Fraught politics of mental health have clearly not gone away. Congress could try to avoid them in the short term by quickly codifying the presidential psychiatrist position before Trump is sworn in on January in the long time, this type of a move could actually Accordingly the Atlantic dedicated a cover story to the mind of Donald Trump. Now look, the media has enabled this kind of armchair psychology of the president elect. Of course, the Washington Post’s Bob Woodward has ld multiple audiences that a notable psychiatrist says Trump appears to be the most classic example of narcissistic personality disorder I’ve ever seen. Enough psychiatrists were quoted in various publications that the American Psychiatric Association issued a statement calling such psychoanalysis of candidates unethical and irresponsible.
Then the point is that none of the people saying so actually knows, trump could very well suffer from some kind of mental illness.
The group cited what’s known as The Goldwater Rule, that prohibits psychiatrists from offering opinions on someone they have not personally evaluated.
When 1189 psychiatrists controversially declared Republican nominee Barry Goldwater mentally unfit to be president, the rule is a legacy of the 1964 campaign. Fragile mortality of the presidency was on display as at no other time in American history, and in 1928, Congress codified a completely new White House position. In 1919, President Woodrow Wilson suffered a devastating stroke that left him partially paralyzed, semiblind and so fragile that his wife and doctor hid him from the public.
In 1923, Wilson’s successor, Warren Harding, died suddenly in office from what was later determined to be congestive heart failure. Doctor would always be on hand if the president were physically ill. These reports do not contain psychiatric information, Today, the presidential physician periodically releases a summary of the president’s checkups. Nor has any presidential physician ever been a trained psychiatrist. Yes, that’s right! Despite the mercurial behavior and ‘pillpopping’, look, there’s nobody employed to keep tabs on the president’s mental health. With all that said… Those presidents who are known to have received psychiatric medication had to arrange for it in secret, most often from doctors without backgrounds in mental health. Michael Dukakis got tagged with the psychiatric stink without even seeing a psychiatrist. By the way, the political media went wild, and Dukakis’ large lead in the polls began to shrink. President Nixon, meanwhile, kept his psychiatric medication secret by getting a Valium prescription from his and Henry Kissinger’s osteopath, as reported by Evan Thomas in his book Being Nixon.
President Ronald Reagan answered a question on the pic by quipping, I’m not planning to pick on an invalid, as George Bush’s campaign was attempting to gin up rumors about Dukakis’ mental health.
Mental health problems been destigmatized in American culture over the past few decades, yet mental health remains fair game in the political arena as some ‘presidential level’ politicians have learned the hard way.
Eagleton eventually withdrew from the ticket, and McGovern’s judgment was called into question. With that said, in 1972, reports arose that Democratic nominee George McGovern’s running mate, Thomas Eagleton, had undergone shock therapy. Then again, left untouched in 1928, however, was the president’s mental health. Nearly a century later and after a revolution in the science of psychiatry we now know that anyone, even presidents, can suffer from a mental illness. Usually, the most stressful and consequential offices in human history ought to have easy access to top-notch medical care available, including whenever it boils down to mental health. So newly sworn in Congress now has a chance to strengthen the health of all future presidents by appointing a psychiatrist from the military to work alongside the presidential physician.
After all.
The introduction of a presidential psychiatrist will surely carry political risks.
Do you know an answer to a following question. Would the president’s judgment be trusted if people knew of psychiatric sessions? Fact, what should happen if the president’s medical files were leaked and the public found out the commander in chief was on antidepressants? At least two presidents John Kennedy and Richard Nixon surreptitiously ok daily psychiatric medications like Valium and identical anxiety treatments while occupying the Oval Office, as I have written before. You see, so that’s not about assuaging the fears or stoking the jeers of those who have called Donald Trump a psychopath or a narcissist.
Another Lyndon Johnson was so emotionally erratic that his p aides consulted psychiatrists and confronted the first lady about his behavior.
Abraham Lincoln experienced such deep bouts of depression during his lifetime that he was confined to bed and contemplated suicide.
Did you know that the assumption that presidents have robust mental health was wrong long before the 45th president came along. While being elected to the most powerful and demanding positions on earth often brings out old gremlins to gnaw on a presidential psyche, far from alleviating any nagging psychoses. Essentially, talking to a psychiatrist any once in a while is like preventative medicine to keep such subconscious demons at bay. Known mental illnesses are caused by both environment and genetics, and history makes clear that the Oval Office can be a psychologically unhealthy place.
Appointing a presidential psychiatrist would also be a fitting addition to an unprecedented decade of bipartisan mental health policy reform in Congress.
Just last month, Congress incorporated Republican Representative Tim Murphy’s Helping Families in Mental Health Cr Act, that overhauled the federal bureaucracy that deals with mental health, into the 21st Century Cures Act.
Others felt that the president should pay for his own doctor rather than charge the taxpayers, Back in 1928, should automatically be given the rank, pay and allowance of a colonel. Today, the presidential physician’s salary is less than $ 200000 annually, out of the federal government’s $ 9 trillion budget a reasonable sum for maintaining the health of the leader of the free world. Now look, a majority ultimately decided that the position must no longer be optional. In 2008, Congress passed Democratic Representative Patrick Kennedy’s mental health parity law, that required hospital insurance companies to cover mental and physical illness equally.