Dec 24^th

The first President I remember was FDR, although Hoover was President in 1927 when I was born. All of these Presidents had a certain gravitas appropriate to the office. I have trouble imagining any of them standing in front of an audience and mimicking a reporter’s physical handicap because they didn’t like what he wrote; then, in spite of film showing this mocking performance, denying that he ever did it. The reporter, Serge Kovaleski, suffers from a congenital defect which makes it difficult for him to control his arms. The performance artist mimicking him was Republican candidate for the Presidency, Donald Trump.

Mr. Trump has also distinguished himself in other fourth grade ways; he has claimed that Hillary Clinton’s use of a restroom was “disgusting” and then staying within his own party, saying of Carly Fiorina, “Look at that face, can you imagine that the face of our next President?” Consider another public incident in which Trump seemed physically unable to stop talking. I discussed this in an earlier post; it occurred on “Morning Joe” where Trump appeared from off the set. Scarborough tried to ask Trump a question but Trump just continued to talk over him. This continued for some minutes until Scarborough finally told Trump that if he continued to talk the program would take a commercial break. Trump continued and Scarborough cut him off. Once the break was over Trump apparently regained control of himself and the interview continued. I am not a clinician but this behavior is borderline pathological. If you listen to Trump’s rallies and his speeches you find that there is no orderly progression of ideas. I doubt that this matters at all to Trump’s typical audience. It will certainly matter to the Republican Party if he wins the nomination.

 Now to turn to another issue: Consider the Israeli Air Force. While the Jordanian, British, French, Danish and American air forces are pounding ISIL controlled territories where is the very powerful Israeli Air Force? They are confining their efforts to striking Hezbollah targets. Most recently thy sent smart bombs into Syrian Territory and killed a Hezbollah commander. Their efforts against ISIL controlled territory that might help their US ally is not much in evidence. Why is that? And more importantly why are the Congressional leaders in both parties apparently paying no attention to the Israeli’s absence from the air war?