Royal Navy, often doing patrols that frigates used to do. However, most of the Royal Navy ships are not actually in a condition for deployment at sea due to lack of seaworthiness. That led the navy to borrow the German frigate Sachsen for a NATO mission in spring 2026. The situation was described by the media and politicians as a national embarrassment.

Presumably, the situation was described that way by some in the media and by some politicians. Aside from that, we're going to let the experts puzzle these matters out—the question of the Samson Syndrome, along with the challenged existence, and state of repair, of the Royal Navy itself. 

For today, NATO is a paper tiger, the sitting president has said—and he has said that Vladimir Putin knows that too. For that reason, the sitting president may pull the United States out of NATO—something he apparently isn't legally entitled to do. 

How simpler things seemed to be last Thursday when, at a televised "cabinet meeting," the president rambled on, for almost five minutes, speaking about the price of a good Sharpie pen.

"It's insane. It's insane," S. E. Cupp said that evening on CNN. Other observers have discussed that day's five-minute ramble about the Sharpies, included MS NOW's Katy Tur and that same channel's Lawrence O'Donnell. 

O'Donnell discussed the president's Sharpie monologue on last Thursday evening's edition of The Last Word. You can watch the tape of O'Donnell's analysis by clicking this link to the videotape provided by the program's web site.

What did O'Donnell say that night? As you'll see if you click that link, the web site offers this two-part thumbnail: 

Lawrence: Trump failed his own self-administered cognitive test while Iran’s regime was watching
MS NOW’s Lawrence O’Donnell describes the Donald Trump the Iranian regime saw today: a wartime president fixated on cognitive tests, presidential pens and Sharpies while nodding off during a Cabinet meeting about war.

In his monologue that evening, O'Donnell discussed the Sharpies too. But before he did, he discussed the president's latest claim about the so-called cognitive tests he has long claimed that he just keeps "acing."  

Over the past six years, the president has repeatedly said that he has aced those challenging cognitive tests in a way few others have ever done. As transcribed by Tommy Christopher at Mediaite, here's part of what he said at last Thursday's cabinet meeting:

I’m the only president that ever took a cognitive test. I took it three times. It’s actually a very hard test for a lot of people. It wasn’t hard for me. But it’s a cognitive test. It starts off with an easy question. And by the time you get to the middle, it gets tougher. By the time you get to the end, very few people can answer those questions. They get very tough mathematical equations and things.

I took it three times. I aced it all three times in front of numerous doctors that I have no idea who they are. And I was told when I went in—they said Dr. Ronnie told me this. My current doctors are fantastic doctors. They said, “Well, if you take it—you know, it’s Walter Reed. It’s essentially a public hospital. And if you do badly, he’s probably going to get out.” But I aced it. I got them all right. And one doctor said, “I’ve never seen anybody get them all right. I’ve been doing the test for twenty years.”

Plainly, nothing can make the sitting president desist from making these claims!

As many others had done before him, O'Donnell ridiculed those claims on last Thursday's evening's program. He then proceeded to mock the president's lengthy discussion of Sharpies. 

As noted above, O'Donnell said the president had "failed his own cognitive test" in his pair of rambles at that day's "cabinet meeting." (We can't really tell you that O'Donnell's suggestion is wrong.)

Last night, at 10:10 p.m., O'Donnell seemed to take a different tack, describing the president as "a madman." (O'Donnell, speaking of the president's apparent current strategy in Iran: "That is how a madman wages war in the 21st century.") 

Out of that aggressive language an important question is born, along with an observation about our American journalism as it's currently practiced:

Back in the simpler days of last week, some observers seemed to be suggesting that the president is suffering some sort of cognitive challenge. On this campus, we have no way of knowing if that's true, but that's what some discussions seemed to suggest. 

Other discussions seemed to suggest something different. Those discussions seemed to suggest the presence of what might be called "mental illness." 

In those discussions, words like "insane" and "madman" began to surface again. Not long before, on March 19, MS NOW's Chris Hayes had said this:

"Every once in a while, you just have to remind yourself the president of the United States is a sociopath." 

That would seem to be a claim about (severe) "mental illness." Around that same time, one of the president's former lawyers had described him as "a demented narcissist" in yet another MS NOW appearance.

O'Donnell has often referred to the president as "delusional." Last night, he went with "madman," then alleged that the president had engaged in "pathological lying" again.

"Madman" isn't a clinical term. At present, neither is "sociopath." Having said that, we'll add his:

Based on the language they used, some of these observers seemed to be alleging some sort of cognitive shortfall. But based on the language other observers used, those observed seemed to be suggesting that the "madman / insane / sociopath" sitting president is afflicted with some version of (significant) "mental illness."

In the Babel of our flailing discourse, various suggestions have been voiced by an array of high-profile observers. We'll leave you today with this observation:

None of those people are medical specialists! Their claims and suggestions could always be accurate, but there's no obvious reason to assume that they actually know what they're talking about.

You've heard us say this before. Our news orgs have all signed on to a sacred pact—a sacred pact which goes like this: 

We will never speak to the medical specialists who, at least as a matter of theory, might have some basic idea what they're talking about!

Is the president suffering a cognitive shortfall? Might he be afflicted with some substantial "mental illness?"

Our journalists and our attorneys bring no expertise to such questions. Meanwhile, what has one trained clinical therapist recently said about all this?  As we continue to seek the president's health, we return to that question tomorrow.

The president wants to exit NATO. Is some sort of medical problem possibly lurking there?

Tomorrow: The clinical therapist's tale

Friday: Colby Hall's intriguing opinion piece