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Sky DancingWednesday Reads: Will We Ever Return to Pre-Trump Normal?
Good Afternoon!!
I’ve been sitting in front of my computer for quite awhile now, trying to figure out what stories to focus on today. I guess to me the most important story right now is that we have a president who is not only evil, corrupt, and incompetent, but also appears to be insane. I got this from JJ this morning:
Trump is posting fresh blasphemies this morning
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) 2026-04-15T12:37:21.279Z
This man is such an embarrassment to our country. If only he would just disappear. Unfortunately, we have to keep dealing with him.
This is from Peter Baker at The New York Times (gift link): Trump’s Erratic Behavior and Extreme Comments Revive Mental Health Debate.
A series of disjointed, hard-to-follow and sometimes-profane statements capped by his “a whole civilization will die tonight” threat to wipe Iran off the map last week and his head-spinning attack on the “WEAK on Crime, and terrible for Foreign Policy” pope on Sunday night have left many with the impression of a deranged autocrat mad with power.
The White House rejected such assessments, saying that Mr. Trump is sharp and keeping his opponents on edge. But the president’s eruptions have raised questions about America’s leadership in a time of war. While the country has had presidents whose capacity came under question before, most recently the octogenarian Joseph R. Biden Jr. as he aged demonstrably before the public’s eyes, never in modern times has the stability of a president been so publicly and forensically debated — and with such profound consequences.
Democrats who have long challenged Mr. Trump’s psychological fitness have issued a fresh chorus of calls to invoke the 25th Amendment to remove the president from power for disability. But it is not just a concern voiced by partisans on the left, late-night comics or mental health professionals making long-distance diagnoses. It can be heard now among retired generals, diplomats and foreign officials. And most strikingly, it can be heard now on the political right among onetime allies of the president.
Former Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, the Georgia Republican who recently broke with Mr. Trump, advocated using the 25th Amendment, telling CNN that threatening to destroy Iran’s civilization was “not tough rhetoric, it’s insanity.” Candace Owens, the far-right podcaster, called him “a genocidal lunatic.” Alex Jones, the conspiracy theorist and founder of Infowars, said Mr. Trump “does babble and sounds like the brain’s not doing too hot.”
Some of the questions about Mr. Trump’s soundness come from people who once worked with him and have since become critics. Even before the civilization post, Ty Cobb, a White House lawyer in Mr. Trump’s first term, told the journalist Jim Acosta that the president is “a man who is clearly insane” and that his recent string of belligerent, middle-of-the-night social media posts “highlights the level of his insanity.” Stephanie Grisham, a former White House press secretary for Mr. Trump, wrote online last week that “he’s clearly not well.”
A bit more:
Mr. Trump fired back in a long, angry social media post that did not exactly radiate calm stability. “They have one thing in common, Low IQs,” he wrote of Ms. Owens, Mr. Jones, Megyn Kelly and Tucker Carlson. “They’re stupid people, they know it, their families know it, and everyone else knows it, too!” He threw the crazy charge back at them. “They’re NUT JOBS, TROUBLEMAKERS, and will say anything necessary for some ‘free’ and cheap publicity.”
A Reuters/Ipsos poll in February found that 61 percent of Americans think Mr. Trump has become more erratic with age and just 45 percent say he is “mentally sharp and able to deal with challenges,” down from 54 percent in 2023. Roughly half of Americans, 49 percent, deemed Mr. Trump too old to be president when asked in a YouGov poll in September, up from 34 percent in February 2024, while just 39 percent said he was not too old.
Democrats have pressed the point in recent days. Mr. Trump is “an extremely sick person” (Senator Chuck Schumer of New York), “unhinged” and “out of control” (Representative Hakeem Jeffries of New York) or, more bluntly, “batshit crazy” (Representative Ted Lieu of California). Representative Jamie Raskin of Maryland, wrote the White House physician requesting an evaluation, noting “signs consistent with dementia and cognitive decline” and “increasingly incoherent, volatile, profane, deranged, and threatening” tantrums.
You can use the gift link to read the rest.
The Hill on Ty Cobb’s thoughts on Trump’s behavior: Ty Cobb: Late-night Trump posts prove he’s ‘gone.’
Former White House attorney Ty Cobb suggested on Tuesday that President Trump’s rhetoric and late-night musings on social media about the ongoing conflict with Iran are demonstrating his cognitive decline.
Ty Cobb
“It’s not a surprise that we’re in this much trouble,” Cobb told independent journalist Jim Acosta during an appearance on the former CNN anchor’s streaming show. “It’s not a surprise given the fact that the Cabinet will not invoke the 25th amendment for a man who is clearly insane, and this war highlights that.”
Cobb ripped Trump’s nightly “screeds,” which he said the president uses to vent “without oversight” about a range of political issues, including the war.
“You think he’s just gone?” Acosta asked.
“I think he’s gone,” Cobb replied….
Questions surrounding Trump’s mental fitness have risen in recent months, spurred by his tendency to embark on rambling tangents and instances where he appeared to doze off or close his eyes during events and meetings.
A Reuters/Ipsos poll released last month found that roughly six in 10 Americans believe Trump is becoming more erratic with age. Trump will turn 80 years old in June.
At the New York Times, Jamelle Bouie doesn’t quite question Trump’s sanity, but describes a man who is lost, confused and out of control (gift link): This Is Not a Man in Control of Himself.
To have spent any amount of time observing President Trump over the last month is to conclude that he is in far over his head.
The president is struggling with the consequences of his actions, raging in protest of the fact that for all its firepower, the United States cannot bomb Iran into submission. When Trump launched his “short-term excursion,” he assumed that it would be — in the words of a Pentagon official in the last Republican administration to launch a Middle East war — a “cakewalk.”
Trump sleeps at Cabinet meeting.
That, as Trump’s own intelligence agencies told him, was a mistake. Now, he is stuck. And he lacks the skill and patience to find a way out of his self-inflicted catastrophe. Unable to will a better outcome into existence — there are limits to the power of positive thinking — and frustrated by his own impotence, his response, familiar to anyone who must manage the emotions of a young child, is to throw a tantrum.
Over the last few days, Trump has denounced “the Fake News Media” as “CRAZY, or just plain CORRUPT!” for its reporting on the war. He attacked Pope Leo XIV in a bizarre rant, calling him “WEAK on Crime” and “terrible for Foreign Policy.” And he posted an A.I. image of himself as Jesus, surrounded by devotees, healing an unnamed man.
This is not a man in control of himself, or a president in control of the situation around him.
I’ve written before about the irony of a strongman president so uninterested in governing that he has handed his power over to a handful of deputies. Trump’s behavior as he faces failure in Iran underscores another such irony.
Months before Trump won his second term, and well before he took office, the Supreme Court handed him the reins of the unitary executive — the promise of an active, energetic administration free of what the court deemed unnecessary constraints. The president hasused this power to run wild, trampling over constitutional government. But he has also, at the same time, shown himself to be the weakest and most ineffectual president of recent memory, less a man of commanding authority than, well, a buffoon.
This is not to say that Trump has been an inconsequential president, that he hasn’t presided over the wholesale destruction of large parts of the federal government, or that he hasn’t turned the sharp edge of the state against the most vulnerable people in the country.
Use the gift link to read more specifics, if you’re interested.
I guess Trump’s War with Iran is the next most important issue. Here’s the latest.
The Washington Post: U.S. sends thousands more troops to Mideast as Trump seeks to squeeze Iran.
The Pentagon is sending thousands of additional troops into the Middle East in the coming days, as the Trump administration attempts to pressure Iran into a deal that could end the weeks-long conflict there while considering the possibility of additional strikes or ground operations if a fragile ceasefire does not hold, U.S. officials said.
The forces moving into the region include about 6,000 troops aboard the aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush and several warships escorting it, said current and former officials, who like some others spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss military movements. About 4,200 others with the Boxer Amphibious Ready Group and its embarked Marine Corps task force, the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit, are expected to arrive near the end of the month.
The infusion of firepower appears likely to coalesce with warships already in the Middle East just as the two-week ceasefire is set to expire April 22. The troops will join the estimated 50,000 personnel that the Pentagon has said are involved in operations countering Iran.
President Donald Trump, in a bid to squeeze Tehran economically, on Sunday announced a blockade of maritime traffic leaving and arriving at Iranian ports. He is attempting to press the Iranian regime into reopening the Strait of Hormuz, a vital passage for the shipment of Middle Eastern oil transiting the Persian Gulf, and end its nuclear program in negotiations led by Vice President JD Vance. Talks faltered over the weekend, but the presidentsaid that they could resume later this week.
On Wednesday, Trump told Fox Business that he thought the war in Iran could be over “very soon” and he expected gas prices to fall to prewar levels by the midterms “on the assumption” that the United States is able to stop Iran obtaining a nuclear weapon. “When that’s settled, gas prices are going to go down tremendously,” he said.
I’d say that is highly unlikely–another example of Trump’s delusional thinking. More from the WaPo:
Iran escalated threats to choke off international trade, with military commander Maj. Gen. Ali Abdollahi saying Iran would block imports and exports from the Persian Gulf, Gulf of Oman and Red Sea in response to the U.S. blockade. “Iran will take powerful action to defend its national sovereignty and interests,” he said in comments reported by Iran’s semiofficial Tasnim news agency.
The arrival of additional American warships will put even greater pressure on Iran and provide Adm. Brad Cooper, head of U.S. Central Command, and other senior military leaders with more options should negotiations fail, said James Foggo, a retired Navy admiral and dean at the Center for Maritime Strategy in Northern Virginia….
The USS George H.W. Bush pulls away from Naval Station Norfolk in Virginia last month. (Kendall WarnerThe Virginian-PilotAP)
The arrival of the additional forces will provide commanders with three aircraft carriers in the region, each with dozens of fighter jets. The USS Abraham Lincoln has been in the Middle East since January, while the USS Gerald R. Ford arrived in the eastern Mediterranean Sea in February, extending a marathon deployment that included time last year in Europe and involvement in operations off Venezuela at the beginning of this year.
The USS George H.W. Bush was close to the Cape of Good Hope, near South Africa, on Tuesday and expected to make an unusual hook around the bottom of the continent on its way to the Middle East, two officials familiar with the matter said. The path to the region was first reported by USNI News.
The three-ship Boxer Amphibious Ready Group last week departed from Hawaii and is now a couple of weeks from the Middle East, officials said. The embarked 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit includes an infantry battalion of more than 800 personnel, plus helicopters and naval landing craft. A similar unit, the 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit, arrived in the Middle East from Okinawa, Japan, late in March.
JD Vance, a recent convert to Catholicism has been busy lecturing Pope Leo XIV.
Anton Troianovski at The New York Times: Vance Says the Pope Should Be More Careful When Talking About Theology.
Vice President JD Vance invoked World War II on Tuesday to defend the U.S. bombing of Iran from criticism by Pope Leo XIV, extending the Trump administration’s spat with the Catholic Church and underlining the White House’s struggle to justify an unpopular war.
Mr. Vance, who is Catholic, told a conservative audience at the University of Georgia that the pope was wrong to say that disciples of Christ are “never on the side of those who once wielded the sword and today drop bombs.”
“Was God on the side of the Americans who liberated France from the Nazis?” Mr. Vance said after referring to the pope’s comment. “I certainly think the answer is yes.”
That seems like a flawed conclusion. Just because the “good guys” won, that means that God helped them to victory?
President Trump has appeared stung by Leo’s condemnation of the war, criticism that has highlighted the challenge the administration faces from the coalition of conservative and religious voters who helped elect Mr. Trump in 2024. The president lashed out at the pope on Sunday in a social media post that called the first American-born pontiff “weak on crime” and “terrible for foreign policy.”
Pope Leo in Algeria
Leo has stuck to his antiwar stance, telling reporters Monday that he had “no fear of the Trump administration.” Without mentioning Iran or Mr. Trump, the pope posted on social media on Tuesday that “God’s heart is torn apart by wars, violence, injustice and lies.”
The back-and-forth has presented a particular quandary for Mr. Vance, a convert to Catholicism who is publishing a book about his path to the faith and who has long courted the Republican religious base. Asked about the debate between Mr. Trump and the pope at an Athens, Ga., event hosted by the conservative group Turning Point USA, Mr. Vance admonished Leo, saying that if he was “going to opine on matters of theology,” his comments needed to be “anchored in the truth.”
“In the same way that it’s important for the vice president of the United States to be careful when I talk about matters of public policy, I think it’s very, very important for the pope to be careful when he talks about matters of theology,” Mr. Vance said.
Okay, JD. I’m sure you know more about “matters of theology” than the Pope.
It seems that some Trump supporters disagree with Vance. AP: As Vance rallies with Turning Point, some supporters bristle at Trump’s war, memes and feuds.
ATHENS, Georgia (AP) — Fresh from a marathon trip to Pakistan that failed to reach a deal for ending the war with Iran, Vice President JD Vance jetted to this Georgia college town for a campus tour organized by the conservative powerhouse Turning Point USA.
But instead of showcasing the youthful energy that the organization harnessed to return President Donald Trump to the White House less than two years ago, there was a mostly empty arena, awkward questions and unusually sharp criticism.
JD Vance at Turning Point event in Athens, Georgia
The event affirmed Trump’s difficulty selling the war and how much he’s complicated his own political fortunes by assailing Pope Leo XIV and posting a social media meme that depicted himself as Jesus.
“I did vote for Trump. I am not a Trump supporter anymore,” said Joseph Bercher, a Catholic who said he was glad that Leo has expressed opposition to the war with Iran.
Bercher said the Jesus meme, which the president took down Monday after a rare conservative backlash, was a “red flag” indicating Trump’s true character.
“He sees himself as like a demagogue or someone to be worshipped,” Bercher said….
Many of the college-age attendees donned Turning Point attire, Trump hats and red-white-and-blue paraphernalia for the event. Yet they were outnumbered more than 2-to-1 by empty seats in what is not even the largest arena on this sprawling campus that sits about a 90-minute drive from downtown Atlanta.
A Marine veteran who served in Iraq, Vance acknowledged that not all young conservatives are enamored with another U.S. war in the Middle East.
Both Democrat Eric Swalwell and Republican Tony Gonzales have resigned from the House of Representatives.
NBC News: Reps. Eric Swalwell and Tony Gonzales officially resign amid misconduct claims.
Both Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., and Rep. Tony Gonzales, R-Texas, resigned from Congress in disgrace Tuesday, pre-empting a push by their House colleagues to expel them from office.
Both lawmakers were facing unrelated House Ethics investigations into alleged sexual misconduct, in some cases with women who had worked for them, a violation of House rules. Their resignations mean that those investigations effectively come to an end, since the Ethics Committee only has jurisdiction over sitting members of Congress.
Investigations by law enforcement agencies can continue; and the Manhattan district attorney’s office has said it has launched a probe into Swalwell focused on an alleged assault that took place in New York.
On Tuesday, another woman alleged that Swalwell drugged, raped and choked her in a California hotel room in 2018. Her lawyers said she was going to report the incident to law enforcement later in the day….
Gonzales, first elected to Congress in 2020, had been dogged by rumors and allegations of sexual misconduct since last September, when one of his staffers, Regina Santos-Aviles, died by suicide.
Text messages obtained by NBC News and confirmed by the woman’s husband show that Gonzales had sent Santos-Aviles sexually explicit messages in May 2024. And Gonzales later admitted he had an affair with her while she was his subordinate.
A second woman who had worked for Gonzales told NBC News that he had also sent her sexually explicit text messages, including repeatedly asking for sex and nude photos. A spokesperson did not respond to that allegation. Gonzales said in March he would not seek re-election, but after the Swalwell scandal, Gonzales said he would quit Congress early, heading off an expulsion vote.
Liz Goodwin at The Washington Post (gift article): How Eric Swalwell rose to the top of Democratic politics as rumors followed him.
When Cheyenne Hunt first arrived on Capitol Hill as a staffer in 2020, several other young women working there warned her privately: Stay away from Rep. Eric Swalwell.
Swalwell could be “creepy,” Hunt said other women told her, especially over social media.
Lonna Drewes (left) speaks during a press conference alleging California congressman Eric Swalwell (right) raped her. Getty Images, California Environmental Voters
Six years later, Hunt is one of several women who have leveraged their large followings online to go after Swalwell, enlisting women to come forward with their stories and connecting them with reporters at CNN and other outlets. Late last week, allegations that include sexual assault of a former staffer and sending unsolicited explicit messages to young women came to light in investigations published by CNN and the San Francisco Chronicle. On Tuesday, a woman accused Swalwell of raping her in 2018.
In recent days, Swalwell (D) exited the California governor’s race and resigned from Congress. He apologized for some “mistakes in judgment” he made while in office in a statement on Monday. The Washington Post has not independently verified the allegations, and Azari and Swalwell’s Capitol Hill staff did not respond to a detailed list of questions for this article.
The stunning fall has Hunt and others asking how someone who was dogged by persistent rumors of inappropriate behavior toward women similar to what she heard in 2020 could have risen so high and so fast in a party that says it supports women’s rights.
“We do need to take a look inward as a party because it was an open secret,” said Hunt, the executive director of the youth group Gen Z for Change, referring to the Democratic Party. “Not necessarily that he was assaulting people but that he was a creep. That was well known.” [….]
Rumors that Swalwell, 45, had affairs in Washington followed him, but there is no evidence that the more serious allegations of sexual assault were circulating among Democrats while his career took off, these people said. This week, Democratic politicians who were close allies of Swalwell including Rep. Nancy Pelosi, the former House speaker from California, and Sen. Ruben Gallego, from neighboring Arizona, have said they knew nothing about allegations against Swalwell. Gallego told reporters on Monday he believed Swalwell led a “double life.”
You can use the gift link to read the rest.
Gabby Birenbaum at The Texas Tribune: Rep. Tony Gonzales resigns from Congress amid backlash over sexual misconduct allegations.
Rep. Tony Gonzales, R-San Antonio, submitted his resignation Tuesday from the U.S. House, ending a five-year congressional career months after he revealed he had an affair with an aide who later died by suicide.
Tony Gonzales
“There is a season for everything and God has a plan for us all,” Gonzales said in a statement Monday evening previewing his intention to leave office. “When Congress returns tomorrow, I will file my retirement from office. It has been my privilege to serve the great people of Texas.” [….]
Gonzales, a Navy veteran first elected in 2020, admitted to having an affair with a staffer in early March, weeks after the San Antonio Express-News reported on the extramarital tryst, including text messages in which the staffer pushed back against Gonzales’ requests for nude photos….
The House Ethics Committee had opened an investigation into the San Antonio congressman to determine whether he “engaged in sexual misconduct towards an individual employed in his office” and “discriminated unfairly by dispensing special favors or privileges.” [….]
A former Gonzales campaign staffer came forward last week saying Gonzales had been sexually inappropriate with her as well, including sharing text messages in which the then-candidate had asked her for nude photos and for sex.
Good Riddance to both of them.
Those are the stories that interested me today. What’s on your mind?
#DonaldTrump #EricSwalwell #JDVance #LonnaDrewes #PopeLeo #TonyGonzales #TrumpSInsanity #TurningPointUSA #TyCobb #USSGeorgeHWBush #warInIran
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