McCain's health

Age Matters
By Ruth Rosen - August 26, 2008, 3:28PM

I've never thought Sen. John McCain was mentally ill, not even after George W. Bush tried to discredit his intelligence and wit in 2000. But now I worry about the obvious deterioration of his health. Look back at clips from 2000 and you see a candidate who made the press swoon, so smitten were they with his sharp conversational skills, his quick wit, his charming accessibility.

Now I watch Sen. John McCain and I see the kind of change I witnessed in Ronald Reagan. As he entered his second term as President, I happened to be watching film clips of a younger and sharper Governor Ronald Reagan. The difference was staggering. Earlier, he had been a quick wit, fast on his feet, feisty as well as charming. By 1984, however, he seemed confused and distracted; I watched him with shock and saw an individual clearly slowed by the early signs of a terribly deteriorating disease.

I'm hardly alone in noticing the changes that have occurred in John McCain. People are whispering about his confusion, his slow delivery, his deterioration, but unlike the issue of Obama's race, it is not being openly discussed.

It is not a question of age. One eighty-three year-old woman took me aside last week, a woman who's as sharp and quick as she was when I first met her forty years ago, and asked me, "Why is no one talking about the fact McCain appears to be suffering from the early stages of some kind of dementia?"

I had noticed the changes as well. I don't know if he knew the differences between religious groups in Iraq in 2000, but when I look at old clips of Sen. John McCain during his 2000 run for the presidency, he seems like the kind of quick, witty, guy who knew how to finesse anything he didn't knew.

Consider, by contrast, his lame and confused response to the question of how many homes he owns. Clearly, the question is complicated, because this is a couple who owns property separately, jointly, and have several homes on individual plots of land. But a quick-witted John McCain in 2000 would have responded, "Look, we live in Arizona in our home; we vacation in two condos. The rest is investment property, some of which belongs to my wife and some of which we own jointly. Any other questions?"

It goes without saying that Obama's race is a potent factor in the 2008 presidential race. But I wonder if anyone will openly say what people are whispering about every day, namely, that Sen. John McCain genuinely seems confused, slower than eight years ago, and, in the opinion of more than a few senior citizens who recognize the signs, in the early states of some type of early dementia or Alzheimers.

McCain's failure to think and respond quickly should worry every American. We have experienced two terms of the worst presidency in American history. We have lost considerable moral credibility around the world, started two wars that cannot be won through military means, allowed unfettered regulation to undermine our economic strength and widen wealth inequality, and shredded many of our most cherished democratic civil rights and liberties.

I, for one, want a brilliant, progressive, president who is capable of reversing at least some of this damage. So aside from McCain's capitulation to the right-wing constituency of his party, every American should worry about his ability to govern. His various medical conditions, in fact, require so many drugs, it's a wonder he can function at all.

Think about it. To ask Hillary Clinton's infamous question, is he the person you'd like to answer the White House phone at 3am? And will anyone stop the whispering and finally say it loud and clear---that this is a man who is simply too impaired to be president? This is not about his age. This is about the reality of his health.

 

Excellent find. McCain's mental state is clearly the biggest problem here. But all the sociopaths on the right care about is getting a tax break, the USA be damned.

 

Most people don't hit dementia until in their mid 80's, the guy is 72 and putting in some long days... personally my observation is that older guys that work really hard stay younger than the louts.

Speaking of dementia, did you know that there is a large segment of the population that thinks the government is well equipped to manage their retirement and health care? And that other people should pay for it all? LOL

 

"A new analysis suggests that about 3.4 million Americans age 71 and older—one in seven people in that age group—have dementia, and 2.4 million of them have Alzheimer’s disease (AD). The study, supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), is the latest in a series of analyses attempting to assess the prevalence of dementia and AD, the most common form of dementia. Published online this week in Neuroepidemiology, the study is the first to estimate rates of dementia and AD using a nationally representative sample of older adults across the United States."

In related news:

"Faced with overwhelming evidence that he was wrong, McCain denied he’d ever said it: "Well, I’m not saying they could go without protection. The President goes around America with protection. So, certainly I didn’t say that."

Other people are paying for it now.

 

Boxers, football players, hockey players and others who have taken blows to the head have a tendency to develop dementia and other related problems at a much sooner rate than the norm.

McCain claims to have been beaten frequently as a POW, blows to the head would have been likely.

Consequently it is quite probable that the abuse he suffered, which made him a war hero, also has contributed to the obvious brain damage we now see...

 

Wednesday, July 23, 2008
Does John McCain Have Alzheimers?
10 warning signs of Alzheimer's:

1. Memory loss. Forgetting recently learned information is one of the most common early signs of dementia. A person begins to forget more often and is unable to recall the information later.

2. Difficulty performing familiar tasks. People with dementia often find it hard to plan or complete everyday tasks. Individuals may lose track of the steps involved in preparing a meal, placing a telephone call or playing a game.

3. Problems with language. People with Alzheimer’s disease often forget simple words or substitute unusual words, making their speech or writing hard to understand. They may be unable to find the toothbrush, for example, and instead ask for "that thing for my mouth.”

4. Disorientation to time and place. People with Alzheimer’s disease can become lost in their own neighborhood, forget where they are and how they got there, and not know how to get back home.

5. Poor or decreased judgment. Those with Alzheimer’s may dress inappropriately, wearing several layers on a warm day or little clothing in the cold. They may show poor judgment, like giving away large sums of money to telemarketers.

6. Problems with abstract thinking. Someone with Alzheimer’s disease may have unusual difficulty performing complex mental tasks, like forgetting what numbers are for and how they should be used.

7. Misplacing things. A person with Alzheimer’s disease may put things in unusual places: an iron in the freezer or a wristwatch in the sugar bowl.

8. Changes in mood or behavior. Someone with Alzheimer’s disease may show rapid mood swings – from calm to tears to anger – for no apparent reason.

9. Changes in personality. The personalities of people with dementia can change dramatically. They may become extremely confused, suspicious, fearful or dependent on a family member.

10. Loss of initiative. A person with Alzheimer’s disease may become very passive, sitting in front of the TV for hours, sleeping more than usual or not wanting to do usual activities.
(Warning signs courtesy of the Alzheimers Association)

I don't relish saying this out loud, but I'm coming to seriously question whether at the age of 71, John McCain is exhibiting the signs of early stage Alzheimer's disease. This just does not seem like the same man whom I admired so much in 2000. I remember a man who was not only passionate but also sharply logical, fast-witted and able to understand, remember and communicate complex ideas.

A few gaffes are only human. This many is most certainly not. Day after day we see new examples of John McCain forgetting or misunderstanding things. Major issues like whether Iran is a Sunni or Shiite state, what country Vladimir Putin is head of and the time line of very recent events in Iraq. Similarly, I don't believe that a man with as much integrity as John McCain could be deliberately making so many flip-flops as he has appeared to. Rather, I think he honestly has completely forgotten his past positions on myriad issues that he'd declared only days or months previously.

It's a damn shame that a man who seemed to have been made to be President should miss his chance in 2000 when he was fit and ready and then just when he is finally handed the nomination he is no longer capable of doing the job.

The Convention has not happened yet. He's still only the 'presumptive nominee.' I think that there is now a rough consensus among Republicans that John McCain is getting pummeled by Barack Obama and shows little odds of winning. It's not too late for him to bow out and be replaced on the ticket.

With his sudden cancellation of his only press availability event all week, one has to wonder what is going on behind the scenes in this regard. Barack Obama is out there looking like he's already President and McCain's response is to run away and hide? You can't win if you don't play, and John McCain has stopped playing. Why?

It's easy to say that my mere suggestion that McCain suffers from Alzheimers is unfair and constitutes some form of age discrimination. Yeah, I kinda feel the same way. But the cost of ignoring this could be huge. Let's not forget that Ronald Reagan's 'I forgets' and 'can't recalls' began while he was in office and apparently affected his ability to understand what his own administration was doing in terms of the Iran Contra affair. At the time, people wondered if he was all right and in fact they turned out to be absolutely correct to worry.

At the very least, I hope that Senator McCain will have himself screened for Alzheimers, including a brain scan and an MMSE.

 

Does McCain Have Early Stage Dementia?
His actions of late have forced me to wonder about this. I had a grandparent who did suffer from a form of non-Alzheimer's dementia that slowly progressed from mild to very very devastating.

The events over the last few weeks have led me to think that is a outside possibility. John McCain has developed a rather undeserved repetition as a political maverick. Some claim it is because he often ignored his party and did what he thought was right. This view doesn't really stand up to close review, his record this decade is far closer to one of party toady than maverick.

The other trait that McCain possessed that may have led him to develop this reputation is his habit of what might be called forceful truthfulness. He tended to call them as he saw them, a style seldom seen in DC. He was often blunt, truthful, and generally seen as being fairly sharp in his criticism.

He is still blunt, but his command of facts seems to have slipped. He repeatedly had to be corrected when he confused the Shiite, Sunni and Al Qaeda alignment. At a recent appearance it appears that he thought our troop levels in Iraq had already dropped below pre-surge levels, it isn't even close. The while making a brutally bad speech in Keener, he claimed he supported every investigation into the government's response to hurricane Katrina, when he had in-fact voted against about every post hurricane bill, including investigations.

McCain's lies and misstatements are so obvious it make you wonder how he could make them. Does he think no one will notice as he makes things up, does he not care about the truth, does he think such overt factual errors will be ignored, or could it simply be that his mind is slipping a little.

I saw this happen once, a small mis-recollection here, a fact that just could not be remembered there. I can not help but wonder could that be the case with McCain. I know, I know, he did allow a brief review of his medical history. But, at this point in my grandmothers decline, she had not yet been diagnosed, heck, only in hindsight did these early signs mean anything.

But when a man who claims expertise in Iraq can not keep the key players straight in his mind; When a man who aggressively pushed for more troops to be deployed forgets that they are still deployed; When a man claims to have supported bills he in fact voted against, you have to wonder. Is he stupid, a bad liar, or if the person is of a certain age, could his mind be slipping a little?

 

Strangest thing is that with all the tax breaks and having more money I can afford less.

 

In the spirit of age discrimination and lipstick on a pig gender discrimination: Here's an idea. Let's see if LoZZZER can post a few anti-McCain and Palin articles not written by LEFT LEANING JEWS.

The more hit pieces I read titled by folks named Rosen, Krugman, Goodman, Cohen and Phillips the more I'm POSITIVE that McCain and Palin aren't the same agents for Trotskyism and the wholesale debasement of ethics as Obama and the corrupt Biden.

Percentage of Americans who are Jewish: 2%

Percentage of Democrat U.S. Senators who are Jewish: 25%


Follow the money....

 

Your response is Ad hominem, of course. The republican way, of course...

Perhaps your own past prime dementia is why you can't actually address the points raised about McCain's health and corresponding behavior...which makes the possibility of dementia, early stages of Alzheimer's, etc. quite probable and should well be considered when deciding who is running the country.