Psychiatrists, Trump, 25 Amendment, and secession. UPDATE

When Donald Trump won the election a lot of people who might call themselves liberals suddenly put their powdered wigs on and started to talk in pious tones about the American Founders and the intent of the Electoral College and that the Electoral College should refuse to vote for Donald Trump.

This didn't happen. Had it happened I think it would be disastrous. A few people that most people had never heard of would have nullified an election. It would be a civil war. Imagine every highway in the nation blockaded in the rural counties of the nation. The national guard would have to be called out in every state of the nation.

Now there seems to be a movement to impeach Trump based on psychiatric opinion and the 25 Amendment to the Constitution.

Some members of Congress were foolish enough to invite a Yale Univ. psychiatry professor to speak to them to see if Trump could be impeached on grounds of mental health.

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/01/03/trump-25th-amendment-mental-health-322625

Lawmakers concerned about President Donald Trump’s mental state summoned Yale University psychiatry professor Dr. Bandy X. Lee to Capitol Hill last month for two days of briefings about his recent behavior

This is stupid at so many levels.

First there is a whole history of psychiatry being used for political purposes and for social repression.

There is Soviet psychiatric abuse of dissidents. There is the infamous statement about Barry Goldwater supporters having mental issues. There is the whole history of anti-gay psychiatry. I am sure other examples could be given. Foucault's wrote "Madness and Civilization." Thomas Szasz wrote "The Myth of Mental Illness" and "The Manufacture of Madness." There is the book, "Diary of a Mad Housewife," about how a woman with an inane husband is told that she is crazy. 

Then there is the state of the "science" of psychology which is in disrepute. There is the whole business of scientific results not being replicated. Freud was exposed as a fraud. Perhaps you know that Carl Jung was a Nazi. 

Then there is the ongoing scandal of psychiatric hospitals declaring people insane to collect insurance money. I don't think there is a branch of medial practice or science with lower credibility with the public. 

Being obnoxious, rude, loathsome, inane, stupid, vacuous and vain are certainly undesirable qualities, but they are not insanity. 

However, all of the above means nothing to idiotic partisans. After all, Slate, the publication of the establishment actually published this article doing an analysis of Trump's signature. 

http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2017/01/20/donald_trump_s_horrifying_signature_is_a_cry_for_help.html

The whole problem with psychology and psychiatry is that the profession and its practitioners have tended to see persons who don't share their opinions or beliefs as being mentally ill. 

I have the 25th Amendment supplied with a link at the end of this blog posting. 

The idea is that if the president is mentally unfit, the president could be declared unable to perform the duties of office. 

It is somewhat disturbing that even one congressional representative would have Bandy X. Lee doing a briefing. 

It isn't at all surprising that Bandy X. Lee is doing this. Lee is the editor of "The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump," a book with testimonials of "27 psychiatrists and mental health experts assessing the president's level of 'dangerousness.'" 

What might be impeachable is some dealings with a foreign power. However, I think that it needs to be something very clearly a betrayal of the United States, and clear, not to Democrats who are breathing heavy with panic alarm, but the general public. Misfiling paperwork or omitting a form or violating some obscure regulation isn't going to be enough. 

A belief in Democracy is the acceptance of losing the election. Obviously a lot of people haven't accepted losing the 2016 presidential election. 

The precedence for what is happening is a disturbing affair after another radical change in government, the election of Franklin Delano Roosevelt. This is the infamous Banker's Plot. 

https://www.npr.org/2012/02/12/145472726/when-the-bankers-plotted-to-overthrow-fdr

It needs to be pointed out that bad policy, wrong opinions, poor diplomacy, rudeness, vulgarity are not impeachable offenses. Otherwise someone on some pretext would be calling for the impeachment of any president within an hour of the president assuming office. 

The various right wing secessionist movements are dormant because Trump is the great hope of the demographic to whom they hope to appeal. They are waiting until Donald Trump is no longer seen as a hope for right-wing aspirations. This might happen with the 2018 elections if the Republicans lose both houses of the legislature to the Democrats. 

However, what would even more enable secessionists would be that Trump is removed from office on some basis that doesn't have credibility. It would tell Trump's demographic of supporters that even if they get someone they like elected to office the establishment will by some means or another remove that person from office. 

At the Texas Republican state convention in 2016 a secession resolution lost by only 16 to 14 with one abstention. There is support out there for secession.

If Trump is to be impeached it better be on grounds that are plain and clear and widely understood. Even then, it could really enable secessionists.

UPDATE:

There is a lot of discussion on how smart Trump is. I don't think it is particularly relevant. For those who think ridiculing Trump or dwelling on the extent of his intelligence is important they need to have a broader focus.

Trump has defeated first the Republican Party establishment, then the Democratic Party establishment in 2016. That doesn't mean that Trump is smart. It does mean that with whatever intelligence he has he figured out a way to defeat both establishments with very little resources.

I would use the word that Trump has cunning, but that word is often used when people who we would like to think aren't smart, out smart someone who we think are smart.

The issue is that Trump had a strategy, whether stumbled upon or cleverly devised, which worked well enough to get him elected against all odds.

We might consider that whatever he is doing is working for him. There are a lot of special elections that the Republican Party are losing where they should have been odds on favorites. However, Nov. 2018 is a ways away. How many people initially thought the 2016 Trump campaign was an amusing circus until it wasn't?

It could be that Trump is having a melt down and is crashing and crashing the Republican Party. It looks like he is. I just don't know. I don't think anyone really knows either. 

The 25th Amendment:

SECTION 1 

In case of the removal of the President from office or of his death or resignation, the Vice President shall become President. 

SECTION 2 

Whenever there is a vacancy in the office of the Vice President, the President shall nominate a Vice President who shall take office upon confirmation by a majority vote of both Houses of Congress. 

SECTION 3 

Whenever the President transmits to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives his written declaration that he is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, and until he transmits to them a written declaration to the contrary, such powers and duties shall be discharged by the Vice President as Acting President. 

SECTION 4 

Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President. 

Thereafter, when the President transmits to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives his written declaration that no inability exists, he shall resume the powers and duties of his office unless the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive department or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit within four days to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office. Thereupon Congress shall decide the issue, assembling within forty-eight hours for that purpose if not in session. If the Congress, within twenty-one days after receipt of the latter written declaration, or, if Congress is not in session, within twenty-one days after Congress is required to assemble, determines by two-thirds vote of both Houses that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall continue to discharge the same as Acting President; otherwise, the President shall resume the powers and duties of his office.

Courtesy of this page.

https://constitutioncenter.org/interactive-constitution/amendments/amendment-xxv?gclid=CjwKCAiAqIHTBRAVEiwA6TgJwwbZ2weBoR20K2-QOW8OG3amMjTnOfqPPrCCF27z8kyEqIZhO7kJ_hoC_gIQAvD_BwE