Violating the 53-year-old “Goldwater Rule” banning psychiatrists or psychologists from hazarding diagnoses about public figures, a group of psychiatrists led by 47-year-old Yale Assistant Clinical Professor Dr. Bandy X. Lee let her politics eclipse her clinical judgment. When Sen. Barry Goldwater (R-Az.) ran for president against President Lyndon Johnson in 1964, Johnson’s dirty-tricksters used psychiatrists to vow that Goldwater wasn’t fit for president. Never mind that Goldwater was a distinguished member of the U.S. Senate from Jan. 3, 1953 until Sen. John McCain (R-Az.) took office Jan. 3, 1987. Yet during an election campaign supposedly objective psychiatrists found him mentally ill. Yale’s Dr. Bandy X. Lee leads the charge against President Donald Trump, believing her professional judgment supersedes her political bias, giving her a phony duty to warn the public.
Holding a conference at Yale on Trump’s mental health April 21, Lee concluded that like-minded psychiatrists believe Trump poses a “clear-and-present-danger” to the United States. “More than just being a liar or a narcissist, in addition he is paranoid, delusional and grandiose thinking and he proves that to the country the first day he was president. If Donald Trump really believes he had the largest crowd size in history, that’s delusional,” said New York University psychiatrist Dr. James Gilligan. Gilligan’s statements about Trump are so exaggerated, so out of context, so unprofessional he deserves sanctioning by the American Psychiatric Assn. Ethics Committee. Using his profession, known for its privacy, to label a sitting president shows how partisan politics infiltrate respected professions. Trump wasn’t accused of Gilligan’s insults until he decided to run June 17, 2015.
Speaking at the April 21 Yale Conference on Trump’s mental health, Dr. John Gartner started a petition with 41,000 signatures to deliver to Congress insisting Trump was “psychologically incapable of competently discharging the duties of president.” “We the undersigned mental health professionals [please state your degree], believe in our professional judgment that Donald Trump manifests a serious mental illness that renders him psychological incapable of discharging his duties of President of the United States,” stated Gartner’s petition. Gartner can’t state with scientific certainty that Trump suffers from any mental illness. Whether he exaggerated about how many folks attended the inauguration has nothing to do with mental illness. Most members of the medical, legal and political professions exaggerate when it suits their interests. Calling Trump mentally ill is outrageous.
Severe mental illness isn’t defined by isolated symptoms like “gradiosity,” “delusions,” “obsessions” or anything else. Severe mental illness is defined by the inability to tolerate stress and to function under pressure. By all accounts, Trump’s spent his 50-plus-year real estate career dealing with the most high-pressure, complex, demanding transactions imaginable. No professional worth his salt would make such outrageous claims about a public figures’ mental health for any reason. Psychiatrists that don’t like Trump’s personality or his politics shouldn’t debase the field making outrageous diagnostic statements. “And we respectfully request he be removed from office, according to Article 4 of the 25th Amendment to the Constitution, which states that the president will be replaced if he’s ‘unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office’” read Gartner’s statement.
There’s been no change in Trump’s behavior since he announced for president in 2015. He was observed by millions of voters at campaign rallies and 12 Republican primary and three presidential debates. Trump’s rival, former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, made the mental health arguments through the 2016 and lost Nov. 8, 2016. Trump’s shown no differences in style and demeanor all through the campaign and now eight months into his term. Showing his true colors, Gartner showed his extreme political bias against Trump. “This notion that you need to personally interview someone to form a diagnosis actually doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. For one thing, research shows that the psychiatric interview is the least statistical reliable way to make a diagnosis.” Gartner wants no metrics or science to diagnosis only his personal passions to do the job.
Yale University should be ashamed of itself for sponsoring a partisan witch-hunt in the name of scholarship, science or professionalism. “It no longer takes a psychiatrist to recognize the alarming patterns of impulsive, reckless, and narcissistic behavior—regardless of diagnosis that, in the person of President Trump, put the world at risk,” concluded the Yale confab. If it no longer ”takes a psychiatrist,” it’s because Yale’s group led by Dr. Bandy X. Lee broke every ethical standard to advance an anti-Trump political agenda. There’s zero evidence that Trump has changed one iota since announcing for president in 2015. Saying he suffers from a “serious” mental illness is so preposterous, so unprofessional, so off-the-wall that she disgraces the psychiatric field. Citing Trump’s handling of North Korea tells the whole story: Trump didn’t endanger the country, he got dictator Kim Jong-un to stand down.
