Commentary

During the 2024 campaign, it was obvious that Biden, Harris and Walz couldn’t get Trump out of their minds. The fact that Trump commanded 24/7 news coverage didn’t help. 

I never thought Trump Derangement Syndrome would continue after he won reelection, but it has, and it seems to be catching, as unusual it would be for a mental condition.

Dr. Holly Schiff, a psychiatrist, agrees, she “sees the signs becoming more common and intense,” claiming her patients are “unable to control their emotions due to their hatred and feelings toward Trump.”

During Trump’s first term, the American Psychiatric Association had no such listing for TDS in its 947-page manual of mental disorders, however, Dr. Carole Lieberman, a prominent conservative voice, calls it a “legitimate psychological phenomenon.”

Perusing a tongue-in-cheek essay on the symptoms, it is believed that TDS “arises from an acute and sustained psychological inability to reconcile reality with an emotionally charged narrative of political opposition.

“Patients believe Trump’s reelection signifies the end of democracy, human rights, and even life as we know it.  They see Trump supporters everywhere; see MAGA hats in their dreams; and find themselves attending multiple protests per week.”

“Does the Village People’s YMCA song make your blood boil and our jaw tighten until it aches?  Or do you find yourself suffering to get behind policies, even if they agree with your worldview, because they were influenced by Donald Trump?”

If so, “you might be grappling with Trump Derangement Syndrome,” wrote Dr. Cassidy Morrison, senior health reporter for the Daily Mail,

Incidentally, did you know it was the late Charles Krauthammer, a psychiatrist and political columnist who coined the phrase derangement syndrome? It was to describe the intense and what he saw as unhinged responses to everything related to George W. Bush.

A harsh critic of Trump, Krauthammer defined TDS as an “inability to distinguish between legitimate policy differences and signs of psychic pathology in the president’s behavior.”

I understand that Republicans in Minnesota are seeking to legitimize the term used to describe the left’s disdain for Trump with a bill in the state legislature that would legally define it as a mental illness.

Congressmen With TDS?

There are many, led by House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, who delayed the vote on the Big Beautiful Bill with an 8-hour, 44-minute rant against Trump and the Republican party. 

In all of the coverage of Democrat Leader Jeffries’ remarks that “people will die” because of the Medicaid cuts and the Post’s statement that “Nearly 17 million people will lose health care coverage,” nowhere will you have or ever read about hospitals being required by law (42 U.S.C. 1395) to treat anyone seeking treatment for a medical condition regardless of citizenship, legal status or ability to pay?  Someone may die, but not because of a loss of Medicaid

“This bill is a deal with the Devil. It militarizes our entire economy, and it strips away health care and dignity of the American people.” – Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

And In the Media

Think a paper like the Wall Street Journal is all in for Trump?  Then why do two page one headlines refer to the “Unpopular Bill,” and “Wall Street Worries About Crisis-Level Budget Deficits” one day after bill is signed.

The accompanying headline from the Arizona Republic is another example of how the media attempts to sabotage President Trump’s make America great again agenda in its “news” coverage.  It’s why he often refers to the “fake news.”

In the past, I have been critical of newspapers that allow opinions to appear in news stories and quotes by anonymous sources, but so far headline writers have escaped my criticism.  That is until now.

Headlines serve as the initial point of contact for the reader, determining whether the story will be read.  The headline writer must read the article and distill it into a few words. It must be compelling if it’s going lure the reader into reading it.

Because the subject headline appeared over a piece by the Republic’s “mother publisher,” USA Today, I’m not certain where the headline was written, regardless, the GOP bill was not a tax bill.  Certainly, the writer was aware of the tax cuts the president has been promising since his campaign, but if the writer had been doing his job, he would have noted in the first sentence: “The fight is over Republicans’ sweeping bill to cut taxes …”

The Washington Post got it wrong, too, with its headline referring to the tax bill and “a massive tax bill” in the lead paragraph.

These are not simple journalistic errors.  Making Trump look bad is the goal.

You may recall the stir at the Washington Post when owner Jeff Bezos announced that the paper was not going to endorse anyone for president. The 90 percent Democrats on the paper’s staff wanted an endorsement of Harris.

However, Bezos said he was optimistic about Donald Trump’s second term as president and ready to help him to cut federal regulations. “He seems to have a lot of energy around reducing regulation, and if I can help him do that, I’m going to help him,” Bezos said.

Trump is “calmer” and has “grown in the past eight years” since he was elected president the first time. Asked whether he was concerned about the president-elect’s aggressive stance toward journalists, Bezos said he hopes he can persuade the incoming president that the press is “not the enemy.”

Challenging the Post

In his commentary, Why the CBO Almost Always Gets it Wrong, Economist Stephen Moore noted the Washington Post “fact checker” Glenn Kessler is a believer in the accuracy of CBO figures.  Kessler argues that the CBO does dynamic scoring and adjusts for changes in tax laws, but Moore points out that the 2017 scoring of the Trump tax cut has already underestimated the revenues from the first six years a $1 trillion or more.

DNI Tulsi Gabbard revealed another attempt to sabotage the administration, when Washington Post reporter Ellen Nakasima sought sensitive information seemingly designed to downplay the success of the strike on Iran’s nuclear sites.

On the Positive Side

“The United States under President Trump is liked less by the rest of the world … but it is furtively much more admired.

“It is also more respected in the way that matters most, which is that other nations know they cannot ignore or flout us with impunity.  The nation is more powerful.

“The transformation is due to the leadership of a president unwilling top buy the fool’s gold or feigned foreign friendship at the price of American security and the future of the west.

“Trump’s detractors see his narcissism and avarice and make the mistake of thinking those are all that motivate him.  They don’t believe that making America great again is a real goal.

“Their hatred blinds them, so they appraise him poorly …”  – Hugo Gurdon. Editor, Washington Examiner

 May God bless the United States of American and provide clarity for the sufferers of TDS.