Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Leahy on McCain's dementia

I've always admired Senator Patrick Leahy.

Today he clearly states something that the GOP prefers to forget -- Reagan was severely cognitively impaired during his second term. During that term Baker governed the US; fortunately for us that was an improvement.

Leahy also draws a rather obvious comparison ...
Talking Points Memo | Leahy Goes There

...Leahy told Vogel yesterday the media has given McCain a free pass on flubs including mixing up Middle East geography, Shiite and Sunni Muslims, and referring to Russia's relationship Czechoslovakia -- a country that hasn't existed for 15 years.

'It was the same way with Ronald Reagan in the last few years he was president,' Leahy said, referring to the belief that Reagan experienced early signs of Alzheimer's disease late in his presidency....
McCain used to be cognitively stronger.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

that's pretty horrifying.

Anonymous said...

This seems to ring true. My mother has progressive dementia. She has trouble with logic and makes seemingly erratic and unsupported decisions (witness the choice of Sarah Palin, the apparently spur of the moment decision to suspend his campaign). She also has trouble with language, often pausing in mid-sentence to search for a word and losing her train of thought. There appear to be only two explanations for the way he has recently run his campaign: 1 - that he is trying to throw the election, or 2 - that he has developed dementia.

JGF said...

Sometimes I wonder if he's trying to throw the election.

If he were behaving rationally I think he'd definitely win. Even now I think he'll win.

On the other hand Palin has gotten him far more support than many people thought. For many McCain voters the fact that she's "the woman next door" (though she isn't) is a plus.

I guess they'd pick their transplant surgeon the same way ...