Madness

"I will do such things,
What they are, yet I know not; but they shall be...
The terrors of the earth."
--William Shakespeare, King Lear

“O! Let me not be mad, not mad, sweet heaven; keep me in temper; I would not be mad!”
― William Shakespeare, King Lear

I'm flying to Thailand very early on Sunday.  I have packing and other preparations to complete.  And I seem to be acquiring a cold or some other ailment that makes me sleepy.  So you're not going to get a well-written, well-reasoned final posting to this blog before I fly off to another hemisphere.

But you, like me, have been watching our Great Leader.  Watching him claim with gusto that the disastrous election results were tantamount to a personal victory for himself.  Laughing at those pathetic Republicans who lost, lost only because in his imagination they weren't devoted enough to Trump.  Focusing on the gain of a seat or two in the Senate, and ignoring -- except for those barbs at the losers in his own party -- the losses in the House, the governorships, and the various legislatures.

Seemingly believing himself beloved by the nation, when the raw figures from the Congressional elections (Democrats 56.9 percent to Republicans 41.5 percent in the Senate races)  show an overwhelming majority of the country is hostile to him, and/or his party.

And then there was Europe.  Trump rushes off to France to honor the American war dead from the two world wars, and then doesn't.  He sits in his hotel room and broods and tweets.  There's more, much more, and you've read it in news and opinion reports. He shows up at meetings with other leaders; while they chat and laugh, he stands alone scowling and bitter.

My question is whether he is sane.  I'm not talking about personality disorders -- God knows he clearly has many -- but about whether he is teetering on the brink of sheer madness.  Probably not yet.  We like to apply strict scientific criteria today in diagnosing psychosis.  But in Shakespeare's time, the average citizen felt free to size up the situation, relying on common sense. 

King Donald's court would be buzzing with the question -- is he quite mad?

As far back as February 2017, conservative columnist and blogger Andrew Sullivan asked the question:

I keep asking myself this simple question: If you came across someone in your everyday life who repeatedly said fantastically and demonstrably untrue things, what would you think of him? If you showed up at a neighbor’s, say, and your host showed you his newly painted living room, which was a deep blue, and then insisted repeatedly — manically — that it was a lovely shade of scarlet, what would your reaction be? If he then dragged out a member of his family and insisted she repeat this obvious untruth in front of you, how would you respond? If the next time you dropped by, he was still raving about his gorgeous new red walls, what would you think? Here’s what I’d think: This man is off his rocker. He’s deranged; he’s bizarrely living in an alternative universe; he’s delusional. If he kept this up, at some point you’d excuse yourself and edge slowly out of the room and the house and never return.

In the 21 months since those words were written, has Mr. Trump come to appear more rational, more disciplined, more in touch with reality?  I leave the answer as an exercise for the reader.

In the last week, David Remnick wrote a column in the New Yorker, discussing the same issue in often picturesque language.

The President of the United States rages daily on the heath, finding enemies in the shapes of clouds.

Quite.

I shall sit calmly in Chiang Mai, Thailand, contemplating nature, clearing my mind of disturbing thoughts, seeking only the best in the people I meet.  I'll return to America with some trepidation.