Whether it's demented or not, we're all now at the mercy of Trump's big brain, by Hal M. Brown.

 

How the holy Hell does Hezbo-f*cken-llah being involved in Jan. 6th pop into Trump's brain when he's downplaying what happened on Jan. 6th? 

Here's is the excerpt about this from HuffPost:

Trump took questions from reporters near the end of the roughly hour-long remarks, during which he pledged to make “major pardons” for people convicted of participating in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.

Asked if he intends to pardon anyone convicted of violent offenses for their actions that day, Trump dodged — instead appearing to blame both the FBI and Hezbollah, an Iran-backed militant group in Lebanon, for the violence.

“We have to find out about Hezbollah, we have to find out about who, exactly, was in that whole thing,” Trump said. “Because people that did some bad things were not prosecuted.”

Hezbollah? Really? These guys?

Trump likes to brag about how intelligent he is. He characterizes this by saying he has a very, very big brain. Consider this from a science website:

Trump's "Very, Very Large Brain" Comment Underscores Myth About Intelligence

Intelligence has a lot more to do with what's inside your brain than its size.

BY SARAH SLOAT

SEP. 27, 2018

Excerpt:

President Donald Trump has repeatedly dedicated moments of his presidency to informing the public about his intelligence. A few weeks before he took office, Trump announced he didn’t need daily intelligence briefings because “I’m, like, a smart person.” In January, he reminded everyone on Twitter that his “two greatest assets have been mental stability and being, like, really smart.” Now, he’s telling reporters about his “very, very large brain.” But contrary to longstanding claims, a bigger brain doesn’t mean a smarter man.

Speaking at a press conference in New York on Wednesday, Trump referenced an interview that Michael Pillsbury, the Hudson Institutes director for Chinese strategy, gave to Fox News last month. Pillsbury said that China respects Trump because he is “so smart.”

“If you look at Mr. Pillsburgy, the leading authority on China, he was on a good show — I won’t mention the name of the show — recently,” Trump said. “And he was saying that China has total respect for Donald Trump and for Donald Trump’s very, very large brain.”

The article explains that the size of a brain has nothing to do with intelligence: "Assuming that absolute brain size is decisive for intelligence, then whales or elephants should be more intelligent than humans, and horses more intelligent than chimpanzees, which definitely is not the case.” 

Perhaps Trump really believes his brain is literally larger than 99.9% of the world's population and that this means his IQ ranks in the upper 1/10 of one percent. Of course this would put him off the top of the IQ test scales at the Einstein level.  

If brain size determined intelligence, Trump would be less intelligent than he was as a young man because brains shrink as people age:

"Your cerebral cortex, the wrinkled outer layer of the brain, gets thinner as you age. It's especially noticeable in the frontal lobe, which processes memory, emotions, impulse control, problem-solving, social interaction, and motor function. Thinning can also be noticeable in parts of the temporal lobe, which is located behind the ears and helps people understand words, speak, read, write, and connect words with their meanings." WebMD

The brain shrinking, or atrophy, that is inevitable when one ages does not affect intelligence. What does happen with some people when they age is that they develop one or another form of dementia. 

Human brains weigh between 2.8 to 3.1 pounds. Brain size can vary slightly among different populations and individuals. Gender also plays a role in brain size variations. On average, male brains are about 10% larger than female brains. However, this difference disappears when accounting for body size, and importantly, there’s no evidence that this size difference translates to any cognitive advantages. (Reference: Human Brain Size: Exploring Dimensions, Comparisons, and Evolutionary Significance)

There's no way of knowing if Trump has dementia at this point. There's no actual diagnostic test for it like an MRI which can find a brain tumor that is affecting behavior. A dementia diagnosis can only be made with a full neurological assessment. Whether you're an expert or a lay person you can only reach a conclusion based on your observations of Trump's behavior.

Without this we are left with looking at Trump's behavior to try to discern whether these recent examples of his throwing out abberant ideas are a manifestion of brain disease or of Trump's psychological condition. It may very well be the latter. Trump may be feeling that, since he has won the election, he can totally let loose and express any thought no matter how weird or unrealistic that pops into his mind. 

A personal note: When group of residents in the senior community where I live started an improv group, I didn't even consider joining even though I thought it would be fun. I think I have a modicum of talent for this. I knew I couldn't do improv without being able to go blue and unleash my inner Lenny Bruce.

Where did Hezbollah come from when he was trying to gaslight about Jan. 6th? You can say it doesn't matter. Maybe it doesn't. It could be that he'd been seeing stories about it on the news or reading about it since. It has been in the news:

We are still left with not knowing what is really going on in Trump's big brain. It could be that he's showing more signs of dementia. It could be that we're seeing the true Trump unleashed in all his unhinged glory.

If this is dementia one thing is certain: it will get worse. If this occurs there will be a point where it will be impossible to hide given Trump's lust to be in the limelight and his being a motor mouth. He won't have the advantage of being given questions in advance like he was 30 minutes before his Fox News Iowa Town Hall (see article). Besides, even being given a heads up about questions wouldn't make a difference since the results of an election won't be in the balance. He won't feel he has to come across as presidential.

There is no way anyone with severe dementia can present as cognitively unimpaired. If this happens we have the 25th Amendment scenario. I have no doubt that once it is obvious to the public, Vance would lose his loyalty to Trump in a New York minute.

 

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Do you know what the Streisand effect is? It has nothing to do with singing but is relevant to efforts to hide the truth. By Hal M. Brown

 

Click here to enlarge the original image of Barbra Streisand's cliff-top residence in Malibu which she attempted to suppress in 2003 to full size. 

I didn't know what The Streisand effect was until I read this on BlueSky:

Click above to enlarge.

Here's an explanation of what the Streisand effect is:

The Streisand effect is an unintended consequence of attempts to hide, remove, or censor information, where the effort instead increases public awareness of the information. 

The effect is named for American singer and actress Barbra Streisand, whose attorney attempted in 2003 to suppress the publication of a photograph showing her clifftop residence in Malibu, taken to document coastal erosion in California, inadvertently drawing far greater attention to the previously obscure photograph. The effect exemplifies psychological reactance, in which the attempt to hide information instead makes it more interesting to seek out and propagate.

Attempts to suppress information are often made through cease-and-desist letters, but instead of being suppressed, the information sometimes receives extensive publicity, as well as the creation of media such as videos and spoof songs, which can be mirrored on the Internet or distributed on file-sharing networks. In addition, seeking or obtaining an injunction to prohibit something from being published or to remove something that is already published can lead to increased publicity of the published work.

The Streisand effect is an example of psychological reactance, wherein once people are aware that some information is being kept from them, they are significantly more motivated to acquire and spread it.

Read numerous examples and the back story with Streisand on Wikipedia here.

In the past few days we have Trump making a last ditch effort to stop the release of Jack Smith's report. Trump’s lawyers said they reviewed a two-volume draft copy over the weekend. The question anyone following this should be asking is what is in the report that they don't want the public to know about.  There are no doubt many people who thought that the entire Jack Smith matter was done and dusted. Now Trump's efforts may pique their interest whether or not it is ever released.

Trump, through his lawyers, also tried unsuccesfully to stop the sentencing in the E. Jean Carroll trial.  This can have the same effect.

As long as we have the semblence of a free press everything Trump is going to do to try to censor the news will make the news. This doesn't only apply to Trump. It was reported today that Mark Zuckerberg is going to stop independent fact checking on Facebook and Instagram.This has already led to an accusation that he on of the oligarchs showing fealty to Trump. 

Last week Jeff Bezos wouldn't allow an Ann Telnais editorial cartoon showing him and other billionaires bring money to Trump. This led to a huge media and public reaction against a media mogul .

The danger with Trump is that he could succesfully hide information so nobody ever finds out that he's hiding it. This can only be done in a complete dictatorship where the press is totally controlled. The Streisand effect only works when the attempt to suppress information is done in secret. Fortunately you can't do this by filing lawsuits. It can be done in the intelligence community. The planning for the raid to kill bin Laden is an example.  Many military and national security operations illustrate this. The Manhattan Project and D-Day are other examples.

Trump will obviously try to make his administration leak-proof. He will always want to control the flow of information. If the past is prologue, Trump's administration will leak like a sieve.  If he tries to use the legal system to manipulate public opinion there is a good chance the effort will backfire.  

The more noise Trump makes about something being fake news the more likely it is to be fact-checked regardless, and often because of, efforts to stop fact-checking.  

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I post my blogs on Stressline.org where you can subscribe (for free everywhere) and on Substack where, if you want to submit your email, you can be notified of all new blog posts. I also post them on Medium because this enables them to be easily found on internet searches.

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Jan. 6th: The start of the second great experiment in American democracy is about to be certified. Something wicked this way comes. By Hal M. Brown

The United States is about to embark on its second great national experiment with Donald Trump being certified as the winner of the 2024 election as president. Very possibly this will mean Project 2025 will be initiated laying out the guiding principles of his administration. (Click above to enlarge)

There's nothing astonishingly original in my saying this. Critics of Trump and Trumpism have been saying this for over a year. To be candid, in writing today's blog I just wanted to have an excuse to use the illustration I put together. My fear that this experiment may represent the death knell for democracy is expressed in the illustration. 

You now doubt know that Benjamin Franklin, when asked whether the federal constitution of 1787 established a monarchy or a republic famously said  “ a republic, if you can keep it.” George Washington, in his first inaugural address, described the “republican model of government” as an “experiment entrusted to the hands of the American people.”

There should be no need to remind Americans that our democracy has been considered an experiment since the nation was founded. A good article about this is "Why Franklin, Washington and Lincoln considered American democracy an ‘experiment’ – and were unsure if it would survive" by Thomas Coens. 

The country has survived as a democracy, even through Trump's first admisntration. It has never had a president like a supercharged Donald Trump. There was never a playbook like Project 2025. Trump appears to be following this. We can judge this by his statments and his nominations. There is plan afoot to change the fundamental way our country is governed.  This made me think of the Ray Bradbury novel "Something Wicked This Way Comes."

Above, one  of the many covers of the book.

Here's a summary of the novel from Wikipedia:

Something Wicked This Way Comes is a 1962 dark fantasy novel by Ray Bradbury, and the second book in his Green Town Trilogy. It is about two 13-year-old best friends, Jim Nightshade and William Halloway, and their nightmarish experience with a traveling carnival that comes to their Midwestern home, Green Town, Illinois, on October 24. In dealing with the creepy figures of this carnival, the boys learn how to combat fear. The carnival's leader is the mysterious "Mr. Dark", who seemingly wields the power to grant the townspeople's secret desires. In reality, Dark is a malevolent being who, like the carnival, lives off the life force of those it enslaves. Mr. Dark's presence is countered by that of Will's father, Charles Halloway, the janitor of the town library, who harbors his own secret fear of growing older because he feels he is too old to be Will's dad.

The novel combines elements of fantasy and horror, analyzing the conflicting natures of good and evil that exist within all individuals. 

The title comes from the line  in Macbeth said by the three witches. Consider what the witches represent (also from Wikipedia): 

The Three Witches represent evil, darkness, chaos, and conflict, while their role is as agents and witnesses. They appear to have a warped sense of morality, deeming seemingly terrible acts to be moral, kind or right, such as helping one another to ruin the journey of a sailor. Their presence communicates treason and impending doom. During Shakespeare's day, witches were seen as worse than rebels, "the most notorious traitor and rebel that can be". They were not only political traitors, but spiritual traitors as well. Much of the confusion that springs from them comes from their ability to straddle the play's borders between reality and the supernatural. They are so deeply entrenched in both worlds that it is unclear whether they control fate, or whether they are merely its agents. They defy logic, not being subject to the rules of the real world

I shouldn't have to elaborate about why the witches and the Bradbury novel's plot reminds me of what kind of carnival Trump will bring to town.

We may remain a democracy through Trump's administration, although if he achieves half of what he has said he wants to accomplish we will be perilously close to becoming a dictatorship. 

We may end up having tanks on both our borders and deputized Trump vigilantes with AR-15s making sure only the purest of pure are allowed entry.

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I post my blogs on Stressline.org where you can subscribe (for free everywhere) and on Substack where, if you want to submit your email, you can be notified of all new blog posts. I also post them on Medium because this enables them to be easily found on internet searches.

The halbrown.org platform includes a Disquis comment section. To use it you have to register on Disquis.