June 10, 2018

My grandmother died about eight years ago of Lewy Body Dementia. She spent many years with a lot of different diagnoses, though we knew dementia was a primary diagnosis, until her autopsy confirmed LBD. In my grandmother's case, I spent more than fifteen years watching my brilliant, dynamic grandmother (the first woman in her family to get a college degree--she went on to be a city planner/engineer; her own mother barely had a sixth grade education and was so proud of her for succeeding in a man's world) degenerate into a shell of herself, moving stiffly, having arguments with people only she could see until finally she became mute and bedridden. Dementia is an incredibly cruel disease.

Now, I am not a doctor (nor bound by the Goldwater Rule), but I was watching some of press pool coverage of Trump's utterly embarrassing appearance at the G-7 summit, and besides his cringeworthy outbursts, I was struck by Trump's stiff gait and carriage. I could have sworn he almost lost his balance at least once--just walking forward. These were the same things that doctors credited to Parkinson's with my grandmother.

The more and more I look at not only Trump's behavior and word choices, but also his motor coordination, I'm convinced that he doesn't possess healthy brain cognitive processes. Does he have LBD? I can't know. But I know impairment when I see it and that's exactly what I'm seeing. I'm just wondering how long it will take before others start noticing it too.

ABC's "This Week" - From Singapore: Tom Bossert, former homeland security adviser to President Trump; Bob Woodruff of ABC, Jonathan Cheng of The Wall Street Journal; Jennifer Jacobs of Bloomberg Politics; David Sanger of The New York Times; and Eric Talmadge of The Associated Press.. Sens. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and Bob Menendez, D-N.J.

NBC's "Meet the Press" - Pre-empted by French Open tennis.

CBS' "Face the Nation" - From Singapore: White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow; Susan Rice, former ambassador to the United Nations and former Obama national security adviser; Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass.; Ken Starr, former independent counsel. Panel: Seung Min Kim of The Washington Post; Molly Ball of Time; Evan Osnos of The New Yorker; and Salena Zito of Washington Examiner.

CNN's "State of the Union" - Kudlow; Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif. Panel: Karine Jean-Pierre, senior adviser for MoveOn.org and former Obama administration official; David Urban, former strategist, Donald J. Trump for President; S.E. Cupp, host of HLN's “SE Cupp Unfiltered”; and Democratic strategist Paul Begala.

CNN's "Fareed Zakaria GPS" - Antony Blinken, former U.S. deputy secretary of state, former deputy national security adviser to Barack Obama; Elise Hu, NPR South Korea correspondent; Sue Mi Terry, senior fellow for Korea at the Center for Strategic and International Studies; and Ben Rhodes, deputy national security adviser to Barack Obama.

CNN's "Reliable Sources" - Jason Rezaian of The Washington Post; Ben Smith, editor in chief, BuzzFeed News; Elaina Plott, writer at The Atlantic; Rob Reiner, director of “Shock and Awe.” The film is about the Knight Ridder reporters who covered the George W. Bush administration in the run-up to the Iraq War. The panel will be Steven Brill, founder of Court TV and American Lawyer and author of “Tailspin”; Indira Lakshmanan, journalism ethics chair at Poynter and columnist at The Boston Globe; and David Frum, senior editor at The Atlantic.

"Fox News Sunday" - From the G-7 Summit, White House trade adviser Peter Navarro. Ambassador Robert Gallucci, chief negotiator during the North Korean nuclear crisis of 1994; Gordon Chang, author of “Nuclear Showdown: North Korea Takes On the World”; Bill Richardson, former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations; David Nakamura of The Washington Post; Rich Edson of Fox News; Eric Talmadge, Pyongyang bureau chief of The Associated Press. Panel: Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah; Jonah Goldberg of National Review; and Adrienne Elrod, former director of strategic communications for Hillary Clinton.

So, what's catching your eye today?

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