By Sinai
Community
Daily Kos
Sunday, Feb. 18, 2024
(I know I’m late to the party, but forgive me — this took a few days to right intelligibly, and I like beating dead horses)
About one year ago exactly I contracted Covid-19 while at work. I have been vaxxed and boosted 5 times, yet barely 2 months into starting my job as an Assistant State's Attorney I got one of the variants of Covid-19, and I have since then been suffering with Long Covid.
I've been seen more physicians and therapists than I can remember, and I have undergone more tests to assess my condition than I knew existed. One test I underwent was cognitive examination to assess my mental acuity following my infection with Covid-19.
The examination I did was in fact quite similar to what Trump underwent a few years ago (the one he said he aced). I had to pick out animals that did not belong with groups of other animals, pick shapes that did not match other shapes, colors different from other colors, and etc. They also had me do exams to test my brain's capacity for memory, namely the 5 word recollection test (again, the kind of test Trump claimed he "aced").
I know now, thanks to my mother who was present with me at the time, that the 5 words I was to remember were "Face, Velvet, Church, Daisy, and Red." At the time, after only a few seconds, I could only recall the words "Face" and "Velvet." The prognosis at the time was that I had "mild cognitive dysfunction."
Some context is important to draw attention to however, as my neurologist stressed, because the exam I went through was designed for an examinee of "average" intelligence and mental capacity - which meant someone who had an IQ of about 95-100 and only possessed a high school education. My neurologist explained that as someone who had finished college a year early, was the youngest graduate of his law school's class, and a very young Assistant State Attorney the results would be somewhat misleading.
Based upon the exam I took, I was suffering mild cognitive dysfunction... "for a person who normally has an IQ of 95-100 with a high school education." Taken in the context that I was expected to have higher cognitive function than a high school graduate with a 95-100 IQ it is clearer to see that I was not in fact suffering from actually "mild" cognitive dysfunction. Rather, I was suffering from significant cognitive dysfunction having fallen from high-functioning to the lower/borderline deficient end of cognitive function.
That being said, what does this have to do with Biden, Trump, and the stupidity of this whole question on cognition of two starkly different men?
I know firsthand what cognitive dysfunction and having a poor memory looks like. The way Long Covid has attacked my brain and cognitive function is that it has massively inhibited my capacity to handle stressors. Any sort of stress that is placed upon me is magnified multiple times over and blown out of proportion by my mind, so much so that my brain effectively shuts down (at worst nearly like being placed into a mini-coma where nothing is going in, coming out, or going on).
This has the effect of sabotaging my short term memory whenever I am under any kind duress. If I am troubled, I will forget what I am talking about, I will ramble, I will get names switched up, I will forget what I am talking about, and I will start going into circles that gradually get less and less coherent. Once I calm down and work myself out of an episode, I have no recollection of what happened during the "attack" I just had. This seems to be one thing I and Mitch McConnell have in common (if you know about him staring off into space during a press conference).
To illustrate, I have no direct memory of taking any of the examinations I was explaining in the first two paragraphs of this piece. What I described comes from my neurologist's doctor's notes and my mother's explanations of what went on. I was stressed and scared while doing the exams - I recall nothing of them. My mind literally blotted them out of existence.
I was clear minded when reading the doctor's notes and listening to my mother - I remember every detail discussed. My mind is capable of working on all cylinders, but not consistently - not even most of the time. I can talk to you about the most complicated concepts - I can function. Will I remember doing so? Or will I understand those same concepts when you recite them back to me later? Who knows. No one can say at any particular given time, least of all I. THAT is the cognitive dysfunction.
So, when I take my own personal experience with cognitive dysfunction (poor memory) and look at Joe Biden, I am left dumbfounded by every god-damned person who thinks they're an expert on Biden's mind - that Biden is too old - that Biden has a poor memory.
Horsecrap.
Being cognitively dysfunctional and having a clinically "poor memory" involves, if you will, being consistently inconsistent. Cognitive dysfunction is not something that you can control. It is not something that you can tuck away into a pocket and hide from the public, and stress accentuates the presence of cognitive dysfunction.
If Biden actually had cognitive dysfunction, we would see him on live television, forgetting what the hell he is talking about every single time we saw him. You would not have gaffes - you would have complete breakdowns in logic and sequence. Indeed I know this because I just wrote the previous sentence 3 times in a row before I realized I wrote it once.
Being on television is stressful. Being the president is stressful (just look at compilations of pictures of presidents before and after being in office - aging disproportionately quickly). Being berated by howler monkey press correspondents in a crowing mob is stressful. These are things that will, at a minimum, trigger tells that someone has cognitive dysfunction.
Like I have personally experienced, Biden would start to literally not make coherent sense. He would freeze as his brain becomes overloaded and ceases to function - leading to either rambling babbling, or silence.
Did we observe that during Biden's response to Hur's brief? No. We witnessed a man filled with barely contained rage clearly and effectively communicate his frustrations with the stupidity he was being dealt.
Granted, Biden did make a gaffe. Biden, with a slip of the tongue, mixed up two countries that he'd been dealing with all week, involving border crises, refugee influx, and Republican obstructionism. Big whoop. People seem to want to leave out those details.
People also seem to like to leave out the detail that Biden remembered the Egyptian President's name (and after googling it, Biden apparently pronounced the name correctly). I don't even know what that guy's name is.
Contrast this to Trump's behaviors of late. Trump mistook E. Jean Carroll for his ex-wife. Trump had to be reminded that he was in Sioux City, Iowa, during his rally in Sioux City, Iowa. Trump bragged about acing a cognitive test, and his description of the test bore no resemblance whatsoever to the test he took.
Trump still believes he is running for presidency against Obama and in fact beat Obama in 2016 and 2020. Trump repetitively mixed up Nikki Haley with Nancy Pelosi in another of his rallies. And in another rally, Trump went on a long tirade about how he beat Jeb Bush and how it was so stupid that Jeb Bush got us into the Middle East.
Mixing up people repetitively, forgetting where he is, forgetting what the hell he is talking about, and forgetting that he has been making these errors repetitively and uncontrollably. Hmm. Boy does that sound familiar to me.
So, to anyone who is worried that Biden has any cognitive issues - STOP. Take it from someone who does have cognitive issues, the President is fine.
Screw that, Biden is better than fine. Biden is better than many young who are in their prime . I know it because I worked with many of them. Can you really say to me, with a straight face, that Biden is less cognitively functional than Peter Doocy (the guy that even his coworkers agreed was "a dumb sonofabitch")?
Can you really say to me that Biden is less cognitively functional than Donald Trump? I think not. And to anybody who, even after everything that has been accomplished, still thinks Biden as a matter of fact is too old or dottled can eat a bag of rocks. You are medically, factually, and historically wrong.
If you yet still persist to believe Biden is dysfunctional when he accomplished all of this within 1 year of holding office: https://whatbidenhasdone.wordpress.com/2022/01/20/year-one-what-biden-has-done-mega-thread/, then you are beyond helping. All reason and rationality has left you.
This whole thing makes me recall a story from the American Civil War. The public and Union commanders beseeched Abraham Lincoln not to give command of the Union Army to General Grant because he was "...a drunkard... he is not himself half the time; he cannot be relied upon." Lincoln retorted, "Well... what brand of whiskey [does] Grant drink, because I want to send a barrel of it to each one of my generals."
Biden is too old and dottled? Then I should like all Americans and politicians to grow up and take in some of the years of Biden's experience and wisdom, then we should not need someone so old to guide us around like lost children having a temper tantrum.
No comments:
Post a Comment