Interesting perspective on the rambling speeches, I hadn’t considered this before.

Lee Goodman:

“Maybe it’s the drugs.

The hours-long monologues at rallies, remarkable for someone his age. Maybe they are fueled by some substance that gives him energy, that make it impossible for him to stop talking until it wears off and he has to crash.

The incoherent stream-of-consciousness babble that makes one wonder if he knows or cares what he is saying. Jumping from topic to topic, abandoning logic and ignoring truth, shifting mid-sentence from present to past and back until no one knows if he is talking about what is going on now or something he saw in a movie as a child. Leaving us wondering if he could find his way home if someone wasn’t driving him.

The policy shifts, imposing and withdrawing orders with no apparent regard for the consequences of what he is doing. The inconsistencies from one day to another, from one moment to another, then laughing it off and poking fun at those around him. Calling people names, then saying what wonderful people they are, not pausing before firing someone for failing to show obeisance, not hesitating to hire people whom he excoriated the day before.

The insistence that he always be the center of attention, oblivious to the feelings of others. Euphoric when the cameras are on him, pouting when he has to listen to anyone else, shifting in his seat, restless to regain control of the situation. Storming out of rooms, then turning back to deliver an insult or a threat. Throwing tantrums as if he was a petulant toddler.

The frequent trips back to his walled private compound, where he can do things unobserved, unrecorded in government logs and diaries. Where he can perhaps obtain substances from people unknown and unreported. Where he can sleep off whatever has been coursing through him. Where he can spend hours recuperating in isolation, on a golf course, distant enough from the cameras and microphones, not having to answer questions or appear to be alert or mentally competent.

Maybe it’s the drugs, having taken their toll over so many years, causing irreversible damage, making him dependent, rendering him susceptible to manipulation without his even knowing it. Leaving him unconcerned that he has turned over his duties to people who are unelected, unaccountable.

Maybe he isn’t deliberately trying to help Russia dominate, to allow fanatics to eviscerate federal agencies, to enable people with anti-social agendas to reverse decades of progress on civil rights, to empower those who have too much power already. Maybe he just doesn’t care about anything other than getting his next fix so he can feel good. Maybe he’s just another addict, but one who happens to be in an exceptional situation.

Maybe his rhetoric about fentanyl is just a ruse, like a fundamentalist preacher railing about child abuse to conceal his own abusive behavior. Maybe his attacks on immigrants, on our longstanding European allies, on environmentalists, on whatever jumps into his addled mind at any particular moment, are nothing more than a distraction from his own deterioration.

Maybe the makeup and hair dye aren’t just vanity. Maybe they are a manifestation of an internal struggle to reconcile a disjointed, dysfunctional reality with a more pleasing chemically induced view of the world. Like an aging starlet spending hours in front of the mirror trying to recreate lost glamour.

Maybe it’s the drugs.”