Mental Health Expert David Plouffe: Trump Is A Psychopath

Oh, of course, I’m being facetious; Democratic operative David Plouffe isn’t a mental health expert. He even admitted that he doesn’t have a degree in psychology when he declared that Donald Trump was a psychopath on NBC’s Meet The Press. It was based on his views of the man, more specifically what he sees on television. Plouffe said that because he feels that Trump is a pathological liar, who lacks remorse, and has a “grandiose of self worth,” he’s a psychopath. Good on host Chuck Todd for pushing back on this outrageous claim. And I’m no Trump fan, but this was absolutely outrageous. The discussion about Trump’s mental health was spurred by Plouffe’s initial assessment that Clinton couldn’t do well in Colorado and Virginia, two states that the campaign has virtually ceased campaign operations since they feel they have it in the bag. It was a wholly unnecessary remark (via NBC News):

"I mean, basically, we have a psychopath running for president. I mean, he meets the clinical definition, okay," Plouffe told Chuck Todd on NBC's "Meet the Press" Sunday.

Plouffe backed up his diagnosis by listing off psychopathic symptoms that he said Trump has displayed: "The grandiose notion of self-worth, pathological lying, lack of empathy and remorse."

Still, Plouffe conceded: "I don't have a degree in psychology."

[…]

The race ends today; I think Hillary Clinton is guaranteed at least 269 electoral votes," Plouffe said. "I think it's likely going to be a landslide," he added later.

I would also add that Virginia has tended to surprise people. In 2014, incumbent Democratic Sen. Mark Warner looked like he was going to cruise to re-election. As we entered the fall, he was up in some polls by 20 points. The Real Clear Politics average had him ahead of Republican challenger Ed Gillespie by almost 10. In the end, he barely won re-election, with a margin of victory of 0.8 percent.

Yet, getting back to the Left’s fascination with Trump’s mental health. We’ve seen consistently Clinton and her minions hitting Trump for failing one of the basic litmus tests of a president: would we trust this person with nuclear weapons? Clinton says Trump can’t be trusted, though her husband apparently couldn’t be trusted either, losing the biscuit, the card carrying the access codes, for months towards the tail end of Bill’s presidency. Given her serial failure abroad, one could argue that Clinton shouldn’t be running a Girls Scout Cookie sale, let alone our foreign policy, but back to the health question. Larry O’Connor over at Hot Air put on his Media Research Center hat and noted something a bit odd—though not entirely surprising.

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It’s sexist to question Hillary Clinton’s health, but perfectly fine to suggest that Donald Trump is a psychopath. MSNBC’s Mika Brzezinski made similar references, saying that someone from the mental health facility should look into Trump’s mental state. Yeah, that’s weak sauce. If you want to discuss Trump’s health, you have to talk about Hillary’s, which has been dotted with photos of her using stools to get into cars, secret service agents assisting her up stairs, and the video that some on the right say shows the former first lady having a seizure.

Donald Trump has called on Clinton to release more of her health records; she’s refused to comply. So, now it’s a story that deserves at least some attention, without the progressive drivel that merely discussing Clinton’s health is sexist. The media and Clinton have opened themselves up to this glaring bias concerning the health of the two candidates. If you’re going to talk about one possibly blowing up the world, you need to dig into the weeds, which are admittedly a bit nutty, about Clinton possibly having problems with seizures. It’s the same game with different actors.

In 2008, how many stories did we read about John McCain dying in office, his cholesterol levels, and, yes, his mental capacity to be president? There were plenty. Slate even had a post about the deterioration of McCain’s mind after eight years. RedState’s Jay Caruso found these gems:

Both candidates are probably fine health wise. This isn’t a West Wing situation where someone is hiding a degenerative, though non-fatal, illness. Hillary has attacked the alt-right, one of Trump’s most die-hard supporters, in the hopes of tying this band of white nationalists to Trump and the Republican Party. In doing so, they’ve elevated the stature of this loony fringe. With the media, the attacks on Trump’s mental health, but aversion to an equal discussion about Hillary has allowed the other side to make their case about Clinton’s health, whose assessments are just as irresponsible as Plouffe going on national television and declaring Trump a psychopath based on what he sees on television. I’m not a Trump fan, but this explicit bias towards the health question is absurd. And if that means we’ve allowed the crazies to disseminate conspiracy theories, well, maybe that’s the blowback we get. It’s just another low point this cycle.